Many home improvement companies have been slow supplementations any change in suppliers as the industry has slowed during the recent recession. Afraid to rock the boat, retailers doors and windows have chosen to weather the storm by trying to cut costs rather than investigate new solutions. The market has been evolving though, mainly due to quantum leaps in technology, composite door manufacturing as being a prime example.
Composite doors are recognised as being superior to straightforward 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 favored choice of UK consumers, there are plenty of articles on that subject, some even written by yours truly. Suffice to say that when faced by using a choice of a new family saloon or some sort of Rolls Royce for upon the same price, the choice, for many, is beckoning!
Anyway, I’m well known locally for my marketing experience, in particular assisting new business start-ups and i 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 like the demand for them amongst local residents was growing quickly.
The principal basis for this was the fact that the professionals in the upgrading industry, the market leaders in fact, had began selling composite doors recently and had positioned these products at the top of their price range, reflecting the superiority of composite over UPVC doors.
The first problem was the price 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. Entering into the fast growing composite doors market seemed a good move but kitchens . of outfitting a showroom was prohibitive. So the first thing we did were get onto Google, find out who the players were in composite door manufacturing and supply and then back up for sale to the test.
Obviously price and credit facilities were major factors, as was order to delivery turnaround, returns policy and product quality. There seemed to be little difference between the door manufacturers here as nearly every one of those approached had many years experience within the home improvements market and recognised the need for credit facilities, keen prices and fast turnaround. Not to note that with the creation of British Standards into the composite manufacturing industry, the manufacturing processes were extremely similar.
Where some companies fell down though was when we asked them everything they were going to achieve to help us to sell goods. The lack of selling support, knowledge and training was truly shameful, indicative in the slow decline in Britain’s manufacturing base (Short term thinking ,worrying about immediate costs versus long running investment for business has often been the bane of British Industry).
This ‘test’ though allowed certain door manufacturers to come. The ones that we chose as suppliers were easily recognisable as companies that placed heavy focus 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 point of sales materials and help us to obtain the word out locally about the superiority of composite doors over UPVC doors. Our reasoning was that it would cost several thousand pounds to outfit a new showroom and get initial customers, when we going to be ordering from food with caffeine . suppliers for years, so why should they not share the actual world start-up cost?
There were some companies that were willing to help, either by proving a ‘credit’ over the cost of product samples or just proving samples involving charge. Two companies totally outshined in conversation with and my Devon-based door supplier has signed up with both of them:
Door-Stop International, tipped by many people to end up being the market leader in the longer term had obviously done their homework and provide cutting-edge technology such a great own-brand website which retailers can use for in-home demonstrations as well as marketing and advertising tool. Neutral has a design feature that allows potential purchasers to select the style, colour and furnishings for their ideal door and the web site shows the finished design and price instantly, even including a respectable ordering facility.
Nick’s Building Supply
11100 Broadway, Crown Point, IN 46307, USA
(219) 663-2279