At Your Service

Creative Woodworks of Sugarcreek, Ohio, has found success by investing in equipment that produces assemble-ready parts for custom woodworking shops who need to get their jobs done in an orderly fashion. Established in 2009, the shop is manned entirely by Amish woodworkers, which is no surprise as the area is home to one of the nation’s largest Amish communities. Owner David Yoder says advanced machinery has given him opportunity, instead of competition, by teaming up with outside cabinet shops to help process larger projects faster.

“There are a lot of Amish woodworkers around here, but mostly non-CNC shops. So, we find this a niche opportunity where customers don’t have to invest and take that risk buying CNC equipment. They let us help out in their workflow, and this works out quite well,” says Yoder.

Yoder gave Woodshop News a tour of his 12,000-sq.-ft. facility. He explained how everything works in line with Amish practices, a key highlight being how the shop is powered entirely by a massive 3-phase, 480-volt generator.

There are six full-time employees, including Yoder and his eldest son, Timon, who works on automation programming and accounting. Other employees include Marcus Troyer, Mark Miller, Eldon Troyer, and Justin Yoder. Yoder’s wife, Maryann, helps with accounting, and their eldest daughter, Hannah, cleans the offices on weekends.

Yoder was introduced to farming at a young age, but it wasn’t exactly his calling. He says early experiences with manual labor have made him appreciate automated processes.

“I grew up on a farm about three miles from Sugarcreek. It was okay, but we had seemingly no equipment. We had no skid loaders. We had dairy cows, but no milkers. So, we would milk by hand. We had to shovel all our manure by hand. Guess what? I didn’t want to be a farmer. Not that I despise work, I just like automated equipment.”

At 15, Yoder started working for Schrocks, a custom kitchen cabinet company in Walnut Creek, Ohio. He was there for almost nine years before starting Creative Woodworks.

“I really do enjoy woodworking,” he says. “All of my nine years at Schrocks, I worked in the drafting room. So, I have grown up being very intrigued with this woodworking trade. My oldest brother was a cabinetmaker at Schrocks and I wanted to be just like him.”

Creative Woodworks started in another shop with higher-end machinery, but very little automation. Yoder bought land and built the current shop in 2019 to expand the business. It’s steps away from the Age of Steam Round House Museum, one of the area’s many tourist attractions.

The shop features machinery from SCM, including the Morbidelli X-200 CNC router with auto labeling, Gabianni ST115 rear-loading beam, and Stefanni KD-HP edge bander with a return conveyor. It regularly serves a dozen cabinetry businesses within a 30-mile radius, plus a few out of state.

“We weren’t able to do this kind of work in the old place. We had smaller equipment, so we only did doors and drawer boxes. Now we have all this equipment so other cabinet shops don’t have to invest in it.”

Yoder acquires new machinery by networking with manufacturers, which brings him frequent opportunities to give shop tours for potential SCM customers, which in return can lead to more orders. He also attends the major trade shows.

Typical services include large production runs, but smaller customized projects are welcome, too.

“They’re all mostly in the kitchen cabinet industry or commercial cabinetry, like hotels. We’re basically here to help out other shops as they get big orders, or as they’re busy and they don’t have this kind of equipment. We can cut the parts, band them, they’re all labeled, ready for assembly,” says Yoder.

The process typically starts with customers sending files via Cabinet Vision, Mozaik or other design programs. The shop usually doesn’t even see the renderings of these final projects.

“We don’t know how the cabinets will actually look. We get the files and we cut the parts. The cabinet shops are in total control. If the fit is a little loose or a little tight when they’re assembled, they adjust on their end. We just run the machines for them.”

Adjacent to the main shop floor is a storage area for bunks of plywood. “Virtually all of our customers provide their own plywood. From their supplier, they send the plywood here. We stack it and just feed off these bundles as we do their projects.”

Production begins on the beam saw, run by Marcus Troyer, the shop foreman. “The beam saw is such a production machine for us,” says Yoder. “This saw will cut anything into square and rectangular parts.”

The parts then move through the shop for CNC processing, dovetailing, and edge banding. Face frame accounts for about half of the shop’s work, but Yoder likes to put the emphasis on frameless.

“The area that we really focus on is frameless European kitchen cabinets. With this machinery, the router and the edge bander, these make for easier and faster assembly. Everything fits together with qualified mortise and tenon construction.”

It’s a lean operation with a short lead time, according to Yoder.

“People ask me how’s your lead time. And that’s interesting because that’s a concern for every shop. I tell them we don’t really have a lead time. We work in your schedule,” he says. “It’s very seldom that we get a file from the customer and we can’t do it in two days, and not unusual to process some even the same day. So, yes, it is a very short lead time.”

The shop has interesting distinctions from non-Amish woodworking shops to keep in accordance with conservative guidelines.

For example, the generator, which runs on natural gas and solar power, keeps the shop off the public power lines. The offices have two desktop computers for accounting, downloading job files via e-mail, and operation controls for the generator, air compressor, three Nederman dust collectors, and shop lighting, but are blocked from access to the Internet.

Yoder wants to add volume. His next big move is offering customers the option of connectors for quicker assembly. He has ordered an SCM Omal HBD 1300 PT CNC bore and insertion machine that will be used with Peanut 3 connectors from ITF Intelligent Fixings in Stevenage, England.

“Our customers want to know how we can further help speed up their cabinet assembly process, so after much research we are now excited to bring the Peanut connector into our process. The next phase we’d like to be growing in is the closet industry, and by doing this we see that connectors will be essential. If our customers have a faster, better experience in assembling cabinetry, that in return will bring more work to us,” says Yoder.

“We’ll add more employees if we need to. Our facility has room for a few more. However, we will very closely look at how we can automate the process more, instead of only adding personnel.”

Yoder is proud of his shop and welcomes customers for a tour, which has been good for business.

“Times are different than years before. This industry is a lot more open minded than it used to be, more willing to share and network with each other. I think the less we look at each other as competitors, the more we will be available to help each other in time of need, because in all reality my machines will break down and I will need [their] help. Having this mind set is very important to us at Creative Woodworks.

“We’re unique to other shops because we only provide these machining services to other cabinet facilities. We have approximately $1 million in (annual) sales, that’s our service, and it is doing well for us.

“We give all honor and glory to the only one deserving this, our Master, our Creator, Lord of Lords, and King of Kings, Jesus Christ our Saviour and Redeemer.”

For contact information, visit creativewoodworks.net.  

This article was originally published in the August 2023 issue.