It’s the time of year again when the trade magazines ask representatives from across the industry ‘How was it for you?’ and this week I have been giving my thoughts to Glass News.

Despite the fact that the overall fenestration market is down, for The Window Company (Contracts), 2019 was actually another year of growth. We saw no discernible downturn in work from our major social housing clients, and a big increase in work in high end and new build projects.

We increased our volumes in PVC-U and broadened our supplier base to ensure that we continue to provide the best value and best service to our customers, but the biggest area of growth for us has come in aluminium. We’re working on some really high profile, private residential projects in central London at the moment and during the course of the year, we have also worked on educational, retail and workspace developments fitting almost exclusively aluminium windows and doors.

The initial market shock from the Brexit vote has clearly long since faded and, while it hasn’t exactly been ‘business as usual’ for us, it’s certainly been ‘business as best we can’. For me personally not being part of the EU will feel like a loss rather than a gain, but what’s become more and more obvious this year is that we do need a resolution of the current stalemate so that businesses like ours know which tunnel we should be looking through to see the light.

While we still don’t know what lies ahead politically or economically for 2020, our priority will be prudence and financial stability. We are doubly aware of our margins and will certainly not be buying any business or accepting work with dangerously low profit margins. Nonetheless, we are budgeting for further business growth of around 10% and so far we have seen no evidence of a reduction in orders or a drop off in the level of tender enquiries.

I feel very positive about the year ahead and confident in the ability of our team to continue going forward.