Review: November 2018

We’re in December. Where did the year go? Before we look ahead to the final month of the year and Christmas, it’s time to look back at what was an incredibly busy November in terms of news flow.

Final month of silly season

In the world of sales to the general public, November was the final month of “silly season”. It begins in September when the kids go back to school and ends in November when the lack of time means jobs sold in November are unlikely to be installed until the New Year.

At our family run installations business that indeed has been the case. Busy in September and October, with full fitting schedules to the end of the year and into the next. November was indeed still busy on the sales front at the start of the month, but with a definite relaxing of business activity as we closed the month. That’s not to say we’re all sat about with feet up on the desk! We will be going into the New Year with plenty of work booked in, which means we can hit the ground running in January.

From the tone of the conversation that seems to be the case in most quarters. I think overall this has been a decent year for most installers. Perhaps not a runaway booming year, but solid considering the circumstances. Towards the end of the year and into the start of the New Year I’ll be doing my full year review posts which will cover my thoughts on 2018 in much more detail.

The big news

As if you need reminding, but the big news in November was the continuing fallout of the collapse of Safeglaze. In fact for the first time ever in DGB monthly review, the top 5 most read posts published in a single month are all dominated by this single subject. Something which only highlights the reach this story had. Home owner traffic to the site spiked during the month.

You can catch up with all the important points of that ongoing story by scrolling further below. There was some good news to come out of the mess, in that Warmseal, based in the North East, bought the order book from the administrators and is now in the process of honouring all ongoing contracts. So often when a company goes bust in our sector, the mess is left to itself, leaving home owners at a loose end. It is refreshing to see a positive resolution come to this. Safeglaze had quickly become a decent sized business, stealing market share from all of their major competitors. They built up a substantial order book and almost immediately became a disruptive force within the industry.

However, perhaps this is a lesson in growth, in that too much too fast can be just as harmful as all of the other negative forces are to a business.

On a more positive note, the end of #NFA18 Winners Week came to a climax as we entered November. Another fantastic week of winners announcements causing fenestration social media to go nuts. Not only was it great to see the winners and their reactions, but also how those who came in second and third reacted as well. No bitterness, no animosity. Just genuine congratulations to the winners and genuine happiness at making it on to the podium. You can catch up with those winners by clicking here.

On the last day of the month, the winners of the 2018 G Awards were also announced at the Hilton hotel in London. A massive well done to the winners who were crowned late on Friday evening.

How DGB did

Thanks to a very busy news flow, November was an absolute stunner for DGB. Here’s my usual infographic showing how this site did:

Copy: OCTOBER: RECORDS!
Infogram

As the fallout of the Safeglaze collapse continued, traffic from home owners rose massively. This is a demographic this site usually doesn’t reach all that much. However, given the lack of news from parties involved, and that most other industry media sites hardly went near what has been the most important story of the year, DGB attracted attention from affected home owners. During the past month or so I have been contacted by countless numbers of home owners and staff too, asking in desperation if I could help or if I had any news. Unfortunately I was only able to explain that the site was just reporting on the story rather than it being in a position of information.

Thankfully, I was given PR and news articles by Warmseal, GGF and DGCOS which I was able to publish and provide further information on the matter. It was down to this story that gave the site new monthly records, breaking the ones set just in the month previous. I hope from hear to have found some new regular readers and to try build further from there.

December will be much quieter of course.

A look to December

Christmas. It’s finally here. A three week month which will feel like a five week month. I’m not expecting anything dramatic on the news front. What I do expect is for companies and indeed myself to start reflecting on the year we have had and to start making plans for 2019.

As we head towards the last working days of the year, I will start doing my review posts. I’ll be looking at the companies who made their mark, good or bad, in 2018. Who out-performed. Who under-performed. Who caught my eye with new products and innovations. Who to watch out for in 2019 and my own plans for next year. So if you’re hoping for a company shout-out, these next few weeks are your best chance!

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