Whether you own your property and want the kitchen of your dreams, or you are searching for a rental property and feel that the kitchen needs to be redone, help is at hand with the arrival of the 3,000 square foot Häcker kitchen showroom in Al Barsha.
Although German-based Häcker Kitchens have been around for the past 40 years, the new showroom is good news for UAE residents. With innovative designs and the latest in technology, they plan to spruce up the most tired of kitchens.
But if you are a tenant in a property and think that spending money on a kitchen, only to give it back at the end of your lease seems inconceivable, think again. As part of Häcker's service you can even dismantle the kitchen and take it to your new home, should you move.
Their products are so revolutionary that even shipping them to the UAE is extremely high tech. Samir Ranavaya, one of the enthusiastic partners of Häcker in the UAE, explains, "There is a black box fixed inside the container, just like the ones you get on a plane. It can tell if the container has been dropped and even what the humidity levels are like. The Häcker factories have just the same standards."
Technology has certainly improved over the years, although Häcker has always been ambitious. Steven Pardoe, the other partner involved in the Dubai enterprise, says, "Häcker is a German family-run business. It started out as a small bespoke furniture company and has become the largest independent high-end kitchen exporter in the world."
Now with a turnover of €295 million (about Dh1.4 billion), there is hardly anything Häcker finds impossible. "There are almost nine million options with Häcker; they might not all be in the catalogue, but they can be done," continues Pardoe. "There are endless choices. You can choose the height, the depth, the finishes such as high gloss or lacquers. There is so much choice and the products are also very user-friendly."
The range from Häcker is definitely highly diverse. Products range from traditional kitchens with a modern twist to the latest high performance designs such as their Phantom collection which allows you to glide the top of the unit away from you without any movement from the side panels, giving you the illusion of a floating work surface. While that may impress even the most fastidious homeowner, remote controlled doors are another exciting option for customers.
Worktops, meanwhile, provide another barrage of choices. Ranavaya advises, "Worktops come in different materials. We have everything from more exotic stones that aren't readily available in Dubai, granite and marbles from Europe and exotic stones from Brazil. We also have quartz engineered silestone that comes in funky colours and is very high performing and stain-resistant."
With so many choices, making a decision could be difficult, but thankfully there is a design team on hand who can help with decision making and all the staff have been trained by Häcker in Germany. Ross Pinkerton has been designing kitchens for the past 20 years and works in the showroom.
He says, "My job is to make buying a kitchen stress-free. I do the layout on our CAD system and, when the customer comes in, I show them what the kitchen will look like in 3-D."
Pardoe adds, "The customer comes in to meet Ross and it then takes around one to two weeks to get everything absolutely right. The CAD system is linked directly to Häcker in Germany so we can see exactly what is available. It then takes approximately three weeks for production and three to four weeks to get to the UAE."
Once the kitchen arrives, Häcker's trained kitchen fitters take around three to five days to fit the units followed by another week or so to finish all the work surfaces. That just leaves the kitchen appliances and, in order to complement the kitchens, Häcker have teamed up with leading German appliance manufacturers, Miele. While this will provide the finishing touch for the designer kitchens, through this partnership the showroom will also hold social evenings.
Pardoe says, "Every other month we will be hosting networking events. Through Miele we will have chefs doing demonstrations and we plan on getting architects, designers and other like-minded people together."
