A greater role to play

By Mark Enderby, marketing manager, MACO

As a global, leading hardware manufacturer, we have a responsibility to do more than simply provide hardware – in fact, our partners don’t only demand it, they deserve it.

From the actions we take to be an environmental leader, manufacturing more sustainable products within the construction industry, the performance of our solutions not only improve fabrication speed, but also add unique features and benefits.

These provide tangible improvements to windows and doors for installers and ultimately homeowners.

Over more recent years we have seen fantastic leaps forward from across the fenestration industry and indeed the entire construction industry around the world at creating businesses and of course products that are more sustainable. The ecological footprint of the construction industry is huge, as it requires about 40% of all global raw materials and some of them are almost exhausted today.

In addition, buildings are responsible for around 39% of global energy-related CO2 emissions. The main reasons for this are not just the energy efficiency of existing buildings but also the energy-intensive manufacturing processes of many building materials.

As a construction supplier, we recognised early on that our economic activities and our products can make a major positive contribution to environmental sustainability. As early as 2010, we at MACO established the first department on the subject and have since been working intensively on topics such as decarbonisation, circular economy and material health.

This has an impact on all business areas and along the entire value chain. Our main goal is to develop and manufacture in a manner that is not only environmentally friendly but that creates climate-neutral products that maximise the energy efficiency of buildings.

Our actionable changes, plans and how by choosing MACO hardware in your windows, doors and sliding doors you are helping to create more sustainable products, buildings and a planet, can be viewed at www.maco.eu/en-GB/Company/Sustainability

These important efforts across sustainability run alongside improvements in product performance and longevity. This can be most recently seen in the launch of our global, exclusive self-healing surface protection, Silverlook-EVO. Silverlook-EVO stems from decades of our own in-house galvanising experience, which is now paired with tribological sealing.

This offers protection and an elegant look in equal measure. The optimally matched layer construction increases both service life and corrosion resistance, further enhancing the benefits of our partner’s windows, doors and sliding doors.

As the United Kingdom is an island surrounded by salty air it’s easy to see why corrosion is a popular topic of discussion when speaking with our partners. The salty air of course is not the only cause of corrosion but sits alongside causes such as aggressive cleaning agents, builder’s dust and tannic acids found in some timbers.

Here at MACO we are well known for our hardware solutions across windows, doors and sliding doors but did you know we have also developed and created a range of gaskets and weather seals?

These have been created with cutting edge technology, combining materials with different densities to create complex geometries. It is a barrier to the passage of air that makes a superior difference. Giving windows, doors and sliding doors more features to provide benefits such as energy savings, improved sound insulation and wellbeing.

Creating windows, doors and sliding doors that perform to the best of their abilities is indeed a process of precision engineering expertise, and part of this process is of course testing. Here at MACO Door & Window Hardware (UK), we have built a state of the art test centre able to facilitate security and the weather performance of your doors and windows.

Working with our partners, our test centre expertise has ensured that window and door systems have passed formal testing and have even been the birthplace of some of the industry’s most popular systems.

Homeowners want to know more about their products, where they come from, how they perform and their impact on the environment. So, by being a MACO partner you can be sure to answer all these questions and more.