Flexible or Productised - What's the Modular Way?

Working with modular can sometimes be a balancing act between the client’s desire for flexibility in design and the benefits of standardisation for optimal factory production.  This balance is difficult to strike and requires careful thought.

At Volumetric Building Companies, we have worked to understand that balance and are keen to open the discussion to hear opinions from others in the field. Fundamentally, we see two main roads to success: either organise a design and manufacturing process that can handle the variation in client designs, or curate a number of standardised modules in a catalogue and seek to persuade your client to accept those. There are potential compromises in between but let us start by discussing these two main approaches for simplicity.

Our operations at VBC are currently set up for handling a flexible client design and then transforming that to a manufacturable modular design. We have identified a path for this, let's call it the Main Street. The first “stop” on Main Street would be at Redline & ROM pricing where we indicate the suitability (or not) of the project for a modular approach. The second “stop” is a Feasibility Study which further investigates project suitability with a deeper dive into technical and commercial aspects of the scheme. In total, we have 9 major stops along Main Street that arrives at a finalised building.

VBC has walked down Main Street many times during our 15 years’ experience, we have noticed that some of the stops repeat themselves too often to be ignored. Why are we repeating that kitchen design again, or that bathroom? Didn't we do that just two projects back? What if we had a template for it?

This encouraged us to explore more standardised designs and look at them on different levels i.e. a vanity unit that nests into a bathroom that nests into a module. All are products, but the effect of standardising them has different impacts on the overall speed of the journey along Main Street. As a result, we started to see a faster route, a Highway, begin to crystallize. You could make a faster journey through design, maybe cut the time in half.

But who cares? If the client wants a certain design, then - what is the best approach?

Well, the return on investment for a client comes faster if time is shorter. The modular industry could deliver faster to help relieve significant societal problems, like the housing crisis and the refugee crisis. So, can we have two alternative paths? Let the client choose if they want to travel down Main Street or take the Highway.

What do you think? We would be interested to hear your point of view.