In this next feature, we speak to Glassolutions Saint-Gobain’s Marketing Director, Mike Butterick...
...and Mike gives us an insight into how his organisation manages its external environment and specifically...
...how it goes about lobbying government.
Glassolutions is a broad based glass processor and distributor and installer of glass in the UK.
We serve just about every different sector of the glass industry in the built environment...
...from manufacturer of double glazed sealed units...
...through to design and installation and repair of facade systems on...
...major commercial buildings, and just about everything in between really.
That makes us a pretty broad based business...
...and one of our key points of differentiation actually, is the fact that we...
...have this board base of activity and competence across…
...across all our glass markets.
We’ve got competitors in all of those sectors of course...
...but there isn't another business like us that does everything.
In terms of what’s impacting us in those sectors, well...
...the answer is complicated in that each of those sectors is...
...is subject to different forces and different influences...
...and so our environmental scanning activity has to look across all those different markets...
...in all those different sectors, to understand in detail, what’s happening.
I think one of the things to recognise that is, is that in...
...fairly mature industries, which ours is...
...markets are dynamic and they’re changing constantly...
...and so you've got to look for things that change.
Now things change at different speeds across all those different sectors and so...
...one of the key tasks is to understand what’s changing quickly...
...and is likely to have a big influence on us in the future, so that we can focus...
...more of our attention on those areas that really are changing.
So at Glassolutions we have an annual business planning, budgeting process...
...and the marketing planning process is part of that and of course, the...
...environmental scanning activity is a key input and key driver into those management processes.
So the marketing department is responsible for the environmental scanning activity...
...and we draw on a variety of … information sources, both within the business...
...and of course, outside the business.
We use a variety of well known models to help us organise and analyse the information...
...such as Pessil, Porters Five Forces...
...and really that’s used to help us draw insight into the information that we’re looking at...
...and to make sure that we analyse the environment in some depth.
One of the key influences on our market at the moment and likely to be in the future...
...is the government’s targets to improve the energy efficiency of the housing stock in the UK...
...and that’s to save energy, of course, and to reduce our CO2 emissions as a nation.
Glass of course, has an important part to play in that.
The Green Deal is the flagship government initiative to help drive energy efficiency…
...in people’s homes, and that’s a policy that’s been developed and still is developing...
...over recent months and will develop over the coming months.
Now we identified that as a key influence on...
...on some of our major markets and so we looked closely at it...
...realised it was quite complicated, and had to decide to spend some time investigating it in some detail.
We realised pretty quickly that it was designed in a way that wasn't really gonna help us too much...
...which we thought was a missed opportunity for government...
...but also of course for ourselves as an industry.
And so we developed a strategy to engage with government and policymakers...
...to… help us understand their ... drivers, if you like, and their key priorities...
...to see if we could come up with a mutually beneficial way...
...where we could maybe influence their policymaking to everybody’s benefit.
Running alongside the green deal is the initiative called The Energy Company Obligation...
...which is often referred to as ECO...
...which is basically a requirement for energy companies to invest money in energy efficiency measures...
...both within the social housing and private housing sector.
And so, we look closely at that as an opportunity for us to...
...work with energy companies and OFGEM that administers the ECO funding scheme...
...to provide highly insulated glass for homes to the benefit of homeowners...
...to reduce their heating bills and as a consequence, reduce the CO2 emissions of the country.
Now what we discovered is that the energy company obligation as it had been designed...
...didn't really favour glass, other energy efficiency measures were always coming out before us.
We thought that was a little bit unfair because glass has an important part to play...
...and so we worked with OFGEM and the Department of Energy and of Climate…
- Department of Energy and Climate Change that administers this...
...to work out a method whereby glass could become part of this process, if you like.
We’ve been successful in doing that.
The fundamental opportunity that we identified through this process is that...
...there are 13 million homes in the UK that have windows that were fitted more than 10 years ago...
...which are not very efficient windows and we identified that by replacing the old...
...altered technology glass with modern, energy efficient glass...
...we could save significant energy and significant levels of CO2.
Glass technology has advanced so much in the last 10 years...
...that old windows can be transformed in terms of their energy performance...
...and so we thought that was a good idea in terms of participating in the ECO funding stream...
...and so we took our evidence and our data and our argument to OFGEM and to DEC, to...
...advocate the fact that glass should be part of the ECO scheme.
And so they looked at that data and they and looked at the argument...
...and looked at the opportunity that existed, and they agreed with us actually...
...and so as a result of that, we’ve been successful in...
...convincing them that ECO funding should be available for this measure.
So that really has created a whole new market opportunity for the glass industry...
...not just for Glassolutions but for the industry as a whole.
So the sorts of things that we undertook to actually achieve this is that first of all, we had to build the case.
So when engaging with government and industry regulators...
...you've got to have robust, validated, independently validated data.
And so we did some considerable research to...
...to build our case in terms of why this should, why this legislation should have been changed.
We then, and I then approached our...
...industry association, to get their support and to...
...put forward the case that this is something that they should put their weight behind...
...because when approaching government, it’s much better to do it as part of…
...or to be seen as part of the industry, rather than an independent company...
...and so to go along with the Glass & Glazing Federation rather than just as Glassolutions...
...makes a big difference in the eyes of OGEM and DEC.
We then approached DEC, we went to a series of meetings and we put forward our...
...argument in terms of why we thought this was a good idea...
...they had to involve a number of different people in terms of...
...looking at this evidence which they duly did...
...and really we presented it as an opportunity for them...
...as well as just for us as a business and… as an industry...
...because you've got to remember at the end of the day, that engaging with government...
...you're engaging with people who have their own targets...
...and really want to find favourable outcomes.
And so I think if you go in with that attitude to be cooperative rather than just battle head-on...
...against a policy that somebody’s written...
...I think you tend to find that they’re far more cooperative and willing to listen.
The thing that the government was particularly interested in, in this proposition...
...is the fact that glass technology has changed so much in the last few years.
We now put ... reflective coatings or energy efficiency coatings on the surface of glass...
...that reflects heat energy back into people’s homes.
It’s proven to save significant amounts of energy and therefore carbon.
The problem being is that...
...the glass doesn't look any different from the glass that we were using as an industry 10 years ago...
...but it performs massively different in terms of its energy efficiency.
Once you get that message across to people...
...it becomes entirely sensible to replace old glass with new glass...
...leaving existing window frames in place to save money and it’s proven to save money by doing that.
That’s really what government recognise as part of this proposition...
...it has the ability to deliver significant value in terms of their Green Deal agenda...
...in the ECO funding opportunities, in terms of representing value for money.
There aren’t many other things that you can do to save this much money...
...for the amount of cost that’s involved.