It is just as true in fashion as it is in furniture: the measure of all things is made to measure. A closet that is fitted into the sloping roof with millimeter precision delights both viewers and owners, just like a suit that is tailored to the individual sloping shoulders. While with suits, however, often only the price and repeated visits to the distinguished men’s tailor are deterrent factors, with furniture there are a number of objections to an appointment with the carpenter: You don’t know anyone, or if you do, he won’t have time for it for two years Smaller orders, the floor plan is not suitable for built-in furniture, or you actually live to rent anyway and yes, such installation is of course always a considerable investment.
Not least because of these hurdles, a principle is enjoying growing popularity in the furniture industry, the megatrend of Mass customization to be assigned is: the configurator. It promises, if not exactly built-in furniture, at least an approximation of the personal wishes and spatial characteristics of its future owner and at the same time makes him an active designer of his living environment.
In their early days, some of the furniture configurators may have come across the furniture configurator at the computer terminal in the Ikea kitchen department, and it was not uncommon for this first encounter with a 3D construction kit to cause profound damage: the systems were often too confusing, too complicated, too difficult to use still. And the customer may also be overwhelmed by the pixelated 3D look of the kitchen that is created with his mouse clicks. Or the responsibility of immediately having to make a few dozen detailed decisions for future kitchen life yourself. Today, configuration programs and the general digital readiness for online shopping are so advanced that the possibility of making the next wardrobe, shelf or sofa on a computer or smartphone is seen more as an advantage and service.
The customer assembles his shelf twice, so to speak
In the past few years, the furniture industry has seen the rise of a number of suppliers who run everything via the configurator and who have neither a standard range nor the usual middlemen in the furniture industry. The Polish brand Tylko, for example, is very present in the market and offers simple, modern sideboards, bookcases and, most recently, entire wardrobes for self-design on the homepage. With a few clicks and measurements, the cupboards grow quickly (and the price in the top right corner of the screen) and can be varied with centimeter precision in terms of width and also in terms of color, style, doors and drawer distribution. The range at the Munich competitor Mycs is even broader, and they can also add tables, sofas and even chairs to its configurator – where they can still be modified in terms of paintwork and the questions armrests yes / no or upholstery. After all, anyone who has always longed for it can order a chair with a yellow backrest and blue legs for around a hundred euros.
Length, doors, drawers: At Tylko, everything revolves around individually adaptable storage space.
(Photo: Tylko)
If the program takes the curious by the hand and a sense of achievement quickly sets in when configuring, the technology is a win-win for both parties: In the end, the buyer pays for exactly the furniture he needs and wants. And not much more than something comparable off the shelf would cost. On the manufacturer side, on the other hand, a high degree of automation is possible, since every customer formulates an order for the digital cutting station in the factory with their order completion. The magic of Mass customization works: The customer has the feeling of being able to design a very personal piece of furniture, and the dealer only offers exactly what production lines and logistics are optimized for. A homepage with a configurator replaces the stationary furniture trade, the shop window, advice and an assortment that changes every year – a few new drawer knobs or colors in the selection range are sufficient, the customer is the designer himself. He assembles his shelf twice: first on the screen and again a few weeks later, when the heavy flat packages were delivered to the apartment. And if the new sideboard doesn’t quite fit into the wall niche or the whole thing looks like porridge, he is responsible for it himself.
The Pax configurator from Ikea is still quite a fiddly thing
Anyone who has a little desire to set up and design will find a few hours of fun and active living with the sophisticated configurator offers today. From a marketing perspective, the programs are therefore an excellent form of customer loyalty – the user playfully circles around his product, gets involved and personally identifies with the brand. But that only applies if the construction kit works in a pleasantly self-explanatory manner. The Pax configurator from Ikea, for example, is still quite a complex fiddly thing, in which the hopeful plan for the new bedroom closet easily burns out into phlegmatic to desperate clicking around.
The decision-making authority that the configurator passes on to the customer should not be underestimated. In other words: those who find it difficult to decide with their partner even before Netflix can end up with countless color and shape variants for the sideboard in interior design debates that often end in the permanent postponement of the project. The fact that you can’t really see the cupboards and chests of drawers created creates additional uncertainties, no matter how convincing the animation may be. Who wants to go for days being Optimize the sideboard in order to find out that the walnut veneer looks really cheap or that the carefully selected shade of yellow changes to orange. And even if everything looks as planned, the aha experience tends to turn out to be a little restrained in the end – because especially in view of the bold color variations in the new storage space, one or the other may recognize why this task is taken on by trained designers elsewhere.
With one of the pioneers of the configuration principle, the Cubit company in Düsseldorf, customers are given the right color combination for orientation in the acute creative process. Cubit started with configurable shelves in 2006 and is now causing a sensation with its upholstered modules in particular. The freely combinable sofa series not only has high aesthetic and craftsmanship requirements and is built in Westphalia, at Cubit they are particularly proud of the enormous range of colors and fabrics. You move an armchair from the configurator pretty close to something that you normally need a carpenter and upholsterer for – namely, a unique piece of furniture in good quality. However, Cubit also noticed that not every product is suitable for the configurator – a series of lights, for example, where you could choose the lampshade, body and base, wood type and finish, did not arrive and has disappeared from the range. Some areas should still be left to the designers.