After more than six years of product design, development and refinement, the Van Wijks were rewarded for their efforts to create a world-class product with the Chairman's Award at the prize-giving banquet in Sandton last week Thursday, 30 October 2008.
The SABS Design Excellence Awards recognise and promote exceptional indigenous design - and the Van Wijks were one of 14 winners to receive this year's award. Together the winning entries represent some of the best product designs to come out of South Africa in recent years.
The Chairman's Award is chosen annually from the winning entries and voted for by the panel of adjudicators.
Promoting internationally competitive design will help to grow South Africa's economy, says Professor Ian Jandrell, head of the School of Electrical and Information Engineering at Wits University and chief judge at the SABS Design Excellence Awards.
Jandrell believes that today's innovators are tomorrow's exporters and designers thus need to focus on creating world-class products that can compete in international markets.
Professor Jandrell, who has been on the panel for 10 years, said the Orga8 and Orga15 were worthy winners and had caught the panel's attention for several reasons.
“We really liked the use of recycled material and the brilliant, clever design of these filing systems,” he said. “You can see that the product is fully resolved; every aspect of the design has been thought through from the way it looks and feels to how it is made and the way it works - all the loops have been closed. The developers have shown a real understanding of what it takes to turn a great idea into a world product.”
The SABS award comes after the entrepreneurial duo received international recognition at last year's Best of Canada Design Awards, while Van Wijk senior's business, Orgafile, is also a nominee in this year's Cape Talk Small Business Awards.
The products for which they received both design awards - the Orga8 and Orga15 Modular Filing Systems - offer several innovative features, including modularity, flexibility and the use of environmentally-friendly materials.
Arnold van Wijk (father of the twosome) is a veteran businessman in the SA filing industry, having founded and built up one the country's oldest and biggest filing companies, Optiplan, before selling it off in the 1990s.
Van Wijk has since spent what should have been his retirement years developing the Orga8 and Orga15 filing units with his industrial designer son Adrian and expressed his delight at winning South Africa's top design award.
“It feels fantastic to get local recognition after all the years of effort we have put into this product,” he said. “I always believed in what we were trying to achieve with this filing system and this recognition shows that others can also see the value of what we have achieved.
“I hope the South African public will agree with the SABS and see that what we are offering is very different to what is already on the market.”
Modularity is one of the key unique benefits of the Orga8 and Orga15, sold through Orgafile. Unlike the steel four-drawer filing cabinets that most people are familiar with, these units are made up of separate, stackable drawers that can be bought separately and combined in a way that suits the owner.
This modular design allows for greater flexibility as it allows one to “grow as you go” or convert a four-drawer cabinet into two two-drawer cabinets, for example, as and when is needed.
Van Wijk says the products also come with today's sought-after green credentials.
“The filing modules make use of new technology wood extrusions that use post-consumer wood fibre to make the finished product. The material does not contain any toxic materials, like formaldehyde (contained in chipboard), which makes it safer for use in the office and home,” he said.
Van Wijk junior, who led the design process, is an impassioned green enthusiast committed to eco-friendly design and said that taking on the environmental challenge is made somewhat easier with the recognition received last night.
“Green technology will become more cost efficient in the future, but at this early stage most companies are still investing in old technologies that make economic sense and are low-risk,” explains Van Wijk. “It always takes a pioneer to pave the way for others, bear the risks and carry the cost of innovation - and this is what we are doing with these products.
“My father and I have always believed in our filing solution and with his business acumen and my design skills we have been able to achieve our vision. We can now even say that we have achieved it with success.”
Go to www.orgafile.com for more information.
