FenCon trying to shine a light on province’s window manufacturing industry

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This article was published 06/03/2019 (2708 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Al Dueck has been in the window manufacturing business for 20 years and far as he’s concerned, it has been a great business for him and his family (his daughter Aynsley Dueck, is a seven year veteran in the business).

But it doesn’t take a social scientist to understand that the window business isn’t sexy or likely to have the kind of exponential growth sought by startups in the digital era.

But it has been a mainstay in Manitoba, with companies like Loewen Windows and Jeld-Wen among the largest in the country. There are about 25 Manitoba window companies responsible for up to 4,000 direct and indirect jobs with about $300 million in annual revenue not including commercial glazing.

That’s why Dueck helped form the industry association, Fenestration Manitoba, and an annual conference called FenCon – to shine a light on a business that is doing great and does a good job trying to do even better.

The third annual event – FenCon19 – is taking place this week at the RBC Convention Centre. There’s plenty of industry conferences out there, but this one is probably is more of a passion project than most.

Unlike other similar events that may be all about industry promotion or increasing sales or networking or purely staged as a commercial enterprise, FenCon is really about helping the entire industry improve.

“We are trying to bring window and door manufacturing technology and excellence to our city,” said Dueck. “We’re bringing people here and helping the local guys in the process.”

With about 200 people registered — from as far away as Europe, and throughout the U.S. — it may not be the largest industry conference, but it’s 50 per cent larger than it was last year and there is a surprising community feel to the event.

“The way Al has done this conference is… it’s like giving back to the industry,” said Paul Breault, the president of a Montreal company, Precision Motion Controle, that exclusively advises window and door companies on the implementation of robotics and automation to their production.

“What Al is doing is taken to heart,” he said. “There is an attitude of ‘Let’s try to help each other out’… manufacturer and supplier,” he said. “My own presentation is not so much a sales pitch as a way of figuring out how the manufacturers can can us help them better.”

When FenCon was launched, the idea was to find presenters who can address the issues most impactful on the excellence of window and door manufacturing. There will be presentations from Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters (CME) officials who have been leaders in Lean manufacturing training as well as presentations on new technology like ultra thin, very high performance architectural glass and windows.

Breault said the implementation of robotics in the window production process typically does not mean job losses. He said it’s the best way to deal with the labour crunch felt across the country.

“Right now calculating return on investment (on adding robotics) is not so much on what the payback will because of reduced manpower but more on how much is it costing because they can’t produce the windows they want to produce because they don’t have the people to produce them,” he said.

Window and door manufacturers aren’t any more or less compelled to be more innovative or productive than any other vertical segment of the manufacturing industry, but the way Dueck and others see it, the industry holds down a fundamental slot in the bigger picture.

“For one thing we’re on the edge of Fenestration Valley,” said Dueck referring to the fact that some of the world’s largest window and door manufacturers are dotted throughout nearby North Dakota and Minnesota.

“Winnipeg has a history of being a fabrication place and shipping from Winnipeg is excellent in any direction.” he said. “This is a business where you have to have a large capital investment for building and factory equipment, a big payroll to deal with and it’s not a fleeting moment like software.

“And an even bigger point, that is sometimes overlooked is that these are typically family-rooted businesses that are not going to pickup and move to the U.S. or elsewhere.” he said.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca