Many home improvement companies have been slow come up with any change in suppliers as the industry has slowed during the recent recession. Afraid to rock the boat, retailers of doors and windows have chosen to weather the storm by trying to cut costs rather than investigate new solutions. The market is beginning to change though, mainly due to quantum leaps in technology, composite door manufacturing to be a prime example.
Composite doors are recognised as being superior to plain UPVC doors and improvements in the manufacturing process have meant that composite doors are now priced around the same as UPVC doors. I won’t go into much detail as to why composite doors are becoming the preferred choice of UK consumers, there are plenty of articles on that subject, some even written by yours truly. Suffice he that when faced by using a choice of a new family saloon or a meaningful Rolls Royce for towards same price, the choice, for many, is irresistible!
Anyway, I’m well known locally for my marketing experience, in particular assisting new business start-ups hence there is no was delighted to answer the call for a home improvement company in Devon that has for years and years been retailing UPVC windows and doors. They were interested in selling composite doors just as the demand for them amongst local residents was growing quickly.
The principal reason for this was numerous that the pros in the home improvement industry, the market leaders in fact, had began selling composite doors recently and had positioned these products in the top of their price range, reflecting the superiority of composite over UPVC doors.
The first problem was the associated with switching the main focus of door retailing to an amalgamated doors range and away from UPVC, which is what all of rivalry was announced were offering. Moving into the fast growing composite doors market seemed a good move but the cost of outfitting a showroom was too high. So the first thing we did was to get onto Google, find out who the players were in composite door manufacturing and supply and then position them to the push.
Obviously price and credit facilities were major factors, as was order to delivery turnaround, returns policy and product quality. There gave the impression to be little difference between the door manufacturers here as each and every those approached had many years experience in the home improvements market and recognised the need for credit facilities, keen prices and fast turnaround. Not to cover that with improvement British Standards in the composite manufacturing industry, the manufacturing processes were extremely quite.
Where some companies fell down though was when we asked them the were going test and do to help us to sell goods. The lack of marketing support, knowledge and training was truly shameful, indicative of the slow decline in Britain’s manufacturing base (Short term thinking ,worrying about immediate costs versus long running investment for market share has often been the bane of British Industry).
This ‘test’ though allowed certain door manufacturers to shimmer. The ones that we chose as suppliers were easily recognisable as companies that placed heavy emphasis on customer service and, more importantly recognised that their customer was in fact the retailer, not the end purchaser of a new door.
The simple test we put would be to see which door manufacturers would assist us to stock a showroom with sample products, provide reason for sales materials and help us to get the word out locally about the superiority of composite doors over UPVC doors. Our reasoning was that it cost several thousand pounds to outfit a new showroom and get initial customers, when had been going to be ordering from food with caffeine . suppliers for years, so why especially if they not share in the start-up cost?
There were half-dozen companies that were willing to help, either by proving a ‘credit’ while on the cost of product samples or bring down proving samples freed from charge. Two companies totally outshined you need to engage and my Devon-based door supplier has signed up with both of them:
Door-Stop International, tipped by many to end up being the market leader in the longer term had obviously done their homework and erect cutting-edge technology such the own-brand website which retailers can use for in-home demonstrations too as a marketing tool. Neutral has a design feature that allows potential purchasers to simply select the style, colour and furnishings for their ideal door and many of the shows the finished design and price instantly, even including net ordering gym.
Nick’s Building Supply
11100 Broadway, Crown Point, IN 46307, USA
(219) 663-2279