When Brendan Menner moved from Melbourne to Perth in 2005, he wasn’t just chasing warmer weather and being closer to the beach. He had a vision to set up a one-stop destination tradies can call home (rather than having their own factory and overheads).
Brendan officially founded Flat Packs WA in Bibra Lake in 2015, although its beginnings were well underway before then. Now with 20 years’ experience and an ever-expanding team of 18, Flat Packs WA operate a trade-only factory for residential, commercial, shopfitting, boat moulds, fine timber masterpieces, even children’s furniture! If you can dream it or draw it, there’s a high chance Flat Packs can do it. From large mining and university projects, to everyday tradies, Flat Packs WA’s in-house resources include a large spray shop for polishing, plus hardware, appliances, benchtops and more.
Although not the first trade-only cabinet maker, Brendan believes his real point of difference is the widespread capability of the team from machining to software; there’s a large variety of different backgrounds to challenge the norm and achieve greatness. “Helping smaller cabbies be competitive is important, as we can pass on our volume pricing discounts, offer assembly in our factory or even overtake workflow to help achieve tight deadlines” Brendan explains.
Already a Wood Tech customer, Brendan was looking for an additional CNC machine to sit alongside his existing 5-year-old Anderson. The brief was for a high-tech machine, with a larger sheet size capacity and the speed to suit large volumes. The solution was the all-new Anderson Genesis Plus 612 Nesting Cell with automatic loading and labelling.
Machinery innovation and capabilities aside, the real value that got Brendan over the line was the technical support Wood Tech have offered him over the past 5 years, with local technicians based all over the country, including 4 in WA.
It may seem like Brendan Menner has his hands in a bit of everything, so what’s next? “Well, I’ve always had an interest in helicopters...”