BONA FIDE INSPIRATION Wood floor specialists, Bona recently held MasterClasses to update contractors on
their new Inspiration concept and demonstrate how to achieve new creative designs. TCF editor Sarah Robinson attended the Manchester date to find out more.
Floor owners are often not aware how an existing wood floor can be transformed to give a room a completely new look and feel. With this in mind, Bona is introducing a new campaign to inspire home owners to renovate rather than replace. Ahead of the Bona Inspiration launch on 1 June, the wood flooring specialist held masterclasses in Reading and Manchester to bring their certified contractors up to date and brush up their skills at the same time.
More than 40 contractors attended the North-West date and came from as far afield as Scotland and Northern Ireland. The day kicked off with talks on the new marketing material and informed contractors on the shift in focus to target home owners rather than themselves.
There are said to be over 98 million homeowners within the countries that Bona holds training courses and 20,000 professional floor installers and renovators. Therefore, it makes perfect sense to target the consumer instead of the contractors, as demand for renovation will drum up business for the trade.
In order to target aspirational consumers, Bona has worked with trend analyst Cay Bond to develop five fashion-led floor styles that will appeal to every taste. There are 17 looks in total, which are grouped in the Nordic Shimmer, Malibu Dreams, Touch of Grace, New Modern and Garden Atmosphere collections.
These consumer-focused trends have been brought to life in a glossy brochure, the images of which will form the basis of the Bona Inspiration campaign. The fabulous lifestyle images will be used on social media, online and print advertising and will also be available for contractors to use on their own websites along with marketing material for their showrooms. As well as all of this, the
bona.com website will be updated to include inspiration pages and for homeowners to find professional contractors.
14 | SPOTLIGHT ON BONA
After a short ‘fica’ or Swedish style coffee break, it was time to get down to learning how the looks can be realised. Many home owners may be put off from renovating their existing wood floors as it is seen as being disruptive and dusty. However, the Bona team dispelled these myths as they demonstrated just how easy and dust-free a renovation can be.
The key to achieving many of the looks lies in first preparing the floor with a rotary brush, which brings out the grain in the wood. This was done after water-popping to soften the wood and increase effectiveness. By wetting the floor, it’s also possible to get a good indication of the brushing effect as you brush until the surface is dry. Water-popping and metal brushing the wood evens out any prior scratches and intensifies the colouration of the oils and stains.
The Bona team demonstrated how to achieve some of the looks from the collections, using a combination of Bona's sanding and brushing methods to enhance the grain, followed by treatments with the company's waterborne lacquers, oils and colours. Contractors were invited to get involved and see for themselves just how easy the brushing process can be and how integral water popping and brushing is to achieving colour intensity and uniformity. It was surprising to see the techniques used on parquet as brushing is generally unheard of on multi-directional floor surfaces and the contractors were intrigued to see that the process doesn’t scratch the floor at all.
Speaking after the event, Jack Weavers, Country Manager, Bona Limited commented: “As usual our contractors were keen to get involved and there was plenty of opportunity for some hands-on learning. All the feedback I have heard so far has been very positive indeed and we’re looking forward to hearing about the new business the campaign is going to generate for our users.”
www.bona.com/en-GB www.tomorrowscontractfloors.com
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58
