Best-Halls can now be found in more than fifty countries from Northern Norway to Antarctica

The restrictions applied this spring may have closed the borders for a while, but it has been great to see that our international customers’ faith in us has also continued through these uncertain times. Several completed halls have been waiting to be sent off and installed as soon as it is possible. And I’m happy to say that the time is now. When you are planning a larger hall investment, it is good to have an experienced partner who is familiar with the local building legislation and weather conditions.

Internationality has been a part of Best-Hall’s core business for 45 years. First, we headed to the Nordic countries and then continued to expand our expertise to elsewhere in Europe and to Russia. Today, our halls can be found in more than 50 countries from Northern Norway to Antarctica.
Even though Best-Hall is a strongly Finnish company, about 30–60% of our business takes place on international markets. Thanks to our extensive agent network, we have strong local competence and contacts to local construction operators in all key export countries. Best-Hall products meet the demanding international standards as well as the local building control criteria. Each hall is also dimensioned in accordance with the wind and snow loads determined in the local construction norms.

A look into the last decade of export
In my own role as an export coordinator, I get to see every day the many various purposes and needs that our steel frame structured halls are used for all over the world. I decided to study the matter a little closer and show, in numbers, what kinds of halls we have sent out into the world here from Kälviä in the past decade and where they have ended up.

And this is what I discovered.

In 2010–2019, Best-Hall manufactured 363 halls for export to 25 different countries. Our halls take up a land area of more than 762,000 m2, of which around 507,000 m2 are storage halls and about 195,000 m2 are sports halls.

During the last decade, our halls have been most popular in Austria, and we have delivered more than a third of our hall stock there. Other strong export countries include Estonia, Great Britain and Norway, for example.

Versatile and adaptable storage halls have been our most sought-after product on the international markets, making up about 70% of the total export volume. This kind of storage hall solution is ideal for storing timber, for example, as the automatic air drying system guarantees a stable moisture level in the hall at all times.

Up to 20% of our export is made up by various sports halls. Flexible in its dimensions, this pillarless PVC hall with a steel frame structure is a cost-efficient solution that is ideal for a sports hall, as they can be equipped to be a cold, semi-warm or warm hall, depending on the customer’s needs. In fact, Best-Hall’s solutions are used as ice rinks, ball game halls and swimming halls alike across the world.

We have also manufactured structures such as aircraft halls, waste and recycling halls, production halls, exhibition halls – and even a casino.

Best-Hall’s advantages on international markets
Versatility is a word that describes the advantages of a steel frame structured hall well, as these halls offer nearly limitless possibilities. We strive to meet even the most demanding requests of our international customers, as a PVC hall is a surprisingly adaptable structure.

The proportion of exports in our business will continue to grow in the future.

But what makes Best-Hall an excellent partner for hall construction all over the world? Our customers have listed a few of our strengths:

• We have decades of experience of the target countries. We identify the customers’ needs and are able to meet them. We already have the necessary competence and networks. We have a good international reputation and our halls are well known. We have an extensive selection of reference cases all over the world.
• Our halls are of high quality, also when measured against international standards. In addition to high-quality raw materials, we invest in traceability. All work stages from the design process to manufacturing are carried out at our own factory, and we are able to tell at which workstation and by which employee all parts were made. We are able to guarantee that our work has an even, high quality.
• As constructors, we share sustainable values. We also treat our employees well and compensate them fairly for their work. All our employees can take pride in their work and stand by our products. Instead of lowering the manufacturing costs by producing our products abroad, we have ensured our competitiveness by refining our operations and making them more efficient.
• We are able to respond to the trend of prefabricated, fast construction very well. Our halls are manufactured at our own factory and transported to the construction site as separate parts. Our installation team then sets up the hall, which can take less than a week, at its fastest. The installation of a 1,500 m2 hall, for example, takes about three weeks.
• We invest in sustainable development and strive to minimise the environmental impacts of construction. As a first operator in Finland, we are able to calculate a hall’s carbon footprint for the entirety of its life cycle and can help the customer choose a hall solution that emits as little emissions as possible. We are also able to offer our customers the chance to offset their carbon footprint.
• We provide our customers with international maintenance and support services for the hall’s entire service life, which ensures that the hall will continue to meet the customer’s needs also in the future. If the customer wishes to make changes to the hall later, add some equipment or expand or move the hall, for example, we are able to help. We are also here to help with any maintenance or repair needs.
• The customer’s needs are the focus of our entire construction process. All our halls are built to meet the individual demands of the customer and their construction place. Our project managers constantly communicate with the local representative, ensuring that the customer is up-to-date with the project’s progress from its planning to the hall’s handover.

I’m sure that our customers can safely continue to lean on our experience and high quality also in the future.

It is exciting to start the next decade, delivering halls around the world. Hopefully we will reach even more countries. I will be interested to see if we can deliver halls to up to a hundred different countries in the next decade! I believe we are off to a good start.