On a forty unit building, cabinetry stops being a design decision and becomes a logistics one. The same package repeats, the price is set by volume, and the only question that really matters is whether it lands on the right floor in the right week.
The economics of a multi-unit job come from repetition. A small number of unit types, each with a fixed cabinet package, priced per unit rather than per kitchen. Every variation you allow into that mix costs more than it looks like it should, because it breaks the run.
That is not an argument for making every apartment identical. It is an argument for deciding the unit types early, then holding them. A two-bedroom package and a studio package covering a whole building will beat forty individually specified kitchens on both price and programme.
It also makes the building easier to maintain later. One door profile, one finish and one set of hardware means a damaged front is replaced from stock rather than matched, which is the difference between an hour of work between tenancies and two weeks of chasing a discontinued colour. See the commercial hub, slab doors and hardware.
Recent work
How it works
How a Unit Package Is Set
Fix the unit types
Studio, one bed, two bed, accessible. Each gets one cabinet package. The number of types is the number that drives the price, far more than the total unit count does.
Price the package, not the kitchen
Quoted per unit type and multiplied out, so the developer can see exactly what a change to one package costs across the whole building before agreeing to it.
Build a control unit first
One unit fitted out and walked through before the rest goes into production. Anything wrong is wrong once instead of forty times, which is the cheapest hour on the project.
Release by floor
Delivery sequenced to framing and finish milestones rather than shipped complete. Site storage stays clear and the finish trades are not stepping around packaged cabinets.
Timing it
The Schedule Is the Whole Job
Larger projects want ordering three to twelve months ahead of the on-site date, and the number moves with size, unit mix and how much of the package is stocked rather than made. That lead time is not padding, it is what stops a finish trade waiting on a truck.
Delivery then gets sequenced rather than dumped. On a multi-building or high-rise job that means releasing by building or by floor to match framing and finish milestones, so units arrive as each floor is ready and nobody is storing forty kitchens in a car park.
The tradeoff is that changes get expensive once a run is in production, because a variant introduced halfway through has to be made as a separate batch at a separate price. Lock the packages early, then let the schedule do its work. See how commercial casework is built, worktops and office and retail.
Logistics
Other commercial work
The Rest of Our Commercial Work
Unit packages are one kind of volume. These are the others.
Lead times, unit packages, delivery sequencing and change control.
Three to twelve months out from the required on-site date, depending on size, unit mix and how much is stocked. Larger and more varied projects sit at the long end of that.
Repetition is what creates the saving, so we price per unit type and multiply. Fewer types and a fixed spec produce a better number than the same total count spread across many variants.
They can, and each additional variant costs more than it appears to because it interrupts the production run. The usual answer is a small number of packages held firmly.
Yes, and on anything sizeable you should. Releasing by building or floor to match framing and finish milestones keeps site storage clear and stops cabinets being handled twice.
Possible before a run enters production, awkward and costly afterwards. This is the main reason we push to lock packages early and build a control unit before volume starts.
Because a walk-through of a finished unit finds things a drawing cannot. Fixing a detail once beats discovering it in every apartment after the trucks have already gone out.
It helps considerably. One door profile and one finish across a building means a damaged front is swapped from stock between tenancies rather than matched or replaced as a set.
Give us the unit types and the programme dates and we will price per package, propose a delivery sequence by floor, and tell you where a variant is costing more than it is worth.
