THE RISE OF ALUPROF ’IN THE UK’
An interview with Wojciech
Brozyna Managing Director of
Aluprof UK Limited
Established in the UK in 2006,
Aluprof has grown in the UK to
become one of the major players
in the UK facade industry. With
so many active facade systems
companies operating in the UK,
how did Aluprof succeed in taking
a sizeable portion of the UK
market? Wojciech Brozyna, MD
of Aluprof UK, answers some of
these questions:
So why break into the UK market when it was so well-established
back in 2006?
“In Poland we have always viewed the UK as a challenge for us, we
knew that it would not be easy to set up and gain projects from a
virtually unknown system such as ours. We had the benefit of logistics
behind us, as we were already exporting from Poland to several other
European countries and believed we had a good grasp of product
delivery, offering an on time and complete order fulfilment. Added
to the logistics, we had won several awards for our systems in Poland
and believed that our product range could take on any other system
currently available in the European market at that time.
“The market crash in 2008 possibly helped us grow as fast as we did in
the early years as fabricators in the UK looked for alternative systems
which were a little more competitively priced. At this time we were
ready with stocked product in Poland and planning two deliveries per
week to the UK. As a result specifications were switched to Aluprof,
we delivered on our promises and these early adopters of Aluprof
systems continue to be valued customers today.”
How did you penetrate the UK market in the early days being
virtually unknown?
“We decided to send a small team over from Poland, which included
myself and several other employees who knew our systems very well.
We then interviewed and took on a small team of enthusiastic people
who could also see the benefits in our systems and services. It is
these early members of staff who promoted our systems and helped
us gain our first projects. The majority of the original staff are still vital
members of our team today.
“To create awareness, we joined several associations in the UK and
supported their meetings and events. Our approach was quite
simple, we believed that our systems could stand up alongside any
other system and perform as well, if not better than our competitors.
We revealed the credibility of our offer which was enthusiastically
accepted in the UK by specifiers and facade companies. The UK has
always had a passion for European style systems and we did not
disappoint!”
How have you kept up with the growth of Aluprof in the UK?
“When we were looking at the UK back in 2005, we decided that a
central base for our office and warehouse facility would be preferential,
so we decided to settle in the Manchester area which gave us close
access to all the major conurbations across the British Isles. From our
initial offices and warehouse in Norman Road, Altrincham, we moved
seven years ago to a new, larger unit at Altrincham Business Park.