Value Engineering Flooring

At The Solid Wood Flooring Company, we have the facilities to value engineer any existing floor specification that is over budget.

Below we’ve noted some of ways we can help you cut costs without compromising quality:

1. Change the grade: Grading of timber is generally listed alphabetically from ‘A’ to ‘F’. At no point does the quality of the timber come into question, only the permissible amount of knotting and character on a board. Starting from ‘A’ grade you’ll see almost no character, this is the highest ‘prime’ grade possible, with minimal knotting and very straight grain. From there more knots, grain patterns and colour variation become gradually more permissible as you work toward ‘F’ grade. For more detailed information please see our grading scale.

2. Change the Structure: Wood flooring can be constructed in a number of ways with various materials. Selecting the right options for your project is crucial to being cost effective. The following are typically available:

a. Solid

b. 3-Layer single species

c. 3-Layer mixed species

d. Plywood backed single species

e. Plywood backed mixed species

We can help you navigate these choices to select the best option for your unique project.

3. Change the thickness of the top layer: We will only use 3mm or 4mm top layers for our engineered boards. Thinner top layers need to be ‘rotary cut’ which is a method where the log is soaked in chemicals to soften the fibres and is then peeled off (similar to how a pencil sharpener works). Whilst this is a cheap production method it is false value as the top layer will always be susceptible to splitting and will not wear very well. Typical thickness of these top layers varies from 0.5mm to 2.5mm. Be mindful that even when value engineering, there are some places you don’t want to save money, the top layer being one of them (much like if you were trying to save money on a car, you wouldn’t want cut back on the effectiveness of the brake system).

4. Properly Finished Flooring: A further temptation is to by unfinished flooring as it is cheaper on the initial purchase than factory finished (pre-finished) options. However, typical finishing coats on site at £15m2, so it becomes instantly more expensive once you’ve factored in contractor costs. The only time unfinished timber should be purchased is if you want to paint the floor, or have a very specific requirement.

Pre-finished is definitely the better option for most projects. Therein you want to make sure that a good quality finish has been applied and that is suits the intended purpose. There is a big difference between quality oils and lacquers to inferior ones. At The Solid Wood Flooring Company, we only use premium oils and lacquers and use the latest coating technology. As we have standardised this in our production process, we’re able to offer this level of quality cost-effectively.

5. Use an alternative to engineered wood flooring: We have developed products that match the colour, texture and feel of our real wood flooring using the latest technology. You can see details of our alternatives further down this page. Impervia is generally 35% less than engineered wood and our Trident laminate is generally 60% less. Both of these wood alternative products are built for commercial use so you can be confident of a long service life with minimal care required.

6. Buy direct from the manufacturer: A large number of wood flooring suppliers are resellers; this means additional margins on the flooring thereby higher costs or bigger quality sacrifices as they don’t truly control production. Whereas, The Solid Wood Flooring Company is the manufacturer with full control of production and no “middle-men” to factor into any costings. This means an immediate saving with true quality and sourcing control.

7. Species selection: There are many wood species available. American Black Walnut as an example is a high value material, easily 20% more than American White Oak. We have developed techniques to colour Oak to better replicate Walnut which provides an enormous saving. European Oak can also be used and we can now use American Red Oak with a special colouring process we’ve developed to create stunning prime grade white Oak floors in high volume at a reduced cost.

A note on material sources – we will only use timber from either FSC or PEFC certified forests which will have stringent harvesting and replanting regimes. We will never allow our supply chain to be tainted with unsustainable timber; that is our commitment to our clients, the planet and ourselves.