Stainless steel fabrication for HoReCa: you sell a surface, not a part.
A guide to work tables, sinks, hoods and professional kitchen fit-outs. Why the stainless you deliver appears to rust and how you prevent it, the four finish levels and why they are quoted separately, plus the four hygiene rules that change the drawing, not the fabrication.
Of the flow of a stainless workshop, we equip from the catalogue the part covering part forming: laser cutting, bending, rolling and shearing. The equipment for TIG welding, grinding, brushing and passivation is not part of the standard catalogue and is sourced separately. We mention it explicitly because with stainless it is precisely those operations that decide whether the job is accepted.
The customer is not buying a part.
They buy a surface that passes the inspection.
In HoReCa a stainless table is judged on three criteria an ordinary fabrication workshop does not account for: it can be cleaned completely, it looks uniform next to the adjoining parts, and it does not stain after a month. All three are decided before welding.
The margin is on finish and on shape
Everyone buys sheet at similar prices. The difference is made by curved parts, which require rolling, and by the finish level, which is pure labour on the same material. A workshop delivering only flat, mill-finish parts competes on price alone.
Demand comes in waves of fit-outs
Every restaurant that opens, every kitchen that is refurbished is a complete order, with a deadline tied to the opening date. Whoever delivers on time becomes the fit-out company's default supplier, and that company comes back with the next project.
The product is not imported
Tables and sinks are made to the real kitchen dimensions, are hard to transport and are installed on site. The market is local and protected by logistics, exactly as with stone countertops or made-to-order furniture.
The complaint arrives late
Contamination spots appear two or three weeks after delivery, when you can no longer prove anything. That is why the discipline of separating stainless is not an organisational preference, it is the insurance policy of the business.
Stainless does not rust.
It is the iron left on it that rusts.
Five causes, all of them contamination, all avoidable with measures that cost almost nothing: a separate rack, a dedicated tool set, its own workbench, distance from steel cutting, and final passivation.
The practical problem is that the effect appears late, at the customer's site, when the conversation is no longer technical but commercial. That is why prevention is the only strategy that works.
Three configurations,
three types of accessible work.
The most important difference between the levels is rolling: without it you stay on flat parts, that is on the lowest-margin side of any fit-out.
A small workshop supplying local restaurants and canteens, with standardisable products.
- Without rolling you cannot make hoods, curved elements and ducting, that is the highest-margin work.
- The finish stays entirely manual, so polishing time limits how much you can deliver per week.
- A single TIG welder is a single point of failure: their holiday stops deliveries, however well you cut.
A manufacturer delivering complete professional kitchen fit-outs, through fit-out companies or directly.
- The finish becomes the bottleneck: a finely brushed part consumes several times more time than a mill-finish one.
- You need a clean finishing area. A perfectly polished part is ruined in a zone with metal dust.
- The aesthetic requirements of fit-outs are strict: brush direction and uniformity between panels are checked at handover.
A manufacturer delivering equipment that comes into direct contact with the food product.
- Surface and traceability requirements rise significantly. Documentation becomes part of the product.
- Welding requires qualified procedures, and the bead is inspected. It is no longer a matter of appearance, it is one of conformity.
- Passivation and surface inspection become mandatory operations, with dedicated equipment and chemicals.
What happens, precisely
from sheet to accepted part.
Stainless is stored on its own marked rack, with no contact with carbon steel. A single day on the same rack is enough for iron particles to adhere to the surface.
The protective film is kept on for as long as possible through the flow and removed only before finishing. Handling scratches cannot be repaired on a finely brushed surface.
The rolling direction of the sheet is recorded too. On adjoining brushed parts the brush direction has to be the same, and that is tied to how you nested the parts in the sheet.
The finish is labour,
so it is quoted separately.
The same sheet, four different products. The difference is not the material, it is the number of polishing passes, each consuming real time per square metre. Brushed is the HoReCa standard; mirror appears only decoratively and has the drawback of showing every scratch.
And the detail most often missed: the brush direction has to be the same across all adjoining parts. A panel brushed the other way is seen at first glance and is grounds for rejection.
Hygiene changes the drawing,
not just the cleaning.
Four rules settled at the drawing stage that cannot be corrected during fabrication: internal radii instead of sharp corners, a continuous ground weld, a surface with no gaps, folded or deburred edges.
An ordinary metal fabrication workshop does not think in these terms, which is why many technically correct parts are rejected at handover in a professional kitchen.
Four categories,
with steadily rising demands.
Restaurants and hotels
Directly or through fit-out companies. Work tables, sinks, hoods, shelving. Medium aesthetic requirements, deadlines tied to the opening.
Catering and canteens
Volume equipment, standardisable, focused on robustness and ease of cleaning rather than appearance.
Confectionery and pastry
Strict hygiene requirements and surfaces with no gaps. Smaller parts, but more demanding to fabricate.
Small food industry
Vats, tanks, conveyors. Direct contact with the product, therefore welding procedures and documentation.
Ten mistakes,
and the first three only show at the customer's site.
The peculiarity of stainless: the mistake is not visible when the part leaves the workshop. It shows up weeks later, on a surface where you can no longer prove where the contamination came from.
You store the stainless next to carbon steel, and the spots appear at the customer's site, three weeks after delivery.
You use the same brushes and discs on stainless and on steel, contaminating every part you touch.
You skip passivation, so you neither restore the passive layer nor remove the iron particles.
You fold the finish into a single price per square metre, then lose on every job with aesthetic requirements.
You brush adjoining panels in different directions, and the job is rejected for a purely aesthetic reason.
You cut with oxygen to save on gas, then dress every oxidised edge by hand.
You weld continuously on thin sheet, in the wrong sequence, and the top comes out wavy and cannot be straightened.
You draw sharp internal corners, and the part fails the hygiene inspection.
You finish in the same area where carbon steel is worked, contaminating the part right at the end.
You have no second TIG welder, so one person's holiday stops all deliveries.
From the decision to the first fit-out delivered,
in 90 days.
The segment and the standard products
- You choose the segment: HoReCa fit-outs, catering, confectionery or food industry.
- You settle on two or three standard products you will repeat: table, sink, shelf.
- You check who does fit-outs in your area and how they buy: directly or through fit-out companies.
Configuring the part forming
- You receive the cutting, bending and rolling configuration for your thicknesses and formats.
- We settle what is sourced separately: TIG welding, grinding, brushing, passivation.
- You finalise the building layout with the stainless area and the finishing area physically separated.
Financing and suppliers
- You submit the leasing or credit file for the forming machines, with a down payment from 0%.
- You conclude the supply agreements for stainless sheet, on running finishes and grades.
- You purchase the welding and finishing equipment, separately from the main machines.
Preparing the building
- A rack dedicated to stainless, a marked tool set, a clean finishing area, fume extraction at the welding bay.
- Dry compressed air, nitrogen for cutting, extraction at the laser.
- Recruiting and training the TIG welders and the finisher.
The first job delivered
- Commissioning, cutting settings for stainless, the first part measured and corrected.
- A complete trial product, finished to the required level and passivated.
- The first fit-out delivered, with a signed handover and the finish sample approved in advance.
The forming machines
are financed through leasing.
Cutting, bending and rolling go into a straightforward application, with a down payment from 0% and the first instalment after delivery. The welding and finishing equipment, being outside our catalogue, is covered separately, but it is a far smaller amount than the main machines.
About fabrication
in stainless steel for HoReCa.
You get the machine configuration for cutting, bending, rolling and shearing, that is the part-forming side. TIG welding, grinding, brushing and passivation are operations whose equipment is not part of our standard catalogue and which we state explicitly as being sourced separately. You bring the building, the welders and the customers.
Tell us what work you are targeting
and what finish your customers ask for.
The type of fit-outs, the stainless thicknesses and the finish level required. You receive the cutting, bending and rolling configuration, the recommended nitrogen cutting settings, the plan for separating the stainless area, and the list of welding and finishing equipment sourced separately.
Let's build your
next project together.
Contact our team and receive a personalized offer within a maximum of 24 working hours.
10 Poitiers Blvd, 700671 Iași, Romania