Total Door

Gary Deter, the owner of Architectural Door Consultants, in Laguna Miguel, Calif., is helping to drive the western expansion of Total Door. As the company’s representative for Southern California, Arizona and southern Nevada, Gary has been a key force in identifying and signing on well-respected distributors in a vital part of the country.

“Projects are booming on the west coast,” Gary says, adding that he’s excited to bring Total Door Systems into more of them.

Gary has been in the door and hardware industry for 36 years and added Total Door to his product list two years ago. He said the addition of Total Door products allows him to compete with some of the largest firms on the west coast for every project.

His process of working with distributors is to emphasize direct contact with distributors to foster relationships and a deeper understanding of their specific needs. Gary works with a complete customer-centric approach, which means ensuring that distributors have the right training and support to understand new products, how they relate to their specific markets, and the full spectrum of support options available to them through Total Door.

As part of Total Door’s inaugural Advisory Council, Gary is interested in candid feedback from distributors on the tools and support that would help them work more successfully with Total Door Systems.

“Communication is a two-way street at Total Door,” Gary says, “It’s an important value that we share.”

The old axiom about an ounce of prevention being worth a pound of cure holds true in an emerging issue regarding pressure parameters in our industry. The lack of a standard pressure parameter for doors that protect elevator shafts during a fire has meant that many doors are subject to as much as 30 – 40 pounds of pressure, an unsustainable amount for nearly any door.

The problem presented itself during a recent project audit in California. Doors were slamming with too much force because the elevator shafts were pressurized twice as high as necessary. Elevator shafts are pressurized to contain smoke and prevent it from spreading to different floors.

Smoke evacuation design is important, but all too often overlooked. The teams in charge of HVAC and door specifications can operate in silos. The lack of communication means that while there are general suggestions on the pressure, the range is too broad to be meaningful, and no standard parameter has emerged to guide the process.

Beyond identifying the right specification, bridging the communication gap and inviting more collaboration with HVAC is the goal. The right spec will maximize door protection and safety, and maintain Total Door’s reputation for excellence – before and after installation.

While Total Door is at the front end of confronting this issue, we will keep you informed of our progress in upcoming newsletters.

A hospital recommission project in Indiana is proving that Total Door Systems can withstand the test of time. Inspectors found that 40-year-old Total Doors were still completely functional when they assessed the North Clark Community Hospital in Charlestown, Ind. In a rare move, the hospital is being put back into service in August after a nine-year layoff to meet the needs of a growing local population.

The hospital was one of the first projects for Total Door when it was built in 1976. In fact, engineers noticed that one of the fire labels on a door was #003, meaning it was among the earliest projects the company ever completed. They found that the hospital used 400 Total Doors for every single passageway, staircase and entrance in the entire structure and these doors are still completely intact.

Randy Heller, a Total Door distributor for almost 30 years and project engineer for Modern Door, is working to bring 85 of the hospital’s 400 doors into compliance with modern building, life safety, and A.D.A. (Americans with Disabilities Act) codes. He said the doors were in great shape and only needed minor modifications, such as modern labels and a review of their design specifications, to meet today’s standards.

North Clark Community Hospital has quite a history in the Charlestown area. It provided medical care for the entire area until new medical facilities made it obsolete in 2008. But explosive local population growth caused the hospital to be recommissioned this year. So it must undergo a complete inspection to meet all existing building rules and regulations before the grand reopening planned for this year.

As Total Door’s Controller, Jeanne Kitchen is one of the leaders driving the company’s quest for product speed and continuous improvement. Recently, she discussed her roles at the company and what excites her about the future.

Q: What projects excite you for the future?

I’m responsible for all the computer systems that make the business run, such as parts ordering and inventory control; and I head financial metrics and human resources.

A project that I’m particularly excited about is what we internally call “the Configurator.”

It will provide more ease and visibility to pricing and quoting future projects. It will be a fantastic resource for distributors to quickly and easily quote projects; and for end users to see how budget friendly our integrated door systems are for a wide variety of projects.

The second one would be our new preventative maintenance software. This is backstage software that is a part of our continuous improvement initiatives. It makes sure that any maintenance issues are addressed completely and on time. Our maintenance team is notified about planned maintenance immediately and receives reminders until the issue is resolved.

The system then automatically schedules the next maintenance issue after it is completed.

Q: How do these projects work to help distributors succeed?

The Configurator will allow distributors to put a Total Door into any frame from anywhere in the field. All they need is internet access and the configurator will make sure the hardware and software work together to create a door that will fit any opening.

Our focus on preventative maintenance concerns the speed and quality of our products. When we maintain our equipment, we don’t experience unexpected downtime. We can get quality orders to customers in the time we expect every time.

It’s exciting to work towards goals when everyone on the team is pulling together towards excellence.

We’re proud of our plant, and the lean operation we built from the ground up. We successfully adopted single-piece part flow when we moved into a new building in 2010, and have continuously improved our operations to respond to customers as quickly as possible. Read the complete piece here:

http://www.thefabricator.com/article/shopmanagement/a-case-study-in-lean-manufacturing-opening-the-door-to-single-piece-flow

Last year, we made a commitment to you: To make a product that you could represent with pride; to listen to your insights and ensure communication is a two-way street; and to have your back without fail. This year, we are proud to introduce the Total Door Advisory Council. Inaugural members of the council are René Bouchard, Smoot Associates; Jeff Addis, Mayo Associates; Mark Sorrenti, Connection Network Agencies; and Gary Deter, Architectural Door Consultants. They will be contacting various sales reps across North America to get feedback on how Total Door Systems can support their efforts – anything from product improvements to new sales techniques to helpful technology. Total Door will convene the company’s first advisory council meeting in June in Detroit.

The move is part of Total Door Systems’ broader commitment to customer and sales representative satisfaction.

The Council gives sales reps insider access to the continuous improvement efforts of Total Door, and gives the company direct insights that drive that process forward.

We look forward to continuing the conversation. Please feel free to send your thoughts and insights to us at sales@totaldoor.com. We have your back.