by GOSHEN, Indiana — Fusion Designs, a leader in solid wood, domestically produced case goods, is dropping upcharges on painted finishes and tabletop designs because it has found ways to improve production efficiency to the point where they were no longer necessary.
“As raw material stain prices have continued to increase throughout the past few years, stains and paints are now virtually interchangeable in price,” said Marcus Bontrager, president. “It only makes sense that we no longer continue to charge more for painted finishes, and we are excited to do so, since eliminating upcharges makes it easier for retail salespeople to sell our products with confidence.”
Previously, Fusion Designs added a 15-percent upcharge for any of four popular painted finishes. “We’re looking forward to expanding our range of colors further now, and already plan on adding a new Emerald Green painted finish at the High Point Market this fall. There will not be any upcharges on any of these finishes going forward,” the executive said.
In other moves, where Fusion Designs has previously added specific upcharges for making changes to the shape of its tabletops, the company has made significant investments in equipment, including adding a a fourth CNC router to its facility here to gain further efficiency.
“We can now make changes faster without adding additional labor, and so will no longer add surcharges for adjusting the shape of our tabletops,” Bontrager added. “It’s still a complex process, because any time you change the shape of a table, say from square to oval, it also changes the apron and skirting and where the slides are positioned. It’s never only one change, but we’ve become much more efficient in how we approach customization and design changes and so we will no longer add a 15 percent upcharge on that as well.”
According to Bontrager, eliminating additional charges on both paint and tabletop shapes streamlines the entire selling process for retail sales associates. “Most of our dealers use our custom sales kiosk to present options to their customers who wish to personalize the products. Now it’s simply that much easier to give consumers exactly what they want.”
