April 10/17, 2017: Volume 31, Issue 22
By Reginald Tucker
Phoenix—Galleher, a top five floor covering distributor, has begun the process of building a factory here dedicated to the production of high-end custom-made wood flooring products. The new, 60,000-square-foot facility, which includes both production and warehouse space, is expected to be up and running by June 2017.
“Today, high-end contractors are turning more to prefinishing—either in their own shops or through custom prefinishing like ours,” said Todd Hamar, senior vice president, who conducted a tour of the site earlier this month. “The colors designers are demanding nowadays are often only achieved through processes like fuming, bleaching and reactive stains that are difficult—if not impossible—to work with on site. Designers are also increasingly seeking to customize texture in ways that are too tedious to achieve on the job site.”
That’s where the new facility comes in, Hamar said. The new plant—when completed—will offer the following capabilities:
Custom platforms. Customers can choose from a wide range of unfinished platforms Galleher stocks in house or it can press and profile the client’s custom-made engineered flooring in virtually any combination of species, grade, width or length. This includes reclaimed material.
Custom texturing. Services include precision wire-brushing, hand-scraping, tumbling and edge distressing.
Moldings and stair parts. Tread assembly, CNC cutting and finishing.
Reactive stains. Colors are applied and dried in a carefully controlled environment to maintain proper humidity levels—which is crucial to the reactive staining process.
Custom fuming. Ideal process for creating the base for popular colors such as neutral grays and browns.
State-of-the-art coating capabilities. Dedicated lines for UV oil and urethane finishes, plus vacuum coaters, standalone spray booth and a spray line. Hand finishing as well as commercial-grade finishes are also offered.
“By coloring and texturing in a shop, customers have the opportunity to work with these processes in a controlled environment using labor-saving machines,” Hamar said. “More importantly, clients have the opportunity to dial in the look and get approval before installation.”
When the plant is complete, Hamar estimates the facility will be able to process anywhere between 30,000 and 40,000 square feet per month. The site will also handle production of Galleher’s high-end Monarch Plank line.