Sunday, February 23, 2014

The Hottest Product Line is....

To me there’s one trend that is dominating our industry and it’s probably not the one that you think it is.  It’s a product line that fabricators are seeing as a great path to bottom line success.  What is it?  Well it’s probably not the one you think.  That would be something involved with energy efficiency.  And that trend is major and constantly growing.  Obviously we covered in this space and throughout the media the utter importance of our industry and energy improving products.  But right now that’s not the product segment that is seemingly growing at insane clip.  The hot mover is actually decorative glazing.  One look into the excellent current issue of Glass Magazine tells the story.  In the special “Products” section that the top glass fabricators in North America are offering, 13 of the 22 profiles are decorative related with only 3 being related to energy.  Decorative glass is actually a product line that allows fabricators to easily diversify their business and help their bottom line. Add in smart suppliers (both from the paints and machinery side) and the entry into that world is not daunting at all.   Now that said do I wish that the pages of Glass Magazine were filled with new energy related and innovative products?  Sure…. And I believe they exist but they’re not as sexy from a promotional side as decorative and the supply chain from the energy side is not as streamlined into the fabricator like the decorative suppliers are. Overall for me I had been involved in decorative before it became hip, so it’s pretty amazing to see how’s absolutely taken off.

Elsewhere…

--  By the way the rest of that Glass Magazine issue was spectacular.  Cover to cover; the content and layout was top of the line- as always.  And as I am known to do, I studied the ads in there and props to DFI for their very creative bridge ad.  It’s memorable and different… and for many of us makes us feel like we’re all in this adventure together!

--  Last week I talked about the BEC Technical meeting- this week, just a quick note on the overall conference scheduled for next month.  A very strong agenda is in place, kudos to the excellent Jon Kimberlain of Dow Corning and his committee that put it together.  From a glazier prospective, you just need to look at the afternoon session of day 1 and see the value in pieces on sealing, installation equipment, OSHA, codes and more.  Then day 2 features the celebrity talk with this year being former Philly Eagles QB and current ESPN analyst Ron Jaworski.  “Jaws” should be fun since he brings a boatload of energy to every thing he does.

--  One of the former celeb keynotes at BEC was Mike Eurizone, the captain of the US Olympic hockey team in 1980.  He mentioned in his presentation, that if his game winning shot went just one inch to the left, he’d be painting bridges in Boston now and not speaking to a bunch of glass people.  Well I thought of him when the US Women’s hockey team missed out on a gold medal by an inch when their empty net attempt hit the post.  Heartbreaking for them.  And yes, since both the US Men and US Women both lost to Canada, I will be singing “O Canada” in public, and on video in the coming months.  Congrats to all of my friends up north on the wins!

--  One of those friends is Rich Porayko who picked up a fantastic interim gig this past week in being named as head of the Canadian Glass Association. Rich is a class act and excellent man and the CGA tapped him to guide them through the process of finding a permanent Executive Director.  I am confident Rich will do a great job for that organization and be a major asset to the new management that comes in.  Plus I am jealous… I mean he’s running an organization for the entire country!  That’s just awesome.  Remember us little folk eh Rich?

LINKS of the WEEK

--  There’s a clown shortage… oh no what will we do!!

--  Great post on new Olympic events if it keeps snowing this winter

--  I’m struggling to find words here; other than I think I’ll be boycotting McDonalds if this is the way they treat an employee of 8 years!  Not to mention what she did for the firefighters in her town.  Unreal.

VIDEO of the WEEK

On this video you have to wait 20 seconds or so for the payoff… its raw video from the popular “Kiss Cams” that they do at the various sporting events.  This guy came prepared…. And this video now has more than 10 million views!  Amazing!


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