Proud to be a double-glazing salesman (still!)
There are those around that might feel employment as a double-glazing salesman might be demeaning in some way.
Maybe it suggests gainful employment in another capacity may be restricted, perhaps due to some social or even legal hiccups along the way; or simply because one may not have been as studious as one may have been. Or perhaps like me, I had a wife and a kid and another on the way and needed to make some money fast…
That was very nearly 40 years ago: that wife came and went, the kids grew up and instead of abandoning the double glazing industry at the earliest opportunity.
I wholly embraced what I believed to be a craft, made loads of money selling the stuff for others, then set up my own company, initially buying in windows and doors. Now I having a thriving trade and commercial frame making company, a healthy contract installation arm and, because I still like the idea of keeping my hand in ‘on the knocker’, I keep a small retail firm too.
I still go out now and again to flog a house full of windows, because I feel it keeps me sharp, reminds me where I began and, actually, I get a proper buzz out of it! Still do, always will…
There is no doubt that things have improved since the ‘White Gold’ era, one that for me was more like a documentary than a sitcom. Home improvement windows and doors are cherished by homeowners, still much prized.
And according to one list of the least trusted professions in the UK, estate agents, car salesmen, bankers and, perhaps unsurprisingly, bailiffs rank in the list, considered untrustworthy due to their lack of morals, greed, unreliability, and irritating nature.
No mention at all of the venerable double-glazing salesman (or woman), which I take to mean that we are no longer the scourge that we once were.
However, I have recently had pointed out to me the ‘dissatisfied customers’ Facebook page of a certain retail double glazing firm, a well-known brand that I hesitate to mention by name for fear of incurring the wrath of their legal eagles, that has more than 4,000 followers! Those posting on the site are highly active. And being an active and vociferous proponent of this industry, zipping down the list of complaints is a very painful exercise.
Joining the group is by application so everyone is identified and assessed, and some of the stuff on there is incredible, including aggressive behaviour from the salespeople, legal challenges from the company towards its customers and countless cases of poor workmanship with no resolution in sight.
This is 2023 for heavens’ sakes! And yet the language remains entrenched in the ‘Eighties, when it is fair to say that our industry was not at its best.
Have I missed something? Am I kidding myself that our industry is no longer mired knee deep in the brown stuff, with legions of unhappy customers, and double glazing salesmen still the butt of stand ups jokes but in performances that I simply have not witnessed?
No! is my heart-felt belief. Ours IS an industry that has come of age, one that is (as I have restated many times) as well behaved and well-managed as any other. I continue to believe that selling replacement windows and doors and related home improvements, is no longer the easy hustle and easy money that once attracted the types that often brought our industry into disrepute. And that can rightly be proud that our industry has long achieved respectability.
Which makes the Facebook page rather troubling and fortunately isolated, as despite searching, I could find nothing else to match it.
It is however an example of how problems, even the little ones, should be dealt with quickly and decisively, especially with the instantaneous impact of social media; don’t let it get out of hand. Better still of course, don’t let it happen in the first place.