Barnsley window business sees sales top £500k in record-breaking month

A Barnsley-based window and door manufacturer has seen a record-breaking month for sales as its income for May suprasses the £500k mark.

Euroglaze Ltd has seen rising demand for its bespoke windows, doors and conservatories, which are fabricated at its Carlton workshops and supplied to double glazing companies, commercial installers and trade counters across the UK.

The financial results from May follows month-on-month growth of between seven and 11% and means the business anticipates hitting a £5m turnover for the first time this year.

Euroglaze managing director Martin Nettleton believes the business’ growth is due to investing in technology and the latest lean manufacturing techniques, as well as a resurgence in the house-building market.

Martin said: “The up-turn in the construction industry has been very welcome after some tough years. And, on top of that, we feel really proud that we’ve got ourselves in to a strong position and ready to respond speedily to rising demand in the market - and to grow with it.

“We’ve invested in equipment, software and workforce development to introduce leaner, faster, more efficient production processes, through which we’ve been able to up-scale production and deliver more high quality products to our customers.”

Enterprising Barnsley, the business development and support arm of Barnsley Council, has helped Euroglaze increase productivity through modernising its manufacturing, customer service and logistics processes.

The company has invested £30k over the last 18 months in touch-screen stock control systems and other digital technology to manage, monitor and track the movement of products through its factory. Euroglaze has worked with Enterprising Barnsley’s business coaches to put these systems in place and support workforce development and training.

Martin, who took over the business from his father Alan in 1999, said: “I used to look out on to the shopfloor and see lots of window and door frames sitting in racks and think ‘that’s great we’ve got lots of work on’. But now, I don’t see the products standing still for long.

“Every item moves smoothly through the factory process, on to a van and out to the customer as efficiently as possible. This means we can get the job on to an invoice for payment all the quicker too. It’s been a revolution in the workplace and the whole team has moved along with it.”

Euroglaze, which produces around 900 frames a week with the capacity to increase that to 1,500, employs a workforce of 54, with plans to create 14 new jobs over the next two years.

The company achieved a turnover of £4.4m last year and anticipates hitting £5m in this financial year, ending November 30 2016.

Angela Pedley, Enterprising Barnsley business development manager, said: “We’ve been delighted to work with Martin and the team at Euroglaze and it is remarkable what they’ve achieved. It is a perfect example of an established company not standing still and relying on existing trade, but taking the opportunity of a slow-down in the market to develop new and better ways of working.

“Euroglaze has put itself into a strong position for growth and fully deserves to notch up its most successful month yet as a windows fabricator.”

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