At the 2025 Glazing Summit, I spoke about a problem that affects every business in our industry – whether you are a system house, a fabricator, a glass processor or an installer.
The problem? Thousands of small businesses in our sector are working harder than ever… but still not making any money.
And that is a problem for all of us.
Because small businesses, especially installers, are the engine room of the glazing supply chain. They drive sales, carry the customer experience and deliver the finished product. When they underperform, the ripple effects go all the way back upstream.
In this article, I will break down what’s going wrong, why it matters to you and what we can do about it.
First, let’s be clear – this isn’t about blaming installers
Most of the time these businesses are being run by former fitters or salespeople. People who know how to do the job, but not necessarily run a business. They are grafters. But they are also overwhelmed.
They are wearing 10 hats – installer, sales, marketing, HR, finance etc and unfortunately none of them fit properly.
They are not lazy or careless. They are just stuck. And the result?
- Their pricing models are wrong.
- Their margins are too low.
- Their cash flow is tight.
- They don’t know how to grow
- And most of them are flying blind when it comes to the numbers.
A huge leak? Gross margin
A key number that can make or break a glazing business is gross margin. But most small businesses don’t know what theirs actually is.
They will tell you what margin they are aiming for, but they don’t track what they are really making. They confuse markup with margin. They focus on pounds and not percentages. They forget to factor in remedials, travel, labour or overheads.
We have worked with businesses where gross margins were in the teens – when they thought they were in the thirties.
That is not sustainable and it leads to pricing decisions that hurt everyone.
The race to the bottom
We have all seen it. A company trying to grow by being the cheapest. They chop prices, switch fabricators and cut corners. But the products in this industry are amazing. Energy efficient, secure, stylish and professionally installed. They are not a commodity and they shouldn’t be sold like one.
When we drive prices down, we train the customer to expect cheap. Cheap isn’t sustainable – not for the installer, not for the supply chain and not for the industry.
We have already lost too many small businesses in this sector in recent years. And the sad thing is, it is just getting worse.
Getting your head around marketing is key to growth
Many small businesses in this sector are terrified of marketing. They either spend too little, spend badly or they simply don’t track what works. They will tell you what they spent but not what they got back.
If you want to grow, you need lead flow. That means spending (and tracking) your marketing properly.
We worked with a £4M business that was spending 16% of revenue on marketing. That is too high. We helped them get it down to 10% which resulted in a £240,000 annual saving. Leads stayed the same and Return on Investment went up.
This stuff works. But only if you measure it.
What does good look like?
This isn’t about perfection. It is about progress.
Here is what the best-performing small businesses do:
- Track gross margin by product and market sector (retail, commercial etc)
- Build an annual budget
- Produce monthly management accounts
- Review a handful of KPIs every week
- Price based on data, not gut feel
- Link installer pay to performance and quality
- Forecast cash at least 13 weeks out
And no, they don’t all start there, but they build towards it.
So what can the rest of us do?
Whether you are a supplier, fabricator or service provider, you can help raise the baseline. Provide support to your customer base. Chances are they aren’t as experienced in business as you are. There’s many different ways that support might be delivered but could include:
- Training and mentoring
- Hosting events or webinars
- Running education programmes
- Creating peer support groups
- Sharing knowledge and best practice
- Offering simple tools, templates or benchmarks
- Encouraging collaboration, not competition
- And of course, working with specialist businesses like ours – and others – whose focus is helping these companies improve performance
None of this has to be complicated or expensive – it just requires commitment.
Final thought
Better small businesses means a better industry for all of us.
We need to support our small businesses – with the right information, the right tools and the right knowledge.
A rising tide lifts all boats. Let us raise the tide.