The Inside Scoop at CellularWindowShades.com

Here are the hands of one of our “master craftsmen”! Julie’s video (on YouTube) shows how to replace a Smoothy Clutch in your own home (should you wish to do so). She’s one of our go-to Gals, for repairs and shade-building.

But it takes a few stages in the life of a shade to get to the “assembly” stage. So let’s back up a bit…

1 – Order Arrives at “Production”

Orders are logged into our production Log Book. Here’s the first place we look if you contact us, inquiring on an order. As the process passes from having rails cut to having fabric cut and prepped, etc – those looking will see certain marks appear next to an order. In that way, EVERYone in the company can see where in the production process any given order now is at.

2 – Various Departments “do what they gotta do”

At this stage the order’s paperwork and production labels are separated: part goes to the Fabric Department and part to the Rails Department. Everything is cut and tagged with the order’s labels. What information can be found on a production label? Your name, the order’s work number, the size (and if given) the location of the individual shade, the color number, even the year of the work order. As each department finishes an order, the Log Book gets marked up.

3 – Assembly of Your Shade(s)

Soon, all the requisite parts have been cut and gathered; everything can be placed in the production area, with the accompanying production paperwork. Production Team members are able to sign out an order, bringing the shade components to their work benches. The work benches are fun! Julie’s, as you can see (above), is crazy-quilt fabric-covered. Kitted out not only with the smaller shade parts, work benches are also replete with personal mementos. A radio plays in the backgroud, and a helpful and friendly atmosphere pervades the factory floor.

Each shade has a complex set of assembly instructions, and each shade’s paperwork indicates how many parts or what size / length for anything that needs cutting.

Then the *magic* happens!

Bits-and-Bobs are transformed into a whole, complete Window Shade:

That isn’t the end of the process – but it is the end of this blog post.

More Later!