frankj1 wrote:Mazel Tov Theodore
looks like someone came up with a target market list that will probably never shrink...should I assume government contracts?
can ya get me a prison bed...wholesale?
Probably the easiest way to get a prison bed is to commit a felony. You could probably get one tonight if your eager enough.
They do have fed and state contracts for various institutions. Another big fish is contracts with universities. They were working on a big delivery for UMass Amherst dorms when I toured the place the last couple visits. College students don't really pamper their dorm room furniture or furniture in common areas so there's a steady stream of sales on that front.
The facility in Fitchburg, MA does most of the plastic and wood stuff. For the plastic products they use rotational molding
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iennlN-wIz4&t=51sThe place they acquired in North Carolina does all the upholstery stuff.
They also sell those plastic deck chairs (like this
https://shorturl.at/dgACD) as a steady high volume, low cost revenue stream. However, they don't have the capacity to make them in Fitchburg so it's farmed out to a third party somewhere in CA.
Believe it or not, these deck chairs chairs have to go through some tests and need to meet some government standards before they can be sold. Load a dead weight on the chair for X number of days to ensure it won't collapse. They also have some tipping tests they need to do. Place the chair on a smooth surface (they use a large hunk of glass), put a dead weight weight on it and tip the chair backwards in increments to see when the legs collapse or slip out from under the weight.
One of the recent problems they ran into: one of their product lines for the wooden products (desks, book shelves, dressers, etc.) used Russian/Baltic Birch wood as a wood selection. With the war in Ukraine and sanctions against Russia, that source closed down and they have to find a replacement.
