Big start for new installer

A Glazerite installer is starting the new decade on a high by celebrating “phenomenal growth”, three years after the company was founded.

Manchester-based Arctic Seal MCR has fitted more than 6,500 windows all over the UK. Set up in 2017 by husband and wife team Shahzad and Hafsa Ashraf, Arctic Seal specialises in window and door installations for property developers, including the conversion of office blocks into apartments and houses.

Over the next few months the installer has several largescale installs planned, including a 400-frame renovation in Worthing, East Sussex, and its first foray into the new-build market.

Shahzad said: “We work together with our fabricator, the Glazerite UK Group, and systems supplier, Veka, to ensure our installs are of the highest quality. Both Glazerite and Veka help us to meet the correct specifications and have assisted on wind loads and commercial couplings on all of our projects.

“We also work hard to build lasting relationships with our customers, allowing us to focus on the needs and particular challenges they face. Our commitment to the property development market in particular has resulted in us winning more and more business.”

Managing director Shahzad followed his father into the fenestration business and has years of fitting and project management expertise, including large-scale, demanding installs. One such job, its biggest to date, was the £6 million makeover of the old Great Universal Stores building in Manchester, where Arctic Seal installed 1,300 Veka M70 windows over a nine-month period.

The 260,000ft2 building was transformed thanks to cladding and the installation of the new windows, which are anthracite grey with grey-tinted glazing.

Other projects include a project in Coventry that saw the installer replace 370 critall steel windows, and the conversion of a town centre office block in Swindon that required 450 windows.

Glazerite sales manager Peter Smith said: “We first met Shahzad and Hafsa at the FIT Show in 2016, and when they set up Arctic Seal we were delighted to join them as their main fabricator. We’ve developed a great working relationship and what they’ve achieved in just three years is phenomenal.”