Furniture & Fixtures Manufacturing
Schedule fifty phased projects against one shop, cost each one honestly, and keep the compliance records your sheet goods arrive with.
A millwork or fixture shop is a project business pretending to be a production business. Fifty jobs are live, each with its own finishes, its own site dates and its own release schedule, and all of them want the same CNC, the same finishing booth and the same four installers. WorkCell treats the project and the production order as the same record. Quotes become jobs with versioned bills of material and routings per item, operators clock on at terminals so labor lands on the job it belongs to, and the scheduler plans the shop against finite capacity instead of an infinite-capacity wish. Material receipts hold the lot and the supplier documents that came with the panel, which is where formaldehyde compliance evidence actually lives.
Architectural millwork and casework shops, commercial and retail fixture manufacturers, contract and office furniture makers, and upholstery and case goods producers building to order rather than to stock.
| Standard | What It Requires |
|---|---|
| ISO 9001 | The quality baseline larger specifiers and general contractors audit against, covering traceability, control of nonconforming work and corrective action. |
| REACH | Substances of very high concern above 0.1% by weight must be declared through the chain, which reaches finishes, adhesives, foams and hardware on European-bound goods. |
| RoHS | Powered and lit fixtures and height-adjustable furniture carry electrical assemblies, so restricted-substance declarations have to be held per component. |
Panel stock, finishes, foam and hardware are received against lots that carry the supplier's documents, including the invoice or written statement certifying a composite wood product as TSCA Title VI compliant. Issuing material to a job preserves the link, so the finished casework or chair resolves backward to the panels and finishes in it and the project it was built for. EPA requires fabricators to keep that evidence for three years and to label compliant finished goods; WorkCell holds the records, it does not grant the certification, and finished goods themselves are not emissions-tested.
Title VI and CARB Phase 2 certifying statements and bills of lading held against the receiving lot, so the three-year retention obligation is satisfied by the system.
Material issued, labor clocked and outside services purchased, all posted to the job, so a project's real margin is visible while it is still running.
Inspection results captured against the item and the routing revision in effect, including finish checks that are otherwise a verbal sign-off in the booth.
Severity-classified nonconformances with disposition and the 8-D corrective action that closed them, linked to the job and the project they came from.
Fifty phased projects, sixty people and one CNC. The schedule is a whiteboard reconciled on Monday and wrong by Wednesday. Nobody can say what happens to the other jobs when a site date moves, so the shop absorbs the shock as overtime and the office finds out at invoicing.
Labor is on timecards, material came off the rack without a transaction, and the subcontracted finishing invoice shows up six weeks later. The project looked profitable until it closed. The estimator never gets clean actuals back, so the next bid repeats the same mistake.
Every panel purchase carries a certifying statement that has to be retained for three years and tied to the goods it became. When a customer or an inspector asks, somebody digs through invoices. The finished goods are labelled compliant on the strength of memory rather than records.
The same cabinet in four finishes, three pull options and two depths becomes four spreadsheets and a lot of verbal clarification. Cut lists get built from the wrong revision, the finish is applied from the old order, and the rework is absorbed quietly because nobody can prove which spec was released.
Finite capacity scheduling across the shop
The scheduler plans against real machine and labor capacity, not infinite capacity, and proposal runs let a planner test a sequence before committing it. When a site date moves, you see which other projects move with it.
Job costing that closes while the job is open
Material issues, operator clock-ins and purchased services all post to the job as they happen, and every posting is stamped with the cost object it belongs to. Project margin is visible during the build, not after.
Versioned bills of material and routings per item
Each variant carries its own revision and effective date, so a cut list and a finish spec come from the revision that was actually released. Changes supersede rather than overwrite, which is what a late client change needs.
Material lots with supplier documents attached
Panel, finish, foam and hardware receipts record the lot and hold the supplier's certifying statements, so the evidence behind a Title VI or flammability claim is stored with the material rather than in a filing cabinet.
Shop floor terminals for labor and quantities
Operators clock on to an operation at the machine or the bench and record quantity complete and scrap. Labor lands on the right job without a timecard transcription step, and the bench is not doing paperwork twice.
Inspection, nonconformance and corrective action
Inspection templates and AQL sampling plans drive what gets checked. A finish or fit failure raises a severity-classified nonconformance, and the repeat offenders escalate into an 8-D corrective action against the process.
Quotes that become jobs, with the released specification carried forward.
ProductionFinite scheduling of CNC, bench, finishing and assembly with terminals on the floor.
EngineeringVersioned bills of material and routings per variant, finish and option.
AccountingJob costing per project, posted as the work happens, with QuickBooks Online sync.
Quoting, engineering, purchasing, inventory, scheduling, shop floor and job costing on one database.
APSFinite capacity scheduling across many phased projects competing for one shop.
MESTerminals capturing labor and quantities at the CNC, the bench and the booth.
QMSInspections, nonconformances and corrective action tied to the job that produced them.
Moulded components and edge profiles under resin lot traceability.
Chemical ManufacturingCoatings, stains and adhesives produced under lot traceability and QC release.
ISO 9001The traceability, nonconformance and corrective action records the standard asks for.
REACHWhat the regulation requires and which declarations WorkCell keeps for it.
Does WorkCell do panel nesting and cut list optimisation?
No. There is no nesting or yield optimisation engine, and the cut list optimisers shops already use are better at it. WorkCell holds the bill of material, the job and the material issued, and its REST API lets you move part lists out to your nesting software and results back.
Can WorkCell configure a product from options and finishes?
Not through a rules-based configurator. Each variant is an item with its own versioned bill of material and routing, which keeps the released specification unambiguous but means you maintain the variants. If you need option rules and automatic pricing on a configurator, say so before you commit.
How does WorkCell help with TSCA Title VI and CARB formaldehyde compliance?
It stores the supplier certifying statements, invoices and bills of lading against the receiving lot and carries the link into the jobs that consumed the panel, which is the retention and recordkeeping EPA expects of a fabricator. WorkCell is not certified and labelling your finished goods remains yours.
Can we schedule fifty phased projects against one shop?
That case is the reason to use the scheduler. It plans against real machine and labor capacity, so a moved site date shows you which other projects shift instead of hiding the collision. Shops running this on whiteboards usually find the plan holds a few weeks out.
Will we know a project's true cost before it ships?
Yes, as long as the floor transacts. Material issues and operator clock-ins post to the job as they happen and every posting carries its cost object, so margin is visible during the build rather than reconstructed from timecards and late subcontractor invoices afterwards.
See it run on your parts.
Tell us how many projects you run at once and how the shop gets scheduled today, and we will tell you straight whether WorkCell is a fit.