Founded in 1992, Sutelan ovet focuses on the manufacture of bespoke wooden doors, entrances and display windows. Customers include housing companies, public buildings, construction companies and private individuals. Sutelan ovet often works in cooperation with the Finnish Heritage Agency – and the company's CV includes the extremely demanding door renovations of both the Parliament Building and Finlandia Hall.
Sutelan ovet manufactures new doors and entrances, respecting the history of the building and preserving the atmosphere of the original entrance.
Implementing historic entrances is a skill that few in Finland have mastered. The philosophy behind Sutelan ovet is that when a person walks through a door, the feeling and atmosphere should remain unchanged – timeless. In its renovations and restorations, the company wants to remain faithful to the original carpentry, the era, the materials, the working methods and the different substances used in the treatment.
The complete package
When making doors for prestigious buildings, the paint used must also be master class. For more than a year, Sutelan ovet has been using Oulun Automaalit Oy, a retailer of Tikkurila industrial paints in the Oulu region, as its paint supplier.
The cooperation started in earnest when Kari-Pekka Harmainen from Oulun Automaalit and Tikkurila's Key Account Manager Joni Repo and Technical Expert Erkki Keränen visited the Sutela paint shop in February 2023, and together they thought about how things could be done even better. Sutelan ovet had the desire to switch to waterborne paints, and Tikkurila had effective products to accelerate the change.
"Together, we considered the best products for oak, for example, and did trial samples and spraying in the paint shop," says Carpenter Esa Laukkala. Oak doors are truly demanding, confirms Joni Repo. "We discussed products, working methods and different ways of enhancing operations – and found common ground easily," says Repo.
One jointly developed innovation was related to the door renovation of a valuable property in Helsinki. Kari-Pekka Harmainen says the customer wanted the door to bear a certain stamp of craftsmanship: "The brush mark had to be visible, as in the original treatment. So the solution was to spray-paint the door twice and then finish it with a brush," he explains. According to Laukkala, Kari-Pekka Harmainen is a man he has known for years and a master colourist whose quality is trusted. "We knew we were in good hands."
Perfect cooperation
As for Tikkurila paints, the quality of the product and the speed of delivery were convincing:
"When required, we have received the needed paints within a very short timeframe and the colour samples to the customer –– and then quickly into production," Saga Sutela describes the streamlined process. "For the future, we only hope that we can continue our cooperation at such a good level."
Kari-Pekka Harmainen says that Oulun Automaalit has been a Tikkurila retailer for a couple of years now, and new customers have been joining the "team" at a steady pace.
"Business is growing, but the hunger is still there," he concludes
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