A certain age

Today’s acquisition announcement by Roy Frost, along with the tantalising forecast of more to follow, makes an interesting point about the prospects for many small-medium fabricators.

As he rightly says, the industry is at a certain age where many original owners are thinking about retirement, at just the time when the major fabs are urging more and more lifestyle businesses to shut up the factory and concentrate on the front end of the business. He is of course not the first to make this point but as the consolidation bandwagon keeps on rolling, the idea is seeming all the more poignant. Read Story

Elsewhere this week, Palmer reminds that the repercussions of the approach to Brexit are far from over Read Story, the latest Barbour report shows signs of optimism on the housing front Read Story, and the Wood Window Alliance wants to warn us of ‘plastic promises’ and ‘fake truths’ from the PVC-U lobby Read Story.

We hope you enjoy this week’s issue.

Chris Church Editor

Please send all your news stories to news@the-glazine.com

This Week's News

Frost is back – as a Eurocell fab

Former Deceuninck MD Roy Frost has returned to the industry spotlight with the purchase of a £12million sales Eurocell fabricator – along with more than a hint that other acquisitions might follow.

He has bought GJB, a 1,200 frames a week trade fabricator based in Rayleigh, Essex, from its previous owners Ken Blackman and founder Gary Bristow.

Read More Here...

‘Strong economic headwinds’ towards
Brexit – Palmer

The UK window industry faces strong economic headwinds and the dual challenges of a tougher second-time replacement market and wider economic uncertainty as the UK exits from Brussels, according to Robert Palmer of Palmer Market Research.

He says the post-Brexit phoney war is coming to an end and the realities of what will result in the case of a hard Brexit are now beginning to dawn.

This, he argues, is already exerting an impact on consumer confidence and with it economic growth. This slowed in the first quarter of 2017 to just 0.2% - the weakest in 12 months.

Read More Here...

Fake Facts! – ‘wood you believe it?’

The Wood Window Alliance has hit back at what it calls ‘fake facts’ from the PVC-U industry with a campaign dubbed #woodyoubelieveit to “stamp out some of the ‘truth twisting’ in the wood vs plastic debate", with a campaign focused on providing consumers with the real facts of the matter.

TheAliance says the campaign is to help home-owners and industry stakeholders distinguish the facts from the fiction, and is designed to “encourage consumers to think carefully about competing sales messages and about the impact of their choices on their health, homes and the planet.”

Read More Here...

Residential leads construction bounce-back

Residential building contracts soared to £2.5billion last month after dipping to £1.7bn in May, leading an overall 12%increase in all construction contracts, according to the latest edition of the Economic & Construction Market Review from industry analyst Barbour ABI. The report adds that four of the top ten biggest projects were in Residential.

Contract values awarded in June across all regions of Great Britain totalled £5.5 billion based on a three-month rolling average, up from the £4.9 billion in May.

Read More Here...

Six days to glory!

If there’s anyone out there who still doesn’t know – there are just six days left before the entries close for the G17 Awards, the one chance in the year for the brightest and best in the industry to be put under the eye of independent judges ready to gain the recognition they deserve.

We’re giving away no secrets to say there are already some tough contenders in every category – but then, there’s always room for just one more. If you know who that one might be, just click here and have your submission in by next Monday, July 31 and we may see you at the Awards Presentation and Gala Dinner on Friday,17 November at the London Hilton on Park Lane.

We Have Email

From: James Lister,
Operations Director, Anglo European

Steel has always been an integral part of the strengthening of window and door frames. Today it’s more important than ever, as homeowners demand wider windows with more glass and thinner frames. At Anglo European, we call them real-world windows and they are far bigger than the size that gets tested to meet the requirements for certification.

Surprisingly no changes have been made to the sizes of windows being tested for certification, even though there has been a big increase in the number of windows that exceed this size. We believe that the only way to tackle this issue is to have accurate information from testing real-world windows. We have an extensive testing schedule that covers all the main window systems in the UK.

Read More