Abstract
Furniture industry is a significant industry in the manufacturing sector in Sri Lanka based on the number of employees. This paper studies the manufacturing strategy of Sri Lankan furniture industry. A questionnaire survey was carried out among the key players of the industry to investigate the manufacturing strategy and improvement activities. Cluster analysis is used to identify the strategic manufacturing groups based on their competitive priorities and three strategic groups were formed. Top competitive priorities of the Sri Lankan furniture manufacturers were identified as low price, conformance quality and product performance. Performance improvement activities under three major categories namely advanced manufacturing technologies, integrated information systems and advanced management systems were investigated. Manufacturing strategy stages of the furniture manufacturers were studied based on the Hayes and Wheelwright model and it is found out that majority of the companies have the characteristics of stage II of the model.
Highlights
The furniture Industry is a basic industry in most of the industrialized countries, representing in general between 2 and 4% of the production value of the manufacturing sector [1], It was the largest traditional, lowtech sector in the world during 1994-98 period exceeding the value of export trade in the apparel industry and the footwear industry [2]
This research identifies three strategic groups of Sri Lankan furniture manufacturers based on 10 competitive priorities
The taxonomy devel oped in this study has much in common with that of Miller & Roth [10]
Summary
The furniture Industry is a basic industry in most of the industrialized countries, representing in general between 2 and 4% of the production value of the manufacturing sector [1], It was the largest traditional, lowtech sector in the world during 1994-98 period exceeding the value of export trade in the apparel industry and the footwear industry [2]. Developing countries and regions like China, Southeast Asia, Poland and Mexico, with China taking the lead, have built upon their respective competitive advantages and gradually have covered almost 30% of the world market. The European Union furniture industry accounts for about half of the world's furniture production. Among the European countries, Germany takes the lead as the largest furniture producing country, accounting for about 27% of total EU production. This is followed by Italy (21.6%), France (13.5%) and the UK (10.4%) [3]
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