It’s that time of year again when the trade magazines ask some of the leading figures in the industry for their thoughts on the year ahead. I’ve already submitted my comments to Glass & Glazing Products magazine for their January issue and I’ll be interested to read the thoughts of others.

With so much uncertainty in the economy at the moment, thanks largely to Brexit of course and the fact that we have a minority government, my comments centre around how difficult it is going to be for SMEs like us to make any major decisions. Until we know the final outcome of the Brexit negotiations and what impact, if any, the government’s efforts to kick start new housebuilding will have, our strategy in 2018 will be to focus on our planned growth only and not take any major risks on new ventures.

We know that, post Grenfell, there is a big new opportunity for us in fire doors because we already hold all the necessary accreditations to expand in that market, but outside of that we will be maintaining the balance we already have across the social housing, schools and healthcare sectors

That doesn’t mean we don’t expect to grow in 2018 – after all we’re experts at what we do and we have just been awarded our largest ever single contract, but that growth will be very carefully managed.

I suspect many at the sharp end of the window and door industry will share our cautious approach, and that is likely to have implications further up the supply chain. Uncertainty is definitely not what any of us want.