Office space

Prosales, August, 2004 by Chris Wood

Much like the projects they plan for their custom home builder and remodeler customers, Kohl Building Products' ProSolution Center uses a selection of vendor products to embrace a spirit of fashion and functionality in its own design.

During the early 2003 design phase of Kohl Building Products' new 6,000-square-foot ProSolution Center in Mechanicsburg, Pa., Kohl vice president of marketing Deb Ritter was prompted by the project's general contractor to select a counter style for salesmen working the window and exterior building products sections of the showroom. "We sat down with the GC and the designer, and had counter options like an "L" or the traditional straight line, but we wanted something nobody else has," recalls Ritter, who drew a curved, squiggling line for her design team to consider.

"It was this spaceship-kind of squiggle. It probably comes out of more of a retail environment, but we wanted something that had some lines to it," Ritter says. "We wanted to separate the office space from the showroom, but we did not want a wall--we needed a barrier but something friendly, not something that compartmentalized the salespeople." Additionally, Ritter and Mechanicsburg management wanted to overcome the traditional, straight-line counter with its associated inefficiencies of salesman lined up and spilling over onto each other's work areas. "Once we started getting into a lot of business, we needed workstations with enough space for customers to lay out large blueprints and for salespeople to work freely without bumping into the salesperson next to them," Ritter says.

The resulting 60-foot counter creates curved enclaves for four workstations approximately 10 feet apart, and includes large, backlit sections constructed with Hy-Lite acrylic block, a Kohl product staple. The inclusion of some of Kohl's featured products in the construction of the ProSolution Center's office and employee Spaces in addition to the main showroom was a key aspect initiated in the design phase, according to company president Tom Kearse. "You can only display so many kitchens, so we wanted to incorporate active displays within our own utility and work areas," he says.

In addition to enabling Kohl to feature specialty products deeper within their product lines, the use of Kohl supplier products in facility construction also intends to reaffirm that the company sticks by their vendor partnerships and the products that they sell. Public and employee bathrooms are outfitted with Therma-Tru doors, and an employee cafe and training room kitchenette feature Medallion cabinetry.

Not to be outstripped by their co-sellers on the counter, kitchen and bath salespeople have workstations situated within several prominent kitchen displays. Flanked by KraftMaid and Medallion kitchen and bath cabinet designs, the salespeople have been outfitted with 36-inch plasma flat screen monitors, which, when installed on walls adjacent to their desks, enable salespeople to display limitless designs and product options without a contractor or their consumer customers having to crane their necks across the desk or otherwise huddle around a glaring computer screen.

"All of the design concepts that incorporated our vendor's product lines required some additional planning and a bit of an open mind," says Kearse of the final incorporation of the showroom feel within the professional workspaces of the ProSolution Center. "But it paid off. It started as fashion, but it turned out the counters and workspaces are more functional than anyone could have reasonably expected to design."--C.W.