It becomes a ski

At first, the scene seems confusing. The large hall in the basement of the Blizzard production facility in Mittersill lies empty and deserted. Everything looks as if it hasn't been used for a long time. Light only penetrates through milky windows on one side of the room. Silence.

For Blizzard man Thorsten Steiner, however, the empty hall is a good sign. The company, which has been one of the best ski manufacturers in the world for more than 70 years, has completely switched to lean production. The aim is to avoid all unnecessary routes, work steps and materials. Today, only what will be processed in the near future is stored - including various components from the RATHGEBER Group. "Material that just sits around somewhere only costs money, we want to avoid that," explains Steiner. Delivery is exclusively "just in time". Accordingly, less space is required.

What this means can be seen on the first floor of the plant. The atmosphere here is completely different: the work stations for the individual production steps are lined up in the large hall. It roars and hisses, electric carts and their trailers meander through the corridors and supply the individual workstations with supplies.

In summary, this is how ski production works: The individual parts for a specimen are prepared, placed on top of each other and finally pressed together in a mold under great pressure and heat. Finally, excess material is cut off, the ski is sanded - and that's it. In reality, the whole thing is much more complicated, the organization of the processes alone is a job that never ends.

The process begins in the raw material warehouse right next to production. Several tons of material are delivered here every day, restacked and prepared for production. On one side of the warehouse, wooden slats are stacked neatly on pallets, almost up to the roof. It is cool in the warehouse, almost a little uncomfortable. The temperature is ideal for wood. "Wood is alive. Until we have pressed and glued it, it works," says Steiner. Wood is still the material with the largest volume share in the ski. The core essentially determines how the ski functions afterwards.

Carbon, Titanal - and still mainly wood

The wood cores differ greatly depending on the ski. Whether a lightweight touring ski, a comfortable piste cruiser or a rock-hard racing machine - the properties of the finished model are largely determined by the wood core. The processing does its part: first, the sidecut is cut out to make the ski tapered. Modern skis are slightly wider at the front and back and narrow in the middle. This increases edge grip and later enables carving, i.e. cutting tight turns at high speed.

The sidewalls are then laminated onto the ski. The sidewalls are not only the visible side of the finished ski, they also give the steel edge the necessary support and thus enable ideal power transmission. In a third step, the entire wood core is milled once. Afterwards, the ski is higher in the middle than at the ends at the front and back - this is the only way it can flex on the piste exactly as the developers intended for the respective area of use. From this moment onwards, the final shape of the finished ski is already clearly visible.

Back to the warehouse. "Of course, the ideal would be to process the material directly from the truck," explains Blizzard man Steiner. But we're not that far away after all. So pallets of wood cores, edges and side panels are temporarily stored every day. Further back, planks and surfaces are stacked one behind the other like in a very deep supermarket shelf. They are removed from the front and refilled from the back. In this way, nothing gets old and the quality remains high: coverings and surfaces, material for backings or intermediate layers. Plus fleece fabrics for intermediate layers, carbon and Titanal for insoles.

Advantage for the family business

"It is crucial for us that our suppliers also work within this system," says Thorsten Steiner. If even the smallest part is missing on day X, production is not possible - the worst case scenario. Steiner also sees advantages for a flexible partner like RATHGEBER because of these complex requirements. "With RATHGEBER, we don't need long lead times. And if in doubt, they can react extremely quickly to requirements. If I had to order every emblem, trim strip or badge in Asia, it would be extremely expensive. And it would simply take far too long."

Running change is when changes are made to the construction or design at short notice. The supplier must then also be able to react and help. "A family business from close by naturally has advantages," says Steiner. Overall: "None of our suppliers are huge corporations. We rely very heavily on smaller, flexible units" - in other words, classic SMEs.

The complexity of the requirements can be seen in the edges, for example. They are always made of steel and yet are very different. Depending on the model, they come in different hardnesses, thicknesses or finishes. Continuous solid edges are used for racing skis, for example. Slit edges make the ski softer and more comfortable. Touring skis have very thin edges, which saves weight. In addition to the individual models, there are also different lengths. This also applies to the sidewalls or the very elaborate screen printing at Blizzard. Five to seven screens are required per ski design, which quickly adds up to 35 to 40 screens per model across all lengths.

Once the skis have been sanded, checked, packaged and labeled, it's time to go down another floor. In a small part of the former warehouse, thousands of finished skis stand in long rows waiting to be shipped. But not for long. Skis that just stand around cost money unnecessarily.