Spoilt for choice at Hampshire’s premier office furniture showroom
If you’re thinking about improving your office furniture or layout then Haywood Office Services’ mega showroom is a great place to start. Expert advice and free site surveys can make sure you’re sitting comfortably.
We all sit on them and toil away at them, but do we really get the best experience from our office furniture? Most of us probably don’t give it enough thought, suggests business owner Mark Haywood. He’s so passionate on the subject that he built his business on designing bespoke office layouts and giving free site surveys to help convince customers of the benefits of getting it right.
He’s got a point. “Why buy a cheap chair you’ll probably have to replace in a couple of years when it breaks, and which might over time give you a bad back that could force you to take time off work?” he challenged.
“And who wouldn’t prefer an office desk and shelving just how they want it that exactly fits the shape of their office or home office?”
Free advice on office design
The two floors of its 10,000 sq ft showroom just off the M3 in Chandler's Ford offers a massive selection of stock that’s frequently refreshed with the latest ranges, many from leading British manufacturers. Haywoods provides bespoke office furniture, design and installation. They’ll offer part-exchange deals on your old furniture so you don’t have to get rid of it yourself. And they’ll even explain what all those complicated levers do on most modern chairs.
“I always say come and talk to us. We can give customers concept ideas for all budgets, with a free survey and plan. Even if we don’t win the business, we have started a relationship with a potential customer and that’s just as important,” said Mark Haywood.
Ergonomically speaking
An important area where the company advises customers is updating old chairs for more ergonomic alternatives that help business meet health and safety rules on work environments. And Haywoods is always busy helping businesses re-size offices to meet changing technology developments as they move from cumbersome hard drives and monitors to laptops, hot desking and cloud computing.
The Haywoods bespoke approach is particularly well suited to the trend towards flexible and home-based working, where domestic nooks and crannies need to be transformed into practical office space.
Personal touch
Made-to-measure office solutions account for about half the company’s annual turnover, with customers across Hampshire ranging from home office kit-outs up to 100-desk offices. “It’s better to work with a few specialists who know us and make bespoke solutions to our designs,” he said, noting that manufacturing partners have put some of his design ideas into mass production, like shelf-top boxes and curved desk shapes.
What Mark Haywood enjoys most is interacting with his customers, both in the showroom and during the many site visits he makes every week, pad and pen in hand ready to sketch ideas and turn them into reality.
Sitting comfortably
It was an impulsive decision back in 1985 that led Mark Haywood to start the business. While working as a carpenter and decorator on a London office refurbishment job he was asked whether he wanted to buy some of the unwanted chairs and desks. He said yes without hesitation.
After transporting his first stock back to Hampshire he quickly found customers who wanted to buy them, and has steadily built up the business over the past 30 years.
“It’s all about offering a personal service and delivering on customers’ expectations. Don’t let them down and they’ll trust you to keep coming up with what they want,” said Haywood.
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