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Colour
DEMAND FOR COLOUR FUELS 40% GROWTH FOR DECEUNINCK IN Q1 2021
Deceuninck has reported growth of 40%, year-on-year, for the first quarter of 2021, following high levels of activity in the retail sector and strong demand for premium products including flush casements, colour and finish.
Rob McGlennon, Deceuninck’s Managing Director, commented: “We enjoyed consecutive months of record sales under lockdown conditions in the latter half of last year and that has carried through into the start of 2021.
“This has been fuelled by the home improvement boom created by Covid, but also by increasing demand from consumers for higher value items and especially for colour. The strength of our colour offer, which extends to 30 colourways available from stock, and an additional 20 options in just 15 working days, means that Deceuninck fabricators have been extremely well placed to benefit from this,” he continued.
“We know that, on average, our customers sell twice the amount of foiled product as their competitors. For some, it now accounts for as much as 60% of their total output.” The first quarter figures coincide with a recent YouGov report, commissioned exclusively for Deceuninck, that reveals fresh insight into the influence of colour and finish on homeowner purchasing decisions. The survey found that 75% of homeowners said that choice of colour was important when considering new windows and doors, with 96% stating that a match to the overall appearance of their property was also key. The report also identified specific preferences for colour depending on demographic, for instance for younger homeowners in their 30s compared to those aged 50 or over, as well as for type and age of property and also for other factors including security, energy efficiency and cost.
“Our survey has reinforced the existing feedback we have on demand for colour,” concluded Rob. “But it has also revealed a gold mine of data that will allow our customers to sell even more effectively, and to fully capitalise on anticipated demand for the remainder of 2021.”
For more information, call Deceuninck on 01249 816 969, email deceuninck.ltd@deceuninck.com or visit www.deceuninck.co.uk. AN INDUSTRY LEADING COLOUR COATING SPECIALIST AN INDUSTRY LEADING COLOUR COATING SPECIALIST FOR WINDOWS, DOORS, AND ROOFLINE FOR WINDOWS, DOORS, AND ROOFLINE
ANY COLOUR IN 5 DAYS
ANY COLOUR IN 5 DAYS Get a FREE Quote on 01924 454856 or visit
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Get a FREE Quote on 01924 454856 The industry’s favourite colour coating specialist or visit www.glassnews.co.uk | June 2021 kolorseal.co.uk
SPONSORED BY GQA AND BUILDING OUR SKILLS
GQA Qualifications is the only issuer of CSCS cards for the Glass and Fenestration industries. Building Our Skills is a strategic campaign designed to help bridge the growing skills gap in the Fenestration Industry
NEW APPOINTMENTS NEW APPOINTMENTS
QUICKSLIDE COLLABORATES WITH BOS FOR ITS APPRENTICE PROJECT
When Brighouse window and door fabricator Quickslide decided to create an apprentice scheme as a further means of encouraging young people to join the business, the firm turned to glazing industry skills and career advisory organisation Building Our Skills (BOS) for guidance on achieving the best outcome for its project.
BOS was created to bridge the growing skills gap faced by the industry, by working closely with employers and other organisations to attract young and new entrants and by advising on areas of upskilling the existing workforce to ensure it can meet future challenges and continue to prosper. As part of its quest to ‘inform, encourage, support and inspire’, BOS also works with a number of organisations to enable companies to implement recruitment and training schemes, such as that developed for Quickslide. After contacting BOS for guidance on employing young people to join the company as apprentices, Quickslide was connected with GFTS Ltd, an organisation that specialises in providing training within the fenestration and construction industries. Working with the head of Quickslide’s Human Resources team, Rachael Doran, GFTS is providing guidance on apprenticeship schemes and strategies for recruitment and training. The organisation will also work with Quickslide to find suitable candidates, carry out initial vetting and assistance with interviews. Rachael Doran commented: “Amongst a number of other initiatives that Quickslide is implementing to bring new people to the company and provide training for new and our existing staff, we are determined to bring young people into our business and the glazing industry,” she explained. “As Building Our Skills sets out to demonstrate to young and new people, the fenestration industry continues to be incredibly successful, even throughout the difficult times of the past year and there are tremendous opportunities for careers with various skill sets that will set people up for life,” she added.
Quickslide Chairman Adrian Barraclough is passionate about the development of young people in the business: “Through an introduction by Stephanie Tague at BOS, we are now working with GFTS to find two apprentices initially, to come and join us at Quickslide, specifically in our frame production facilities,” he said. “We have many people with us at Quickslide who took a job with us and now have a career,” he said, “and there are tremendous opportunities at Quickslide for development and progression within a business that is growing very quickly. BOS is an excellent initiative to show people what a great industry this is.” www.quickslide.co.uk; www.buildingourskills.co.uk www.gftsltd.co.uk
Garnalex continues to offer unrivalled support to its Sheerline customers through the appointment of a Technical Services and Support Director.
Andy Russell joined the team in April and will strengthen technical support as Sheerline’s network of fabricators continues to grow. Having worked in the industry since the 1980s, Andy will use his extensive experience and knowledge to bolster technical services and support for Sheerline’s innovative aluminium window and door system. Andy was delighted when the opportunity arose to join Garnalex, having previously worked at window system companies Eurocell and Liniar.
Andy says: “It’s great to be working with a highly motivated group of people, many of whom I’ve worked with before. I’m looking forward to the challenges this new role will bring and to be part of something that’s on an exciting growth trajectory. “I’m responsible for the technical team and will be overseeing the support side of the business. My department will provide technical support for the sales team out on the road. We will undertake tooling audits and provide better support for new and existing customers. We will be on site for the customer changeover and provide training on all our product range. “In the short term, I want to very quickly ensure we have robust procedures in place to enable us to offer the best possible support for our customers. New products will be introduced going forward and we will implement systems that not only help us provide technical training for existing customers, but also support new customers when they come on board. I know we will continue to see lots of new business over the coming weeks and months. I’m excited to be part of Garnalex and the Sheerline journey.” Award-winning aluminium window and door system Sheerline has already transformed the residential aluminium market. Developed from the ground up by a team of experts, Sheerline is designed with the fabricator, installer and homeowner in mind.
Garnalex CEO Roger Hartshorn says: “We’re really pleased to welcome Andy to our growing team. Andy’s expertise, borne of several decades working in the window industry will help us provide first class technical support and service. Sheerline is a system with innovation at its very heart and that innovation extends not only to our design and manufacturing processes but to the service we provide customers. Andy will play a major part in seeing that service innovation thrives at Garnalex.”
For more information about the range of Sheerline products available, visit www. sheerline.com and www.sheerlinevideo. com. You can also call 01332 883960 or email info@sheerline.com. Follow @ SheerlineSystem and @GarnalexSystems for the latest news and updates.
Garnalex strengthens technical support with Andy Russell’s appointment as Technical Services and Support Director
CAREERS BUILDING OUR SKILLS SIGNS PARTNERSHIP WITH MILITARY TRANSITION SUPPORT AGENCY
Building Our Skills – Making Fenestration a Career of Choice is delighted to announce it has signed a partnership with FrontFoot, specialists in re-introducing service personnel into mainstream industry as a part of its aim to bridge the skills gap in the fenestration industry.
It is the latest initiative from BOS following the signing of a similar partnership to engage directly with the education sector to raise awareness of fenestration as a way of inspiring future generations to make the industry a home for their skills and career ambitions.
Announcing the new partnership, Building Our Skills ambassador John Ogilvie said: “Engaging with FrontFoot to bring military service personnel into the fenestration industry is the latest in a growing list of key strategic partnerships we are forming to help us bridge the skills gap, and we are delighted to bring this one to fruition. “Everyone recognises the value that service personnel bring to the world of employment, and we are delighted that we have now formed a direct link between our industry and those who can introduce our employers to the talent pool that is available, and most importantly, is available right now. “As we continue with our longer-term journey to engage with the education sector to impart knowledge of our industry into the minds of the future workforce, we have very high hopes that this new relationship will help those looking to add to their workforce right now. “Our first initiative with FrontFoot is to ask them to identify service personnel who would like to become window and door installers.
“We will be building hands-on GQAaccredited practical training courses into the recruitment process, along with 12 months of ongoing support for both the recruit and the employer to ensure that we are delivering a sustainable solution for all parties. We want employers who engage to know they will be getting installers who have been given outstanding basic training in all the key elements and are ready to contribute to their business from day one.” Tim O’Keefe for FrontFoot echoed John’s enthusiasm: “This is a great opportunity for us to work together with Building Our Skills to support them in their challenge to bridge the growing skills gap in the fenestration industry. For us, working hand in glove with service personnel, it is an ideal opportunity to introduce them to a great industry, where we know there are long-term and ongoing opportunities for career development. “We are keen to work with the fenestration industry and to bring new blood to it. We know that service personnel bring great attributes to the workplace and we are really looking forward to making an impact which will benefit all parties. A part of our commitment is to ensure that all the personnel we recruit undergo practical training to give them the best start in their new careers, and to give those employers who engage them the best value for their investment.”
For more information about how to go about engaging service personnel or to request a copy of a prospectus detailing this specific offering, in the first instance email sayhello@buildingourskills.co.uk or visit www.buildingourskills.co.uk.
NEW APPOINTMENTS MICHAEL WILLIAMS APPOINTED AS MANAGING DIRECTOR AT ALUK
Michael Williams is the newly appointed Managing Director at AluK. He joins the business with extensive construction industry experience after a successful 30+ year at Kone, one of the biggest global names in lifts and escalators.
Michael brings a refreshing new perspective to the fenestration sector, just at the time when it faces real challenges in terms of how it responds to the sustainability agenda and also huge opportunities in the booming housing and home improvement market post COVID. He says: “As a start, I will be looking inwards at AluK and identifying ways in which we can continue to improve our product and service delivery to customers and strengthen our partnerships with them. However, my focus will largely be outwards with the ambition of listening to and engaging broadly with our customers and moving aluminium windows, doors and curtain walling systems further up the value chain in both the retail and commercial markets.
“That means even more investment in sustainable product development and process efficiencies, but also in end user and specifier engagement. “AluK is clearly already a really good business with incredible facilities and reputation; but with the hugely talented and experienced team here and the backing we have from the rest of the Group, I am confident that we can be even better.”
Michael has joint Australian and Irish nationality and has previously worked in the UK, Europe and Asia, with an impressive track record across a mix of technical, sales, operations and senior leadership roles.
TRAINING CLASSROOM TRAINING AT DHF’S ACADEMY IN TAMWORTH
Door & Hardware Federation (DHF) has announced that its classroom training will once again resumed. The Tamworth-based trade association has, since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, been providing a mix of online training and examinations via its ‘Distance Learning Programme’ (DLP), with delegates able to continue to successfully meet their training obligations, albeit from the safety of their own locations.
From the end of April, learners can once again return to DHF’s training academy, a self-contained building on its own premises, with just eight delegates permitted on each course and social distancing rules strictly adhered to. Ordinarily, the organisation’s spacious academy can accommodate up to 25 people per course, but as Head of Commercial Operations, Patricia SowsberyStevens explains, safety remains a top priority for learners. “As our courses are fully accredited by Ofqual, we were given the ‘all clear’ for classroom training to resume from 8 March from the Department of Education (DfE). However, we have taken this additional time to ensure that a full risk assessment has been undertaken and a deep clean completed in preparation for opening day. When our classroom learning returned last June, we ensured delegates remained at a safe two-metre distance from one another, provided hand sanitiser, gloves, face coverings and disposable cups for all attendees, and learners were reassured by the spacious environment, both inside and out. We will once again be implementing these initiatives.
“DHF has worked assiduously to ensure that our members and those attending our training courses have received a continuous and highly effective training provision throughout the past year,” she continues. “Feedback on our online provision has been outstanding, but we do understand that, for some, there is no substitute for face-to-face engagement. We are therefore delighted to be able to resume ‘normal service’ shortly and have updated our training calendar accordingly. We look forward to welcoming people back to the academy in Tamworth.”
CAREERS CAB’S CRUCIAL ROLE IN INDUSTRY TRAINING
Not many decades ago you became skilled in a profession such as joinery, plumbing or glazing, by becoming an apprentice with a company where a skilled person taught you how to become a skilled craftsperson over a period of a few years, known as your ‘apprenticeship’. After reaching the required standard you were then offered a job in the same company and eventually became the teacher of new apprentices, so the cycle continued. Little changed then with the ‘foundation knowledge’ and ‘skill sets’. Once qualified, undertaking an apprenticeship would be seen as giving you a job for life.
How things have changed today. Whilst the ‘foundation knowledge’ still underpins the skilled person, new ‘skill sets’ are needed and required on a regular basis as legislation and technology advance at an ever increasing rate. In some instances old ‘skill sets’ need to be unlearnt in order to keep in line with new legislation and new technology. Members of CAB, many of whom have training centres, offer ‘skill set’ courses to train fabricators, service engineers and installers in their products, have long stated that much of the ‘foundation knowledge’ is missing in the industry, especially at the moment when experienced people are in very short supply. CAB has responded to this by offering the first of its ‘foundation knowledge’ courses, the ‘One Day Curtain Walling Essential Knowledge’ Course. Full details can be found at: https://c-a-b.org.uk/ training/cab-1day-curtain-walling-course/ For anyone who is new to the Industry or has never had formal training, the Course offers the ‘Foundation Knowledge’ about curtain walls, the principles of how they work and how they are to be installed. The training course is a first step for CAB into what is planned to be a wide range of fenestration related training, set up to support CAB’s growing membership. This first available training course, which is GQA qualified, also forms the Foundation Course required to begin the training to obtain a ‘CSCS Curtain Wallers Card’.
It is the Association’s ambition, to support the skills pipeline required in the sector, to set up ‘Foundation Knowledge’ Courses that cover each fenestration product group such as ‘aluminium framed fire rated systems’, ‘ground floor treatments’ and ‘concepts of sliding door systems’. Each course will be planned to take a candidate a day to complete and would be followed by a simple questionnaire to ensure the candidate is fully conversant following the course. Preferably, the courses would be taken in class, but distance learning using video conferencing can also be offered. As the voice of the Aluminium Fenestration Industry in the UK, CAB is well placed to offer a National Training Scheme for members and the wider industry, not just as Foundation Courses for the awarding of a CSCS card but training provision in its own right. To keep informed of upcoming CAB events please follow us on LinkedIn here: https://bit.ly/3ozNdoZ Based at the picturesque Bonds’ Mill development in Stonehouse, despite the pandemic, it is business as usual and staff are on hand at the offices or are working remotely to answer any aluminium fenestration related questions. News and event information is also regularly updated on the CAB website at www.c-a-b.org.uk.
Phil Slinger
For Association Membership enquiries, please contact Jessica Dean at the CAB offices by email jessica.dean@c-a-b.org.uk or telephone 01453 828851.
by Phil Slinger - CAB Chief Executive
CAREERS VEKA RECYCLING’S ANDY BURNS CELEBRATES TEN YEARS’ SERVICE
Andy Burns is set to celebrate ten years as a driver for VEKA Recycling in July.
Based in Burnley, Andy joined the company on 4th July 2011, making collections of PVC-U windows for recycling from customers throughout Scotland and the North East.
He’s a well-known face on his regular route, which means he has built up a real rapport with his customers – who probably know him best for ribbing them about the football while sharing a cup of tea! Andy has been at home on the road for a long time, having been a lorry driver for the past 33 years. Despite having never been out of employment since leaving school, incredibly VEKA Recycling is actually only the third company he has worked for, including having previously worked for Hotpoint for almost twenty years and an office furniture group for almost ten years. Andy has technically been with the VEKA family since 2010, as he joined VEKA Recycling on secondment from VEKA Plc – so he was already an established member of the VEKA group. “VEKA has been the best company I’ve worked for and working there really is like being part of a family,” said Andy. “Management at VEKA listen to their staff. There’s not too many places you can knock on the MD’s door with any issues and get invited in for a cuppa and a chat.”
“Andy is a great asset to our business and we all congratulate him on reaching this ten-year milestone,” said VEKA Recycling’s Managing Director Simon Scholes. “He’s a great, reliable, solid chap who our customers really like, a truly valued part of the VEKA family.”
CAREERS
OVER 1100 VACANCIES FOR INSTALLERS IN MAY SHOWS THE SCALE OF THE SKILLS GAP
Research conducted by Building Our Skills has identified that at the end of the first week in May there were over 1100 vacancies for installers being advertised on job sites throughout the UK.
The research was conducted in association with partner FrontFoot, specialists in reintroducing military service personnel into mainstream industry. It is the clearest sign yet of the scale of the skills gap impacting the industry. Speaking about the findings Building Our Skills ambassador John Ogilvie commented “seeing over 1100 vacancies being advertised for installers at a single point in time was truly shocking. It is perhaps the first time we have been able to quantify the nature of the problem which we are all aware of, and of course these are only the ones that are being formally advertised; the true number is going to be much higher”. “It was during a conversion with Tim O’Keefe at FrontFoot that these figures came to life when we were trying to qualify the scale of the opportunity for us to engage with them to bring military service personnel into the Fenestration Industry”. “As many of you know we have recently launched an initiative to try to encourage the industry to look at the armed forces sector as a potential pool of people to tap into the bring new blood to the industry, and the early response has been very encouraging”. “Seeing the scale of the problem in black and white is guaranteed to concentrate the mind, and as an industry we have to think
differently if we are going to start bridging the skills gap which is still growing”. “Everyone recognises the value that service personnel bring to the world of employment and we are delighted that we have now formed a direct link between our industry and those who can introduce our employers to the talent pool that is available, and most importantly, is available right now”. “As we continue with our longer-term journey to engage with the education sector to impart knowledge of our industry into the minds of the future workforce, we have very high hopes that this new relationship will help those looking to add to their workforce right now”. “We will be building hands on GQA accredited practical training courses into the recruitment process, along with 12 months of ongoing support for both the recruit and the employer to ensure that we are delivering a sustainable solution for all parties. We want employers who engage to know they will be getting installers who have been given outstanding basic training in all the key elements relevant to their role and are ready to contribute to their business from day one”. Tim O’Keefe for FrontFoot echoed John’s message, “During all our conversations with Building Our Skills we had been trying to
get a handle on the scale of the skills gap that the Fenestration Industry is facing and seeing this figure has given us a clear picture”. “As John says, these are just the ones we know about, and if employers are able to fill these positions, they are only going to be able to do so by taking installers from a competitor, it doesn’t reduce the skills gap, it just moves the problem somewhere else; the overall numbers needed don’t go down”. “We are keen to work with the Fenestration Industry and to bring new blood to it. We know that service personnel bring great attributes to the workplace and we are really looking forward to making an impact which will benefit all parties and reduce the shortfall in numbers currently impacting the industry”.
