Read online at www.proinstaller.co.uk
AUGUST 2020 | 11
News
MYTHBUSTERS: TACKLING THREE BIG
MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT EUROPE’S
BIGGEST SASH WINDOW MANUFACTURER
Over the past 15 years,
Victorian Sliders has
gone from being a tiny
start-up in a sleepy Welsh
mining village to Europe’s
biggest sash window
manufacturer. But in
that time, more than
a few misconceptions
have arisen about the
Ammanford firm. Group
Managing Director
Andy Jones sets the
record straight.
When I joined Victorian
Sliders, I quickly discovered that
most of the things I thought
I knew about it were totally
wrong.
I think it’s something that
happens to every long-running,
successful business to a certain
extent - lots of people have heard
of you, but many have no direct
experience of working with you,
and that means misconceptions
can spread fast predominantly
spread by people who have
something to gain from mis-information.
But I also think there are more
myths about Victorian Sliders
than most.
For me, fast approaching my
one-year anniversary at the company,
and having spent the last
ten months repeatedly bowled
over by the skill, passion and
dedication of our team, that can
be frustrating.
So I’ve decided to take this
opportunity to dispel some of the
most common misconceptions we
face as a business – and explain
a bit more about the commitment
to excellence that’s seen us
become the biggest sash window
manufacturer in Europe.
Myth 1: All your extrusion
comes from China
One of Victorian Sliders’
greatest strengths is that we
have invested heavily to become
vertically integrated. We have our
own recycling plant, we have our
own mixing plant, we foil our
own products, we arch our own
frames, we paint our own windows
(we actually spray all the
inner rails of our foiled products
as standard unlike many of our
competitors), we make our own
sealed units, and we extrude our
own profile.
That gives us an unparalleled
level of control over the quality
of the products we produce. It’s
an extremely important USP.
But it’s something a lot of
people don’t realise. In fact,
we sometimes find people are
convinced we buy in all our
extrusions as cheaply as possible
from China.
That’s not the case. Not only
is every piece of core profile
we use extruded on-site at our
240,000 square foot Ammanford
headquarters using the same raw
materials as some of Europe’s
leading uPVC systems companies,
from the world’s largest suppliers.
‘ one of the most quality-focused businesses I’ve ever worked at ’
Myth 2: You use cheap
foreign glass
The one thing a lot of people
know about Victorian Sliders –
other than the fact we make sash
windows – is that we’ll offer windows
in any size for just £199.
That’s led to a lot of speculation
about how we can produce
quality windows and sell them at
such an affordable price-point –
and seen some people conclude
that we must be cutting corners
somewhere along the line.
For example, I’ve seen it suggested
we use the cheapest glass
possible to make our IGUs.
That couldn’t be further from
the truth. We buy quality glass
made in the UK – Goole, East
Yorkshire, to be precise – from
Guardian Glass, a widely respected
supplier employing 300 people
in the UK, and over 10,000
worldwide.
We buy our spacer bar, desiccant
and sealant from Thermaseal,
the UK’s largest supplier of Warm
Edge Spacer, again manufactured
here in the UK. What’s more, all
of our sealed units conform to
EN1279 part two and three.
Myth 3: You use poor
quality hardware
Hardware is about the only
thing we use that we don’t either
make in Wales, or buy in from a
British supplier.
Like virtually every window
business in Europe, if not the
world, our hardware is made in
the far east.
The difference, however, is that
we own our own Chinese factory,
employing 30 full-time staff who
solely make window hardware
for Victorian Sliders.
Again, that gives us a level of
quality control that companies
buying from third-party suppliers
can’t match and ensures that our
supply chain is never compromised
by external decision
makers.
The truth about
Victorian Sliders
Those are just three of the
common misconceptions I’ve encountered
over the last year.
But the truth is, Victorian
Sliders is one of the most quality-focused
businesses I’ve ever
worked at, and this is one of the
many reasons that our customers
voted us the number one supplier
of vertical sliding windows in the
UK.
The whole reason we’ve gone
to unprecedented lengths and
made a huge investment to produce
as much of what we need
ourselves, is so we’ve got almost
total control over the quality of
the finished product.
It means Victorian Sliders
windows are extremely consistent
– and one of the best uPVC VS
products currently available.
Don’t rely on hearsay – if
you’re interested in seeing what
we do for yourself, don’t hesitate
to get in touch, and I would
be happy to offer you a guided
tour.
www.victoriansliders.co.uk