POST FALLSBucking two trends at once, the big Harpers Manufacturing office-furniture plant here isnt laying off workers as many manufacturers are, and is expecting sales growth, at a time when many of its competitors are suffering double-digit declines.


How?


We happen to be very lucky, says Stewart Long, who joined Harpers in October as the Post Falls plants general manager. Some of our larger customers are doing very well. (They) havent been affected by the downturn in the economy.


One customer in particular, the U.S. government, put in a big order last fall to outfit temporary offices for Pentagon workers who were displaced by the destruction of their offices in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on Washington D.C., he says. Harpers also filled emergency orders from businesses whose offices were destroyed in the attacks in New York City. Long says industry estimates are that billions of dollars worth of office furniture was destroyed that September day.


Harpers learned something in the process, he says. Not surprisingly, all of the post-Sept. 11 sales were rush orders, and the plant, which employs 520, was able to fill most of those orders in two, three, or four days, instead of the usual 10 days for quick-ship orders, or 15 to 20 days for standard orders.


This facility really pulled together, says Long. We accepted the challenge and found out we were up to it.


Based on what it learned, Harpers made a permanent change to its rush-order program, cutting the promised delivery time in half, to five days, he says.


Other big customers for Harpers line of sturdy metal file cabinets and office-cubicle panel systems are universities and the mortgage banking industry, he says.


Based on its results so far in its current fiscal year, which ends June 30, Harpers expects a 5 percent sales gain for the year, Long says. Although he cautions that we still have six months to go, any gain in sales will be a significant accomplishment in an environment where many office-furniture manufacturers are being hammered, he says.


For example, two of Harpers main competitors reported that their sales fell by about a third in the last months of 2000: Steelcase Inc.s sales declined by 29 percent in its third quarter, ended Nov. 23, compared with the year-earlier period, while another competitor, Herman Miller Inc., announced a 36 percent decline in its sales for its second fiscal quarter, ended Dec. 1, compared with the year-ago period.


Long says Harpers, which operates just the Post Falls plant, is one of the top-performing units in the contract-manufacturing group at Kimball International Inc., Harpers Jasper, Ind.-based parent company. Kimball has a host of operating units around the country and overseas that make products ranging from furniture to pianos to electronic components. As part of the contract-manufacturing group, the Harpers plant in Post Falls makes products both for its parent company as well as for other customers.


Though the plant here has bucked the layoff trend, it also isnt hiring much, either.


Our goal is to improve efficiency, says Long, adding that the company is in the middle of several initiatives aimed at boosting both product quality and production efficiency.


More hiring, however, could be on the horizon eventually.


Long says he expects Harpers to grow exponentially in the next three to five years, possibly even doubling its output.


We have a lot of capacity in the 500,000-square-foot plant, located at 1881 W. Seltice Way, he says. We have tremendous opportunity to grow.


Long says that Harpers will grow by diversifying its production.


As a contract manufacturer, Harpers supplies goods to more than just Kimball, and makes more than just office furniture. For instance, it makes cabinetry for Spokane-based Telect Inc., and other products for electronics and communications-equipment makers that Long prefers not to name. It also makes products for other office-furniture manufacturing companies, based on their designs, he says.


Currently, about 95 percent of its output goes to Kimball, but, We want our other business to be significantly more than 5 percent, Long says.


Diversifying makes us a better companywere going to be challenged in different ways by our customers, he says.


Kimball is committed to keeping its Harpers plant in Post Falls, Long adds. One reason is that besides the manufacturing floor, the building also contains a state-of-the-art furniture showroom that Kimball uses as its primary sales facility on the West Coast, Long says.


At least once a week, the company flies in customers or potential customers on its corporate jet, puts them up at the Coeur dAlene Resort, and brings them to the plant to view the full line of products made by all of Kimballs operating units.


This is kind of unique in the furniture industry, Long says. Its the only plant I know of that has production and a world-class showroom in the same building. Its a great sales tool and one that Kimball uses very well to their advantage.