Designers Desk

November 22, 2011

Northland based Foreno Tapware is proud to be the first tapware manufacturing company in Australasia to receive CodeMark Certification for a range of its products – an accreditation which reinforces the company’s brand values of producing Quality, Innovative and Healthy Tapware.

CodeMark in New Zealand is administered by the Department of Building and Housing, which developed the product certification scheme jointly with the Australian Building Codes Board.

CodeMark supports the use of new and innovative building products by providing a nationally and internationally accepted process for products to be assessed for compliance with the requirements of the building codes of Australia and New Zealand. The scheme provides confidence and certainty to regulatory authorities and the market through the issue of a Certificate of Conformity.

Put simply, this means that any CodeMark certified product in New Zealand is deemed to comply with the New Zealand Building Code when used and installed as specified, and therefore must be accepted by the relevant regulatory bodies. Great news for anyone wanting assurance on the products they choose to use when building or renovating.

Foreno sought CodeMark Certification in New Zealand to provide further evidence of their high standard of manufacturing and commitment to quality tapware products. This accreditation builds on their earlier achievements of Watermark Certification in February 2007 and registration under the Water Efficiency Labelling Scheme (WELs) which, while becoming mandatory in NZ in only 2010, has been voluntarily obtained by Foreno Tapware for more than four years.

Only two other product certificates have been issued in New Zealand so far – James Hardie’s Linea Weatherboard and Laminex’s Metaline Splashback – making Foreno Tapware the third company ever to achieve this certification in New Zealand. An achievement Foreno is proud of as both a tapware manufacturer and a New Zealand owned and operated company.

CEO for Foreno, William Webster comments on the importance of obtaining the CodeMark Certification.

“One of our goals at Foreno is to continually drive for improvement in both the design and quality of our tapware products for the New Zealand market. By supporting and complying with the CodeMark Scheme we are providing an independent test and able to give reassurance to our customers of the quality products we are providing.”

All tapware under Foreno’s Watermark Certification will receive the CodeMark Certification.  At this stage this represents 100 products in their expansive range of tapware with more being added on-going.

Watermark Certification is similar to CodeMark in that it provides a uniform approach to product approvals but relates strictly to plumbing products. It is recognised throughout Australia by plumbing regulatory bodies for demonstrating compliance with the Plumbing Code of Australia (PCA).  CodeMark takes that approval process a step further applying it to the building industry as a whole and, as it is managed by the NZ Department of Building and Housing and legislated under the Building Act 2004, it is relevant and applicable to the NZ market. CodeMark-certified products must be accepted as complying with the New Zealand Building Code when used and installed as their CodeMark certificates specify.

So what does this mean for every day tapware buyers?

“For the end user it means that by choosing a Foreno CodeMark Certified product, it takes away any doubt about the quality of the product.” says Tim Baker, Sales and Marketing Manager for Foreno Tapware.  “Plus, this ‘pre-approval’ means you can automatically add one more tick to the building consent process with 100% certainty that the product will be approved by the Building Consent Authority.”

For more information about CodeMark Certification you can visit Foreno’s website at www.foreno.co.nz or contact Tim Baker, Sales and Marketing Manager – Freephone 0508 367 366 or email at tim@foreno.co.nz