Design & Product Development

Design

We often work with our client’s own staff, or third party product designers. This interaction to combine our injection moulding expertise with design considerations at the concept stage can produce significant cost reductions from the outset. Key areas where considerable savings can be made are tool design, material selection and manufacturing requirements. We work closely with local Toolmakers to provide quality tooling at competitive prices.

Product

It’s not unusual for us to spend many hours over a considerable length of time, sometimes years, assisting our clients in developing and improving their products. It is just as important to us to get it right as it is to our clients! We really do take pride in providing a service that is second to none.

Case Studies and Current News

March 2018 – Exciting times ahead for the Destra Team as Sarah Williams takes over as Managing Director and Kevin Hare continues as Production Director following a successful Management Buyout which will ensure that existing clients continue to benefit from the security of knowing the manufacture of their products will remain in good hands.
April 2018 – Destra are delighted to have been selected as one of 10 local companies to participate in the Scale Up Ashford programme run by Ashford Borough Council and the Kent Chamber of Commerce to promote business growth within the borough. We will be receiving valuable one to one monthly business mentoring for the next year to help inject fresh ideas and reinforce our strong business ethics.
April 2018 – What a month this is turning out to be! We have received one of our largest ever moulding orders and will be processing over 5½ tonnes of specified polymers over the next 6 months to produce over 160,000 components for one customer.
May 2018 – After working with one of our clients for several months last year on product design and material selection, we have been eagerly awaiting the arrival of two new tools ready to start production on their innovative new product. One of the tools has been designed to mould two different sets of levers using a switchable gate – this has saved the client the expense of having two multi-cavity tools and reduced production costs as we only need to switch the flow of plastic within the tool without having to take it out of the machine or change tools.
This month we welcome not one but two new members to the Destra Team to boost our production capacity.
June 2018 – We are awaiting delivery of a new tool commissioned by one of our existing clients that has been manufactured in China. The component it produces will be an add-onn product to one of their existing products and will include Pad Printed areas, one of which could be quite challenging due to the component design! We will be arranging the manufacture of Cliche plates and inks once we have a confirmed delivery date for the tooling.
July 2018 – Another exciting, incredible month as we welcome another member to the Destra Team and the hard work of everyone is really visible as we break the record for the highest ever turnover for the month!
August 2018 – Fantastic news as not only did we break the turnover record for the second month running, we absolutely SMASHED IT! What a Team, what a company!
September 2018 – This is the kind of challenge we LOVE! Our client is looking for an incredibly quick turn around for new tooling as they have tight deadlines to keep to, to get their product launched and on to the market. The product is a very sleek looking bespoke electronics enclosure that has been cleverly designed to reduce moulding and assembly times. To keep the tooling costs down, the layout of one of the tools is designed to have FOUR interchangeable inserts to enable us to mould four variations of interlocking clips that will be part of the final enclosure assembly – so much more cost effective than one tool to produce each component or even a multi-cavity tool. Our toolmaker is designing the tool so that insert changes can be carried out whilst the tool is in the machine, thus reducing considerably the change over time from component to component and keeping the individual moulding prices low. The two new tools are due in in November … watch this space for updates!
Another great example of how we can really push down the initial expense of tooling set up and keep component costs down with careful product design, tool layouts and final assembly considerations.