How to Choose Kitchens for a Multi-Unit Development

Kitchens on a development are a logistics exercise dressed up as a design decision. The design part is usually settled in an afternoon. What consumes the following six months is quantities, phasing, storage on site, and the moment in phase three when someone discovers that the worktop décor used in phase one is no longer the same.

This guide covers how to structure the specification so those problems do not arise, and what to hand a supplier so the scheme can be priced and released properly.

Start with the unit mix, not the kitchen

Before anyone looks at a door style, write down the unit mix and the sales or rental position of each type. A scheme of 40 units with three house types is really three kitchen specifications repeated, not 40 individual jobs — and the sooner it is structured that way, the less it costs to run.

For each type, record the room size and shape, the appliance level the sales price supports, and whether the kitchen is visible from the entrance hall. That last one matters more than people expect: an open-plan kitchen that is the first thing a viewer sees justifies spend that a galley behind a door does not.

One cabinet platform, finishes by tier

This is the single most valuable decision on the whole scheme. Use the same cabinet range, the same construction and the same standard widths in every plot, and let the tiers differ only in what a buyer can see.

The benefits compound. Your quantity schedule uses one set of product codes. Site can move a cabinet between plots without checking anything. Snagging replacements come from one list. And years later, when a buyer damages a door, the replacement is a standard part rather than an investigation.

Every row below the first is a visible item that can be changed without touching the carcass schedule. That is the whole point of the structure.

Building the quantity schedule

Write one schedule per plot type, then state how many of each type you need. “Two-bed apartment × 14” is checkable in a minute; a single flat list of 340 cabinets is not, and it cannot survive a design change.

Each plot-type schedule should run in fitting order and use the categories the supplier stocks: highline base, drawerline base, wall, corner, larder, appliance housing, bridging and boiler units, drawn from the full unit range. Then doors, panels and trims, worktops, hardware, and appliances.

Two multipliers catch people out at development scale. Handles are counted per door and per drawer front, so the number is well above the cabinet count. End panels are counted per exposed cabinet end, which on a scheme with island runs or peninsulas can be double what a quick estimate suggests. Get both wrong across 40 plots and the shortfall is significant.

Worktops across many units

Worktops need planning at scheme level rather than plot level, because they are supplied as pre-finished lengths and cut on site.

Give run lengths wall by wall for each plot type. Then look at the totals across the scheme and check how the runs fall against available board lengths, because the difference between a layout that yields two usable runs per board and one that yields one is real money at volume. It is sometimes worth moving a cabinet 100mm at design stage to change that arithmetic.

Brooklands supplies Kronodesign and Duropal laminate worktops in postformed and square-edged profiles, with lengths, depths and thicknesses varying by décor and listed on each product page. Order upstands and splashbacks in the same décor on the same releases so that a plot fitted in month nine matches one fitted in month two. Cutting, jointing, cut-outs and templating happen on site — the supply is material, and your fitting team fabricates it.

Phasing delivery against the programme

Taking a whole scheme's kitchens in one delivery is almost always a mistake. Boxed kitchens occupy a great deal of dry, secure space, and a plot that is not watertight is not a store.

Release against the programme instead, in blocks that match how the plots come up for second fix. When you agree the schedule, give the supplier the plot numbers in each release and the sequence you expect them in, so the releases can be picked as complete kitchens rather than as loose stock.

• Nominate a delivery contact per release — someone who will be on site and can take the goods.
• Confirm access: hardstanding, turning space, lift availability on apartment schemes.
• Check on the day of delivery, not on the day of fit. Damage or shortages should be reported within 48 hours.
• Keep one plot's worth of contingency for snagging rather than reordering single items later.

Delivery is fully tracked across mainland UK, with larger kitchen and worktop deliveries on a dedicated service and the day arranged with you; timing is confirmed when the order or quotation is finalised. Scottish Highlands and Islands, Northern Ireland, offshore and certain remote postcodes may be excluded or surcharged, and that is always confirmed before an order is processed — see the delivery page.

Decide per release whether cabinets come fully rigid or flat-packed. Rigid removes assembly labour from the critical path at second fix and leaves far less packaging to clear from finished plots; flat-pack takes less storage and is easier to move through a tight apartment core. Rigid assembly does not include installation — the detail is on the rigid assembly page.

Value engineering: what to move, what to leave alone

When the number needs to come down, work through the visible items in order of what a buyer notices least.

• Move first: handle specification, splashback extent, appliance level in the lower tiers, worktop décor within the same profile.
• Move carefully: door style between tiers, drawer pack counts, larder provision.
• Leave alone: the cabinet platform, standard widths, and anything that makes plots differ from one another for no visible gain.

Reducing cabinet quality to save money on a scheme is a false economy, because it is the one element you cannot change later without taking the kitchen apart. Reducing the number of different things, on the other hand, saves money everywhere — in pricing, in picking, in storage, in snagging.

Availability risk on a long scheme

Any scheme running over several phases carries the risk that a décor, colour or appliance model changes during the programme. Plots fitted a year apart then do not match, which matters most on the items a buyer sees side by side in a show home and a completed plot.

Manage it deliberately. Agree the full specification for the whole scheme up front rather than phase by phase, so the supplier knows the total quantity involved. Ask directly whether any item in the specification is likely to change, and design in a fallback for anything that is. Where an appliance model is discontinued mid-scheme, the replacement must fit the same housing and aperture — so record the models against each plot type from the outset. Talk to the trade team early rather than at the point of each release.

What to send

To get a scheme priced, send the unit mix with quantities by plot type, a layout or measured schedule for each type, the finish tiers you intend to use, appliance models, and the outline programme with expected release dates and the site postcode. That is enough to price and to plan releases against.

Upload it through the project submission form, or email sales@brooklandskitchens.co.uk with the scheme name in the subject line. We aim to reply within one working day. Trade and project pricing is assessed individually according to the products, quantities and requirements of each project. There is more background on the multi-unit kitchen projects and kitchens for property developers pages, and if you would like the layouts checked before they are priced, the free planning service will review them.

For smaller schemes, or for a show home where the specification is not yet fixed, it is worth pricing a bundle deal against your schedule. The complete kitchens, door and appliance ranges are all listed with the detail you need to build a specification from.

Frequently asked questions