Strategic Planning And Marketing Of Wood Products

Introduction to Wood Products

Discuss about the Strategic Planning and Marketing of Wood Products.

In the current scenario, the use of laminated beams or glulam is increasing day-by-day in New Zealand. Glulam or laminated beam is a kind of engineered wood that includes several layers (Kazeroon, Ahmad & Bkhari, 2016). Currently, in several countries, glulam is being used for different purposes like, in swimming poor, joinery, and sports hall roof and for other reasons. However, glulam is made by following some steps. In the very beginning, the sawn timber is placed in the tipping machine. At this step, the lengths of the timber are released at slow motion (Lestari et al., 2015). After this, when the timber is released on the roller table or the driven roller, the fluorescent crayon starts making the defects in it. After making the defects, the timbers are passed by the chopsaw in order to shop the defects that are previously marked (Ismail, Ibrahim & Ahmad, 2016).

The next step after chopping the defects, the remaining timbers are passed to the finger joint cutter, which cuts the timbers in the zigzag way. After that, those cut pieces are passed to the finger joint press, which applies the glue at the end points of the timber pieces and then joins the timbers (Soriano, Pellis & Mascia, 2016). This particular step transforms the pieces of timbers in to the continuous piece. After this, these continuous pieces of timbers are placed on the automated stacking table to cut down the continuous pieces as per the specified lengths. Then again the cut pieces are transferred to glue line for producing the beam and forklift (Lu et al., 2016). After this step, the end of the glue line of the timber is passed to the clamps to manufacture the straight beams. There, these straight beams are cured at 25⁰C for 8 hours and then finally the laminated beams or glulam is produced.

• Laminated timber is long wooden construction material that includes several layers with same width.
• Glulam has mechanical properties, which are of high quality than the general wooden materials (Lahr et al., 2015).
• The thickness of glulam is maximum 40mm and this can be straight or constant or cross-sectioned.

• Presently, glulam is easily available and much sustainable product. As the quality of the timber is high, glulam can be used for various purposes.
• The appearance of glulam or laminated beams is much better and so, people can use glulam as the substitute of concrete or steel (Daud, Ahmad & Hassan, 2015).
• The durability of glulam is generally high. However, it depends on the specifications like, type of glue, quality of timber and the application procedure.

Previously in New Zealand, the glulam was generally imported. During 1999, the quantity of glulam that was imported by New Zealand was 11417 m³. However, gradually the country started to produce glulam or laminated beams. Currently, in New Zealand, the average quantity of glulam production is near about 50000 m³ (Hadi et al., 2016). The production of laminated beams is in increasing trend in New Zealand. In the year 2011, the production percentage of glulam in New Zealand was 41000 m³, which increased to 44000 m³ in the year 2013 and in 2015, it increased to 57000 m³ (Hadi et al., 2016).

Manufacturing Process Overview

There are several suppliers of glulam or laminated beams in New Zealand. Some of the suppliers of laminated beams in New Zealand are – Techlam, Timberlab, Laminated Beams Limited and Mcintosh Timber Laminates. All of these glulam manufacturing companies or suppliers of glulam produce and supply the higher quality glulam to the people in New Zealand.

The glulam manufacturing companies in New Zealand has focused on the 4Ps of marketing mix. The first element of 4Ps is product. The suppliers in New Zealand always try to maintain the quality of the products. At the same time, they also maintain the specifications provided by the customers. In case of prices of the glulam or laminated beams, the suppliers in New Zealand have set the price level bit higher than the suppliers in the other countries. Lu et al. (2016) stated that the cost of manufacturing glulam is high in New Zealand. High quality of technology is required to produce the laminated beams. Due to this, the prices of the glulam or laminated beams in New Zealand are high. In New Zealand, glulam is demanded by the people in urban as well as in rural areas (Laurent et al., 2016). The people, who are fond of living at well-designed houses, prefer to use glulam for manufacturing the floors of their houses. The glulam manufacturing companies in this country mainly focused on the urban market than that of the rural market. However, they have not completely ignored the rural market of the country (Thorhallsson, Hinriksson & Snæbjörnsson, 2016). In order to promote the glulam or laminated beams, the companies in New Zealand have mainly used the advertisement as the promotional tool. Different types of newspaper and television advertisements are used by the companies (Hadi et al., 2016). At the same time, the companies sometimes use the sales promotion strategies like, discounts or offers to promote their products in the competitive market.

There are several strategies taken by the glulam manufacturing companies in New Zealand. The strategies are as follows:

• In order to promote the products, the glulam manufacturing companies in New Zealand has mainly focused on mass marketing. This is a style of marketing, in which the companies in New Zealand conduct single program for marketing to target a large number of customers (Lahr et al., 2015).
• The companies have also concentrated on the proper market segmentation. Generally the companies have segmented the market on the basis of the demographic factors and geographic factor. Proper market segmentation has helped the companies to target the market in a better way.
• The companies have also concentrated on the communication with the customers. The companies try to build a strong relationship with its customers by providing personalized services (Kazeroon, Ahmad & Bkhari, 2016).
• The companies has also emphasized on the advertisements. They always try to come up with attractive advertisement tag line to attract the customers easily.

Strengths

• The primary strength of the domestic market of Glulam manufacturing industry in New Zealand is the high demand. The demand for the glulam or laminated beam is high in the urban as well as the rural areas in the country. Moreover, the demand in the country for glulam is increasing day-by-day (Daud, Ahmad & Hassan, 2015).
• There are advanced technology available in the market for manufacturing the glulam or laminated beams. The companies, who are associated with glulam manufacturing, can easily produce their products through these advanced technologies.

Weaknesses

• The number bulk-purchasing customer is less in the glulam market in New Zealand.
• As the price level is high, most of the business deals take place on credit. Therefore, the percentage of debt is high in this market (Lestari et al., 2015).

If the analysis is made on the global glulam market, then it can be found out that the glulam is more famous in the market of North America. The demand is also high in Europe. Laurent et al. (2016) stated that the demand for the glulam in the global market is in increasing trend because of the cost-effective characteristics of the product. In several surveys, it has been identified that till 2020, the CAGR of the global glulam industry will increase by 26%. Kazeroon, Ahmad and Bkhari (2016) noted that the advanced technology and machineries have made the glulam manufacturing procedure easier. In case of Europe, the average yearly production of glulam is 500000 m³. In case of North America, it is near about 700000 m³ per year. The Asia-Pacific region has also taken a major part in the global glulam industry. Since, 2005, the glulam manufacturing in Asia-Pacific region has increased by 25% (Thorhallsson, Hinriksson & Snæbjörnsson, 2016). Therefore, it can be said that the global glulam industry is in increasing and stable trend.

Characteristics and Advantages

The key international competitors in the glulam industry are – Rosboro in North America, Buckland Timber in United Kingdom, Unalam in Northe America, Glulam Ltd in United Kingdom, GLTA (Glued Laminated Timber Association) in United Kingdom, JK Holdings Co. Ltd in Japan, Vicbeam in Australia, Hyne Timber in Australia, Stratalam in New Zealand and Techlam in New Zealand.

The major opportunities for the Glulam market in New Zealand are as follows:

• The foreign investment in the glulam market in New Zealand is increasing. Due to the increase of foreign investment, the growth opportunity is also increasing (Soriano, Pellis & Mascia, 2016).
• Skilled and knowledgeable work force is easily available in the glulam market in New Zealand.

There are also some threats to the glulam market in New Zealand and these threats are as follows:

• The price level for the glulam in the markets of other countries is much low than in New Zealand. Due to this, many customers prefer the companies in foreign market (Thorhallsson, Hinriksson & Snæbjörnsson, 2016).
• The cost structure for producing one standard sized laminated beam is much high in the New Zealand market, which is a major threat for the companies.

Reference List:

Daud, A. F. M., Ahmad, Z., & Hassan, R. (2015). Charring Rate of Glued Laminated Timber (Glulam) Made from Selected Malaysian Tropical Timber. In InCIEC 2014 (pp. 1107-1116). Springer Singapore.

Hadi, Y. S., Efendi, M., Massijaya, M. Y., Arinana, A., & Pari, G. (2016). Technical Note: Subterranean Termite Resistance Of Smoked Glued Laminated Lumber Made From Fast Growing Tree Species In Indonesia. Wood and Fiber Science, 48(3), 211-216.

Hadi, Y. S., Santoso, A., Pizzi, A., & Lagel, M. C. (2016). Characterization of Merbau Wood Extract Used as an Adhesive in Glued Laminated Lumber. Forest Products Journal.

Ismail, S., Ibrahim, A., & Ahmad, Z. (2016). A Review on Structural Response of Hybrid Glulam-Cold-Formed Steel Roof Trusses. In InCIEC 2015 (pp. 833-846). Springer Singapore.

Kazeroon, R. A., Ahmad, Z., & Bkhari, N. M. (2016). The Effect of Span Lengths on the Bending Strength Properties of Glued Laminated Timber Beam. In InCIEC 2015 (pp. 861-869). Springer Singapore.

Lahr, F. A. R., Christoforo, A. L., da Campos, C. I., Morales, E. A. M., Barbosa, J. C., & Panzera, T. H. (2015). Evaluation of the Moisture Content in Stiffness Properties of Structural Glulam Beams. Advanced Materials Research, 1088, 676.

Laurent, A. B., Menard, J. F., Lesage, P., & Beauregard, R. (2016). Cradle-to-Gate Environmental Life Cycle Assessment of the Portfolio of an Innovative Forest Products Manufacturing Unit. BioResources, 11(4), 8981-9001.

Lestari, A. S. R. D., Hadi, Y. S., Hermawan, D., & Santoso, A. (2015). Glulam properties of fast-growing species using mahogany tannin adhesive. BioResources, 10(4), 7419-7433.

Lu, W., Ling, Z., Geng, Q., Liu, W., Yang, H., & Yue, K. (2015). Study on flexural behaviour of glulam beams reinforced by Near Surface Mounted (NSM) CFRP laminates. Construction and Building Materials, 91, 23-31.

Lu, W., Wang, L., Wu, J., Liu, W., Yang, H., Yue, K., … & Deng, Z. (2016). Behavior of Glulam Columns Reinforced by Near-Surface-Mounted CFRP Laminates under Eccentric Compression Loading. Journal of Structural Engineering, 142(11), 04016109.

Soriano, J., Pellis, B. P., & Mascia, N. T. (2016). Mechanical performance of glued-laminated timber beams symmetrically reinforced with steel bars. Composite Structures, 150, 200-207.

Thorhallsson, E. R., Hinriksson, G. I., & Snæbjörnsson, J. T. (2016). Strength and stiffness of glulam beams reinforced with glass and basalt fibres. Composites Part B: Engineering.

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