What’s wrong with Australian windows?
“We’re dumping energy to maintain comfort.”
That’s how Andre Griffs from BINQ sums up what’s happening in far too many Australian homes. We crank the heater, blast the air con, and wonder why the house still feels off. Often, the culprit is simple. The windows are not performing.
We sat down with Andre to unpack what’s going wrong with Australian windows, why it matters more than most people realise, and what BINQ is doing differently to lift the standard.
The Problem with Australian Windows
Andre didn’t mince words. Most windows in Australian homes aren’t doing anywhere near enough to handle real-world conditions, especially in places like Victoria, where temperatures can swing from minus 2 to 40 degrees. That kind of range isn’t mild climate territory. It’s a stress test.
And yet, the story we keep telling ourselves is that Australia doesn’t need high-performance windows. Andre’s take is simple. This belief has become an excuse. Weak regulations and buyer habits have kept the market stuck, and the result is homes that waste energy are generally inefficient and never quite feel comfortable.
What BINQ Is Doing Differently
BINQ’s approach starts with a basic premise: design for performance from day one. Andre explained that a lot of window systems in Australia were originally designed for single glazing, then awkwardly upgraded later. BINQ doesn’t do that. Their windows are built to accommodate double glazing from the start, which makes the jump to better performance far more straightforward.
We also got into materials, specifically uPVC (unplasticised polyvinyl chloride). Andre’s argument is practical. uPVC delivers strong insulating performance and long lifespan, with lower embodied carbon than many traditional aluminium options. Aluminium gets points for recyclability, sure, but Andre’s view is that recyclability doesn’t automatically equal high performance, especially when thermal efficiency is the priority.
The Real Barrier: Adoption (and Messaging)
The benefits are obvious once you understand them. Better comfort, lower energy bills, and less reliance on mechanical heating and cooling. But adoption is still slow.
Andre thinks part of the problem is cultural inertia, and part of it is messaging. People don’t buy windows because they’re excited about window specs. They buy them because they want a home that feels good to live in. BINQ is trying to shift the conversation by educating clients properly. Less “trust us”, more “here’s what this means for your house.”
What’s Next: Composite Windows
Andre also shared what’s coming next for BINQ. Composite windows are designed to bring together the warmth of timber aesthetics with the durability of aluminium cladding. The goal is simple. Make high-performance windows easier to say yes to, without forcing people to choose between looks and function.
Windows aren’t a finishing touch. They’re a performance decision.
And if Australia wants healthier, more comfortable, more energy-efficient homes, we can’t keep treating windows like a commodity. Conversations like this, with people like Andre pushing the industry forward, are how standards lift.
If you’re building or renovating and you’ve never thought deeply about your windows, we hope this article and episode help you to think differently and do more research in the future.
LINKS:
Website:
https://www.binq.com.au/
Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/binq_windows/
Connect with us on Instagram: @themindfulbuilderpod
Connect with Hamish:
Instagram: @sanctumhomes
Website: www.yoursanctum.com.au/
Connect with Matt:
Instagram: @carlandconstructions
Website: www.carlandconstructions.com/
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[00:01:06] Matt: So we're fitting in again, the Performance membranes. Uh, we are lucky enough with their link with Climber to be able to use their facility to record our podcast. With Pro Climber now being a major sponsor on our. On of our show, so we greatly appreciate, uh, appreciable. Is that the word? Fuck. I've screwed that up already for their help.
[00:01:26] Aha. Yeah. You
[00:01:26] Hamish: are, you are tertiary educator. What's the word, Andre? Appreciative. Appreciative. Appreciative.
[00:01:30] Matt: That's the word. So Joel wouldn't have known that. Yeah. Anyway. Wouldn't known. We've known are super, super lucky with our guest today. Um, someone we've been speaking to. Uh, for a while we've been working with for a long time to come on.
[00:01:40] Um, and you would know him as Joel's brother Andre, so
[00:01:44] Andre: that's fantastic. Uh, it's a fantastic intro. Thanks Matt, brother. So we don't, don't need the
[00:01:48] Matt: story at Bink. We don't need to know who you are 'cause Joel's already told it on this podcast. So. Do you know what? Joking in total jokes.
[00:01:57] Hamish: Andre. Um, we are gonna give you an opportunity [00:02:00] to speak Yeah.
[00:02:00] The real story to, to introduce you to our audience and maybe give the, uh, real story behind Bink and who you are and, and how you got to where you are now. Sure.
[00:02:10] Andre: Can I, can I first start off though? Uh, I just wanna set the scene. So from this point forward, I'll be referring to Joel Heidi, build as the flog.
[00:02:18] The flog. The flog. Okay. And you are the,
[00:02:20] Matt: so the boring brother and the flog, correct. That's how we're getting it. That's it. Is that, is that what the episode's called?
[00:02:26] Hamish: That's actually correct. The Boring Brother and the Flock. Um, Matt and I have just both written that down. Who are you, Andre?
[00:02:37] Andre: Uh, how far back do you wanna go?
[00:02:40] Hamish: I reckon go back because your, your story, well, story, journey, whatever the fuck you wanna call it. It's like, it's not linear. You know, you, you, I reckon we had, have had a conversation with you 30 years ago. You, you probably wouldn't say to him, oh, well, I'm gonna own a window company in the high performance space.
[00:02:55] Am I right
[00:02:56] Andre: in saying that? Oh mate, a hundred percent. A hundred percent. I had absolutely no idea what I [00:03:00] wanted to do, um, what that was gonna look like, um, for a very, very long time. Um, I was living at Mum and Dad's till I was in my mid twenties. Um, still really struggling to understand, you know, what I wanted to do.
[00:03:16] Uh, I, I always had just an underlying ambition, but it was really misplaced. Just didn't know what to do with it, you know, and, and, um, you know, I, I, I followed the, the normal path. You know, I, I did year 12, got good grades. I was always academically capable, lazy, like most, most other boys. Um, and, uh, and so I, you know, I, I got the score I needed, went to university, kinda got a little bit lost there.
[00:03:42] Again, I, I was there because I was kind of told, meant to, meant to, meant to believe that that's what I should be doing.
[00:03:48] Matt: Mm-hmm.
[00:03:48] Andre: Uh, and did it and kind of just spread by to be honest. Um, and
[00:03:54] Hamish: what was the, what was the degree that you were in?
[00:03:55] Andre: Uh, so I did a, uh, I did a double degree in, uh, it [00:04:00] and, uh, accounting.
[00:04:01] Matt: Okay.
[00:04:01] Andre: Um, and, um. Yeah, look, I, I didn't really enjoy the accounting side of it at all. Um, again, just, I just didn't have any, any perspective. Um, I couldn't put it into, into, into real terms, you know, so just couldn't, couldn't understand why it was important or what would be good for me. Uh, in hindsight, if I, if I to do it now, I think I'd get a lot more benefit and more enjoyment out of that, just from the business side of things.
[00:04:26] Uh, but at the time I found the practicality of the it side of things a lot more appealing. Um, and so I kind of sunk my teeth into that. Um, anyway, finished that again, had no idea what I wanted to do and I actually left Australia and went to the uk, lived in London for 12 months and a large part of that was breaking free of the shackles of the ethnic, very tight family unit.
[00:04:49] Um, I can
[00:04:51] Matt: see that you guys are pretty tight
[00:04:52] Andre: family still. Yeah, look, we, we are, we are, we are a very, very tight family and, and you know, when particular myself and my brothers, you [00:05:00] know, if we are in a room together. You know, it is like a fish market. I mean, there are, there, you know, there, there's, there, there'd be four of us and there'd be six conversations.
[00:05:07] Right. And, and, and it, and it, and it's just on. Right. You know, we, we, we just, we're taking the piss out of each other. We, and we are, but we are just, we are usually just laughing at stupid shit. Right. Um, and we just, we we love it. That's, and you know, we we're all type A personalities too, you know.
[00:05:25] Hamish: We're, are are your, are your parents like that?
[00:05:27] Andre: Uh, yeah, they are actually. They, um, uh. My mom and dad, my dad especially, massive party animal. Right. That's where Joel gets it from. Okay. Alright. So I wanna clarify that Joel gets the party animal aside from dad. He gets, uh, his, he doesn't really get that, the charisma necessarily from dad. Yep. He gets that, that from you.
[00:05:57] Yeah. Clearly [00:06:00] learned behavior from you? No, a actually it's the, the, uh, the dark horse is my mom. Right, right. In a very typical ethnic sort of a setting, it's dad and he's the top of the top of the queue and all the rest of it. And moms just in the background, Slan, is
[00:06:13] Matt: that
[00:06:13] Hamish: correct?
[00:06:14] Andre: Uh, yes.
[00:06:15] Hamish: Yeah. And I, and I, and I don't want this episode to be like hijacked by Joel.
[00:06:20] Yeah. Um, he's a funny dude. He's got a really amusing social media account. Yeah. And yes, he's a big personality. But there's obviously like a level of intelligence that runs through all of you, because even though Joel might come across as this kind of Larry and Tradey guy, he's a pretty deep thinker, even though it's kind of laid with a comedy 'cause there is some like, in like important topics that he's touching on.
[00:06:45] Uh, and I do want to then swing it back to you too 'cause uh, I, I do wanna know, does that kind of run through that family, like the kind of level of intelligence? I mean, he says, you know, you are the smart one, right? But he's. Yeah, there's levels of intelligence, different smart intelligence. Oh, levels of intelligence.
[00:06:58] Um, are [00:07:00] all you four,
[00:07:00] Andre: four boys there? There's actually five boys in the family. Five boys. Wow.
[00:07:05] Matt: Do you ever, because going ahead to go back, because you had a lot of Instagram followers, but your, your account got hacked in, you lost them all. Correct. Do you have a reminding that you still had more?
[00:07:18] Andre: Actually, I actually forgot.
[00:07:19] That that was the case. But thank you for reminding me. Uh, 'cause the next time I see him, I'll, uh, definitely have a little jab.
[00:07:24] Matt: Yeah.
[00:07:25] Andre: Yeah,
[00:07:25] Hamish: I do remember that. That was in COVID.
[00:07:27] Andre: Yeah. Uh, I actually, I can't remember exactly what that was. I'll take your word for it. But it, it was horrible, you know, and it, it just got completely shut down.
[00:07:34] We just lost everything. Like all the, all that hard work. Yeah. I mean, we, we, we, we got it back without too much. Too much of time, um, because I guess that that sort of underlying momentum was still there. So we, we were able to get it back. We'd have to work hard for it. But yeah,
[00:07:49] Matt: and like, and the hard thing is like, you don't know that, like, just that, I forget how many safe followers you had, but just one of those people who don't follow you now could have been a job.
[00:07:57] Like that's the part that you can't ever [00:08:00] Yeah, yeah. Understand. And I kind of, I remember, yeah. I couldn't, I remember when it happened and I was like, whoa, that sucks.
[00:08:06] Hamish: I think there's almost a different brand of followers now, though. You know, like if you think about, um. It is probably easier to get followers back then.
[00:08:16] Andre: Uh, yeah. I think, I think in a lot of ways it, uh, it, it was, um, you're getting quality now, I think. Yeah. It's, yeah. It's, look, it's, it's a, it's, it's just a different, it's, it's a completely different, different flavor of, of what we're getting now. I mean, back then, you know, the passive house, high performance, you know, it w it, it was a much harder sell Yeah.
[00:08:35] Than what it is now. Right. You know, it, it's still not easy because there's, there's still. There's a larger portion of the market I think, that has no aware, no idea about it, and just isn't aware of it.
[00:08:46] Matt: Why would this, is that being our theme of the day? Yes. So I'm just totally off track. Why do you think they don't know?
[00:08:52] Andre: Um, I, I, I think, I think there, there are, there, there's a few reasons. Um, I think as an industry we haven't necessarily [00:09:00] been all that strategic. Um, and, and all that deliberate in, in what we do and how we go about it. Um, I think it's a little bit, a little bit cultural. Um, the, the cultural influences are, um, from a work culture.
[00:09:11] I mean, you know, it's, it's a, you know, should be right. Um, we've always done it that way. Why do, why do I wanna change? We're in Ireland. We're so far from everyone else. There's no competition, so. Anything that ever happened happened only in Australia. Right. So the, the international influences just kind of weren't, weren't really there historically.
[00:09:32] Whereas if you take Europe for example, like if you are one country in Europe and if you are lagging behind, you'll get found out real quick. So you just can't, right. Whereas in Australia you don't get found out so quickly. Interesting.
[00:09:44] Matt: Ooh. Which is kind of like, oh, I don't know whether to jump so far forward because.
[00:09:51] This is my, my question I have for you is like, what is the major issues with Windows in Australia?
[00:09:55] Hamish: So I reckon before we get to that, I know, but like, it's kind of link in because I was, I was about to jump [00:10:00] to some Windows specific ones too, but I actually wanna know a bit more about how Bink started
[00:10:04] Matt: the real story.
[00:10:05] The real story. So we've got like the mockumentary,
[00:10:09] Andre: uh, look, he, he, he, his, his version of it, uh, was, was, was pretty close. You know, obviously I have a bit, bit of a bit of a laugh about it, but. Uh, and I, and I won't give you the full version 'cause of the, all the detail 'cause he's, he's already broken that.
[00:10:23] But, but yeah, it, it pretty much was my brother Arnie was, uh, renovating his house. One, a set of buy four doors, you know, eight, nine, $10,000 for a set of buy. Four doors for four panels. Right. And he's just looking at like, being the typical immigrant, it is like how much that there's just, there's, there are four glass door panels and some hinges.
[00:10:41] Where's like, why am I paying eight, nine, $10,000 for this? Right. So. Uh, and he was always been the real sort of Wheeler dealer. He'll have a crack at anything.
[00:10:48] Matt: Yeah, right. He'll, he'll get into things real quick. And no background in Windows. Carpentry trade, no business. Is
[00:10:54] Hamish: he the singer?
[00:10:55] Matt: Yes.
[00:10:56] Hamish: Yeah. Okay. That's
[00:10:57] Andre: correct.
[00:10:57] Yeah. Uh, and what a singer [00:11:00] too, by the way. But, uh, but, but yes, he's the singer. Um, does he,
[00:11:03] Hamish: does, is he the one with the looks?
[00:11:07] Are we stopping this? I don't think so. Okay, cool. 'cause I, 'cause it's not you or Joel. I was, I was gonna, I was gonna nominate myself,
[00:11:14] Andre: but
[00:11:14] Hamish: Okay. So how come
[00:11:15] Matt: you haven't got to like sing a tune about Bink? Like a little jingle.
[00:11:19] Andre: Oh, the Bink jingle. Yeah, the Bink jingle mate. Have you ever tried herding cats?
[00:11:24] Hamish: Yeah. Okay. Oh, do you know what, knowing both you and Joel now and maybe a little bit. About your other brothers? Fuck, for starters, I think it's a dear. Yeah. Um, to Joel. Feel sorry for your parents. Like that would've been a freaking nightmare. But, so, so this the, the, the story that, um, Joel told about, um, uh, Arnie.
[00:11:45] Yep. Arnie was renovating and I think, did Joel come and make the doors or was it Arnie that made the doors?
[00:11:50] Andre: No, look, the originally Joel and one of his mates, sorry, Arnie and one of his mates. Sat down with like, with what? Effectively like almost engineering drawings. Right. And they, they basically [00:12:00] kind of pieced it all together and, um, it was a, it was a bifold door, but it was really cr uh, it was just a crude version of one, um, didn't have a jam around it, none of that sort of stuff.
[00:12:09] Just at the top, top section, bottom track. And um, and then he decided to put it on, on, on eBay. 'cause he immediately being the opportunistic sort of filler that he is, he's going, hang on, this has cost me like two grand in parts. If this got charged 8, 9, 10 grand for it, I reckon I can make some money outta this.
[00:12:27] So, hang
[00:12:28] Hamish: on. So he built it with the viewer, put it in his own home? Correct. But it never ended up in his own home?
[00:12:32] Andre: Well, well, he hung it, but it didn't, it wasn't there for long because he took some photos of it, stuck it on eBay and auctioned it. Oh. And, and he and, and just made a tidy profit on it. And people that missed out on the auction were like, Hey, do you have any more?
[00:12:47] Can you make me another one for the same price? And he just kept getting all these inquiries and next thing he knows, he's making them in his backyard. But that's, he then asked Joel for help as well, and, and Joel came around and said, yeah, look, sure, but [00:13:00] it's gotta be, look, you need a jam like young, you can't just sell this right.
[00:13:03] So Joel helped him out and Joel designed the, designed that, and then started to set up a few jigs and few basic, basic things. Proper back out stuff. Yeah.
[00:13:12] Matt: Yeah. And the two of them aren't in the business anymore, which is kind of ironic. Is that right? Yeah.
[00:13:15] Andre: Correct. Yeah. Correct, correct. Look, uh, ar Arnie always said he only ever wanted five, maybe 10 years.
[00:13:21] Uh, he's always been a rolling stone, right? So, um, okay. Uh, he said he, he wanted five to 10 years and five years he was done. He, he wanted to do something else.
[00:13:28] Hamish: What's ha doing now?
[00:13:30] Andre: Uh, uh, he, so he's always been a singer, professional singer. Yeah. So he makes a tidy living outta that. Um, he has a, uh, a talent, uh, business.
[00:13:39] Yeah. Um, and when he's not busy doing that, he actually drives buses.
[00:13:45] Hamish: Right.
[00:13:46] Andre: Okay. So it keeps himself pretty busy. Yeah, very busy. Does he have a family? Yeah.
[00:13:50] Hamish: Oh,
[00:13:51] Andre: wow. Okay. So
[00:13:52] Matt: recently you, I saw Joel making windows at his house. Yes. And you guys all went over and given him shit about it. [00:14:00]
[00:14:01] Andre: Well, yeah. What, for a little bit.
[00:14:02] But Brendan, Brendan and I went over and we, we gave him a chop out. Um, and, uh, you know, 'cause he, he was, he was, he was basically setting up to do, uh, uh, slot attendant joins. Yeah. For the sash. But on, on the, uh, the, the DeWalt, um, site, uh, yeah, assault. And, uh, so he set up a jig and all the rest of it. And, and he, he did, he did all, he did all of it.
[00:14:23] And we were just sort of standing there watching and, you know, giving him a bit of, bit of advice here and there. And it was just, it was just more just a cool thing to do. Just go hang, hang out with the brothers for a little bit. Yeah. And
[00:14:32] Matt: you know, do you, do you look at like what he was doing there and it's like, it's almost going back to where you started, but do you take something away from that and then go back to Bink and be like.
[00:14:40] We're missing a, there's something that he's done that we've missed or forgotten about and brought
[00:14:44] Andre: that back. Lemme, lemme tell you in no uncertain terms if that happened. Yeah, I reckon I'm done. A big mate.
[00:14:51] Matt: No, but like, no, but like, no, but no, no, but like, but you, I, I, I know, I know what you are saying. You are saying you've lost like the human, not the human element, but you are in the office.
[00:14:58] Like you are not sitting there in a factory [00:15:00] every day. But you watch him and you be like, oh, have we now not doing that? Or is that like,
[00:15:05] Hamish: that's actually, you know, I think you're on a really good train of thought here because every, a lot of stuff that you guys do now is all robot operated, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:15:12] Which, which, which you have to do to have a scalable business. Like I get that. But you know, there is something beautiful in that sort of handcrafted approach, and I think maybe what Matt's getting at is that. Yeah. Is there something that you don't see or don't pick up If you're trying to automate everything that you would see if you're actually Yeah.
[00:15:31] Touching, feeling and going through that process. Well, that
[00:15:35] Matt: cut, that cut doesn't work. Like, oh, we cut like that. Can we maybe now increase in efficiency if we do it that way?
[00:15:41] Andre: I, I. Or, or, or, or, or
[00:15:44] Hamish: does it validate the reason why you do automate and get Rob robots involved?
[00:15:48] Andre: No. What it, look, what it, what it did was f first of all, when we were there, all of us were looking at that and we were just, we were reminiscing.
[00:15:54] We're like, yeah, I remember when we used to do this. I remember when, when we were trying to work these things out and all the rest of it, it was
[00:15:59] Hamish: [00:16:00] nostalgia in that. Oh, it was, it was fantastic.
[00:16:01] Andre: Honestly, it was, it really was just a really nice experience. Just one for the bank. Do you wish it was still like that?
[00:16:08] Uh, yes and no. I like, I, I, I, I miss. I missed, I missed the, uh, the, the stage when it was just my brothers and me and just simple. Just, we just do a window and that. Yeah. Yeah. I mi I miss that. I, I don't miss, uh, not having the, uh, the knowledge Yeah. And not having the expertise, uh, and not having the setup and all the rest of it, and all the things that we have now.
[00:16:30] Right. I definitely don't, don't miss that. Right. I think what we've got now is 100% the way it's gotta be done in Australia. In fact, I don't think the way it's gotta be done anywhere in the world really. Right. If you wanna make, if you wanna manufacture a product of this nature to this level of, to a level of quality, that's the setup that, that you have to have that, it just doesn't work anywhere.
[00:16:49] So you are
[00:16:49] Matt: playing a European supplier in an Australian market. So if you're in Europe, like as you said before, you'd have, you just, it's the next thing you've gotta do. It's the next thing where here you come here and it's like, [00:17:00] whoa, look at their equipment, kind of thing. But that's stock standard almost.
[00:17:04] If we went overseas, like you're still getting the best, the best products, but
[00:17:07] Andre: Yeah. So the, the thing, the thing that, that I think you don't realize like in this country is that it's not just, it's not just the hardware, right? It's not just like the equipment that isn't commonplace here, right? So you can't just buy secondhand gear.
[00:17:20] You've gotta get, even if you want secondhand gear, you've gotta buy from overseas, right? It's not just that, it's the actual knowledge that isn't here.
[00:17:26] Matt: Mm,
[00:17:27] Andre: right there, there isn't anyone that I, that, that we can go to and they say, Hey, listen, I'm having trouble with this bloody tilt and turn window. What, what are we doing wrong?
[00:17:35] Because we followed all the instructions. What's wrong? Right.
[00:17:38] Matt: Yeah.
[00:17:38] Andre: You, you, you, there's not, maybe that's what I
[00:17:40] Matt: was getting out the question that Joel, like, you, you, the instructions are making it by hand. There are no instructions, but then the robot there are. Yeah. And that's, that's probably where I was more getting at.
[00:17:49] Andre: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, you know, it, I think that happened for us. Organically over the course of, you know, 10 years. Right? Yeah. When, when, when we were very, very [00:18:00] hands-on and we, and, and you're right. You know, every time, you know, you'd go out on the floor and, and you'd, you'd, you'd do something or you'd be involved in, in something.
[00:18:06] You, you just start picking up a whole, it's just an, it's sometimes it's a slow accumulation Yeah. Right. Of, of all this stuff. And so I suppose for me, I, I didn't get that out of that day. But I just got so much more idea. It is just, yeah. It's like, yeah, I remember that. You know, it was a, it was, it
[00:18:22] Hamish: was a cup filling moment, you know?
[00:18:23] Yeah. 'cause you know, you can look at the success that Binks going through at the moment, and you are looking at all the innovation that's happening and you know, that's great and you, you know, but, but you're probably not sitting in the moment and thinking, holy shit, look at where we're coming from. Yeah.
[00:18:37] But in that moment, in Joel's garage, you're probably like, maybe, and again, maybe I'm just putting words in your mouth, maybe it was a realization of actually how far you'd come.
[00:18:48] Andre: Uh, it, it, it was, there was definitely a moment like that and, and I actually said to, said to Joel as well, um, while he, while he was trying to fine tune, uh, [00:19:00] his, his, his jig and putting the, um, uh, uh, the actual joints together, the, the, uh, the test piece.
[00:19:07] You know, I actually looked at Brendan and Joel and said, you remember when, when we had no idea any, any, about any of this stuff. We had actually, we had absolutely no idea. It was just all of us. With some opinion, a lot of it was just completely unfounded. Right. And it was just trial and error.
[00:19:22] Hamish: Yeah.
[00:19:22] Andre: Right.
[00:19:23] But that wasn't trial and error. That was, that was four to five years of joint experience in one moment. Yeah. Going, no, no, you gotta do this, you need to do that. If you don't do that, that's gonna happen. And we all, we all knew it. And that, that was a, it was definitely one of those realization moments.
[00:19:42] Matt: Um, so why do Australian windows suck?
[00:19:47] Okay. Okay. Let me, let me rephrase this. Why do 99% of Australian windows suck?
[00:19:53] Hamish: Do, do you know what, maybe rephrase that question to ask a little bit more. Okay.
[00:19:57] Matt: Why do fucking most Europe, Australian windows [00:20:00] suck?
[00:20:00] Hamish: Okay, great. That's, that's better. Okay. Righto. Okay. Um, and, and, and what then sets apart with what you are doing?
[00:20:09] Andre: So, I think in Australia, well, no, let me be more specific, um, in Victoria. Um, there, there's a, there's a misconception I think, fundamentally, that we, we aren't cold enough to be uncomfortable in our homes. Like, the weather's not cold enough, so stupid, uh, you know, it doesn't get hot enough. Um, like all the, all of these reasons, right?
[00:20:32] But if you look at our temperature variance, right? You know, we, we will go in, in, this is Victoria, we'll go from minus. To, uh, degrees to 40 degrees, right? Mm. It's a, it's a massive temperature range,
[00:20:45] Matt: 50 degree swing,
[00:20:46] Andre: right? And there's this misconception, right? And, and, and, um, and I think a lot of it starts there.
[00:20:54] So the buyer values aren't, aren't pushing it. The second part of this is that [00:21:00] the regulations aren't pushing it either, so it's gotta be one or the other, right? And preferably both. Um, you've gotta have, I think the, the, the market pushing it and saying, Hey, we, we want this stuff. But you've also gotta have the policy makers saying, well, you know what, this is actually good policy, right?
[00:21:14] Because there's all this talk about, um, uh, climate change. There's always talk about, uh, cost of energy and, you know, spiraling out of control and, and, and they make a big deal out of it, right? And everyone focuses on, um, the burning of, of coal and the energy creation. They're focused on cars. Or, you know, you are using, uh, uh, internal combustion engines and fossil fuels and blah blah, yet you've got this house that's leaking like an absolute sieve and it's sucking energy.
[00:21:47] Right? And no one's talking about that. And that part I don't get, I just, I, I don't understand that. Like, it, it's such a hole. It's literally, literally a massive hole in millions of houses around Australia, [00:22:00] right? And we are dumping energy to, to maintain a level of comfort. And by the way. We're not doing that all that well either.
[00:22:07] Because if you, if you were to graph, I mean, you guys know if you were to graph the temperature variance in, in a house while, while you are, while you are awake and you've got the heater on, you know, it's, it's like a high frequency graph. Right. You know, so rollercoaster stuff, Luna Park. Yeah. And it, and it's, and it's just uncomfortable.
[00:22:22] Right. Whereas, you know, if that were not the case, if it were well insulated and, and, and, and tight, you'd have a much more of a flat line. You'd be comfortable, you'd be using less energy, but. There's just no, there's not a lot of discussion about that. You know, that, that's why I think the things that you guys are doing is fantastic.
[00:22:38] Hamish: I think leaky windows is one thing, but there are so many other, um, parts of a window that make it a, a good window. Yeah. So air tightness is one thing. Yeah.
[00:22:47] Matt: How about just keeping water out?
[00:22:48] Hamish: Keep well, keeping water out something, which is like, so what? Not
[00:22:51] Matt: a given for some window companies. So, so, so,
[00:22:54] Hamish: so I know that I can go and buy much cheaper windows than the windows that you are.
[00:22:59] That [00:23:00] you're providing. Yeah. So, so what is the major differences or some of the differences that, um, your windows are ticking? Yeah. From box point of view than others aren't, and, you know, go into u values, go into thermal bridging, like all of that kind of stuff.
[00:23:13] Andre: The way we've set up our designs in our manufacturing, I guess we saw that the trends had to be heading in a certain direction.
[00:23:22] They had to be heading towards, uh, high performance. And so from the very, from the very start. We set up our designs to be suitable for double glazing. So the transition for us from single to double was like a non-event.
[00:23:36] Matt: Yep.
[00:23:37] Andre: Okay. We, we changed from single, when we started we was single glazing. Right. And, and at that point we're talking strictly timber.
[00:23:43] Yep. Correct. Yep. Strictly timber. Yep. Um, and we went from single to double glazing in a very short time because our designs, we designed them already to suit double glazing, whereas a lot of the other guys have been doing it for longer. It was a big change for 'em. All, all their tooling had
[00:23:59] Matt: to change,
[00:23:59] Andre: [00:24:00] perceived as a big change.
[00:24:01] There's not a lot of tooling
[00:24:03] Matt: as they
[00:24:04] Andre: just couldn't get their head around it. And I'm, I'm being, I'm being honest. It's just a wider Yeah. Right. It's just a deeper I can, I
[00:24:11] Hamish: can understand, I can understand the jump if say, uh, an uh, UPSC or aluminum on extrusion wouldn't fit space. Yeah. The whole molding tool, which we're talking about timber
[00:24:22] Andre: correct.
[00:24:23] Correct. So the, the alley, the alley guys for sure, um, you know, they, they had a lot more work to do. Yep.
[00:24:30] Matt: Um, and I'm assuming they write or on the standard code boards for a lot of these window issues to protect Yeah, of course. The aluminum brand one, the largest. Proportion of windows in Australia. Yeah. As a high percentage.
[00:24:43] If you look at everywhere else in the world, I think, is it UBC's referred to as white gold in Europe?
[00:24:48] Andre: Uh, it was referred to white gold in the uk. UK Yeah. Yeah, you're right. It's
[00:24:52] Matt: like, so like everywhere else in the world uses UPVC. Yeah. We're just in a aluminum here for some reason.
[00:24:59] Andre: [00:25:00] Yeah. Look, the, the, the, the aluminum guys did, I think, did a fantastic job of, of really cementing their position in the market.
[00:25:06] Um, and again, I think they were quite strategic about it. So you, you've gotta. Give 'em credit with Chris too. Yeah. They ran the business very well. Okay. It just wasn't a very good product for the consumers. Uh, but also, you know, the in, again, I'll say in Victoria, there's just this push to have, you know, the, a big house two story, this, that double garage, triple garage, fancy car, all the rest of it.
[00:25:29] Right. But it's, it's just like, it's all, it's all it's quantity. There's, there's, there's such a shift, I think, away from quality into, into quantity. Right. And the worst part is I think Australians, I mean, we are generally, we we're a wealthy country, you know, mean the, the middle class is super, super strong.
[00:25:47] We've got disposable income. And most Australians, I think if you present the options to them, they're actually happy to spend the money on something better. They're just not being presented. The option, the, the actual options very, [00:26:00] very well. And I think that's for us as an industry, that's what we need to do.
[00:26:03] We need to re regain our position. In terms of PVC and timber windows, for example, or high, high performance windows. We need to regain that position and we need to take some of that stuff back. That was ours to start with, that we allowed the aluminum guys to take over.
[00:26:18] Matt: Are they, norm are, so I'm gonna semi pick apart your Marky message from, in a good way, like high performance windows.
[00:26:26] Aren't they Just the window that everyone should have?
[00:26:28] Andre: Yes,
[00:26:29] Matt: that's, and I feel like you've. There's a messaging there that like each scene, and I think that word high performance sometimes seen, and we've been talking about this actually common theme of today is it's a bit of scary. It's like how do you market high performance?
[00:26:43] Like, oh, I just want the normal window. Yeah. But the reality is with the UPVC window, that is the normal window that everyone should have. Yeah.
[00:26:51] Andre: Look it, uh, yes it is. But when you're catering to the market that we cater to, right? The, the general market. [00:27:00] If, if we said, Hey, this is just a. Standard window, they would expect it to have a standard price.
[00:27:05] Right. But the cost components are different. Like, you know, you can't make a window to, to work as well as, as what ours does without using better hardware, without using better. But your UPC is the
[00:27:15] Matt: same price as aluminum, though. We,
[00:27:16] Hamish: we need to recalibrate our mind of what a standard window should it should be.
[00:27:21] Yeah. And then move on from there. But U PPP C is
[00:27:24] Matt: like, is this like, I literally did an experiment on it on our we, the rife arranged project that we did. And for shits and gigs, I thought I'd send it off to aluminum suppliers and some very well known ones. Um, some I just not so well. 'cause I wanted to see the, the price differential in it.
[00:27:40] Firstly, two of them come back with single glazed Yep. Ignoring the whole double glaze with the low eco. So firstly, you actually listen to the brief, which was.
[00:27:50] Hamish: Or even, or even read the energy report.
[00:27:52] Matt: No, no, I didn't send an energy report. I just told what the brief was. Yep. So being quoted as per the brief, I had two come back just saying Single glaze is okay.
[00:27:59] [00:28:00] And I'm like, it's not one, just come back with double glaze. I'm like, no, you need the low E coding. And their excuse was, oh no, that adds a huge amount of cost. And then I was like, and okay guys, you've all missed the, uh, the thermal bridge free design. And they're like, oh, that will just make it too expensive.
[00:28:15] When you actually start to factor in the, like for like the UPVC was substantially cheaper. And I, and, and, and the thing, I think the issue is like, you guys are so honest with your, your messaging and the high performance, and this is what we're gonna give you, where the opposite side is. Like, we are just gonna give you the, the bare minimum.
[00:28:31] Yeah. And we'll hit you later once the energy report comes through. All once, once they've got a. Tidy that up later. Yeah. And I, and that, that's a huge issue I think within the aluminum market personally. Like it was really eyeopening and maybe, again, I'm in a bubble and I just thought that was a horrible experience.
[00:28:45] Hamish: Can I, can I just, um, just sit in the elephant in the room for a second, but you PC's plastic. Yep.
[00:28:52] Matt: So is our membranes are sitting right behind. Oh,
[00:28:53] Hamish: exactly. Exactly. But, but, but this, this is, this is a common, this is a common, uh, [00:29:00] I don't know, point of contention that we need to have a conversation with clients about.
[00:29:05] And
[00:29:07] Matt: so is their joinery. So like,
[00:29:08] Hamish: yeah, I, I, I get all, I get it all. I get it all. So, so how can we, 'cause clients are like, oh, well aluminum's, uh, you know, it's, it's complete, it's recyclable. We can, we can pull the glass out and we can recycle it. And you can do it a hundred times. Yep. A thousand times. You can keep going.
[00:29:23] 'cause aluminum is, you can just keep mounting it down and, and redoing it. Why would I, from a sustainability point of view, choose UPVC over aluminum? Well, there's,
[00:29:34] Andre: there's some very, very good reasons. Um, the first of all, first of all, the, the embodied carbon in PVC extrusion is significantly less than aluminum.
[00:29:44] I don't know if you've ever seen an aluminum ex, uh, an aluminum smelter. Yep, yep. It's basically massive, massive, uh, uh, cauldrons with. Uh, uh, probes going into it, massive amounts of electricity going into the plant, right? That's it. And then to
[00:29:58] Matt: melt it and make it again, it's a high [00:30:00] carbon content, correct?
[00:30:00] It
[00:30:00] Andre: is a, it's a massive, massive amount of amount of energy to actually produce aluminum in the first place when you're using aluminum for doors and windows in, in this instance, because they're conduct energy, so well, they're not doing EU any favors in terms of reducing the energy, uh, of, of the house, right?
[00:30:16] Yes. You can recycle it for sure. Um. If you take PVC, the embodied carbon to produce PVC in the first instance is significantly less. Um, when you use it in a door or window, you are getting a product that actually insulates extremely well, like poles apart from aluminum. Uh, and the third thing, uh, is the, the lifespan of PVC windows is actually so great that the PVC uh, extruders.
[00:30:47] I actually, they actually find it difficult to get recycled content because they've gotta wait so long for end, end of life, uh, windows, right? So in Europe, the the extruders are, are, are mandated. They have to use [00:31:00] a certain amount of recycled content. So the, so the, the, the PVC extrusions that we use here to make windows from Alloplast, from Alloplast.
[00:31:09] They already have recycled contract,
[00:31:10] Matt: which, which, uh, at your stores I've seen it shows like you can play with the little balls like the, you've got the little Yeah. Box that has the recycle component, correct. That goes into it.
[00:31:18] Andre: And, and allali Plus actually, and again, this is a shout out to Alloplast, and this is, you know, there was a couple of reasons why we paired up with Alloplast.
[00:31:25] Um, one of the reasons is they, they, they recognize our values. They, they, they know what we're about. They know what's important. They've already got a recycling, um, program.
[00:31:36] Matt: Course European will take,
[00:31:38] Andre: they, they will take all of our off cuts so all of our off cuts don't go into the bin. Yeah. They go into an L plus bin, goes in the L plus truck on the return trip from delivering goods to us.
[00:31:47] So they're not using carbon to, to bring it back to, to their factory either. Right. And then they're recycled there and then it goes across Well they, or they're, they're spreading the carbon. They're spreading the carbon. Sure. Alright. And, and, um, it then goes [00:32:00] across the bay and there's a company that, that then repurposes it, and I believe they make furniture out of it.
[00:32:05] Matt: Oh,
[00:32:05] Andre: that's cool. So that, that program is already happening. Right. And, and, and that's just in Australia, but as said in Europe, you know, they've, they've, they've, they've got much higher mandates. Right. So, you know, again, like the, the stuff we're using has already got recycled content and it can get recycled again.
[00:32:22] We just gotta wait 20 ideas before the windows are done. I
[00:32:23] Matt: think the issue with plastic, yeah. Huge issue microplastics in society. Totally agree. But it's also so useful. We're not gonna go to, like if you're in surgery, hell, how many tools in a surgery unit would use plastic? Are they gonna say or you can't use them?
[00:32:38] Hamish: Oh yeah. I mean we're certainly not, I know, but like the thing
[00:32:41] Matt: is, plastic's such an easy thing to jump on and it's like we spoke about at the start, um, about the, the whole emission thing and the amount, the energy, the coal, and people jump on the plastic straws and for a good reason, but there's bigger fish to fry.
[00:32:53] Hamish: Yeah. So just, uh, to probably just to indicate how good a conductor aluminum is. And I'm, I'm only, [00:33:00] and I'm hoping I'll get this right Cameron, 'cause I was reading over a presentation Cameron's doing tomorrow Yep. To get the equivalent of R two insulation. Yep. With aluminum, I think it's over 400 meters. Uh, I've, I've heard, I've heard the, some of the numbers as well.
[00:33:16] Yeah. Over 400 meters. So that, that's a, to get an R two value in, that's the whole
[00:33:20] Matt: athletic track.
[00:33:20] Hamish: Yeah. Around. Yeah. All the way around to, to, it's gonna be that deep to, to meet equivalent of artery. Yep. So that's how good of a thermal conductor. It's,
[00:33:30] Matt: if you imagine it's only what? Well, there's a reason we use metal in our pan.
[00:33:34] Yeah, like that. Like, isn't that the whole reason? Like we have metal pots, we don't use plastic pots because they don't, you know, I guess the
[00:33:39] Hamish: reason I'm bringing that up is that, like, that, that's just to try and really sort of get in people's minds how good a, like what's actually happening if that's not thermally broken.
[00:33:47] Yeah. But you'll touch it in summer or it'll be hot in winter, it'll be cold.
[00:33:50] Matt: And people wonder why shit can, is still framing industry.
[00:33:54] Hamish: I don't, certainly don't wonder. But
[00:33:55] Andre: look, the, the other thing, um, that, that hasn't really hit, hit our [00:34:00] shores just yet, but it's on its way. When, when we, when, when the mandates come in and they start forcing the average build to get sealed up just a little bit better, you're gonna have con quite potentially condensation issues too.
[00:34:16] Hamish: Yeah. Right. And again, it's, it already be happening.
[00:34:18] Andre: Yeah. You know, so, so this and, and these, these are all things that happen in Europe as well. Right. So, you know, they've, they've, they've, they learned that they worked it out. That's why they've got HRVs and all the rest of it. Right.
[00:34:28] Matt: It's so frustrating that you have.
[00:34:32] Europe who worked it out. And then you have America who have gone, Hey, we'll copy it. Who Then Canada copied it and then New Zealand copied it, and then we're gonna copy it in Australia. And we're the dumbest of all, we've already seen the six examples of it not working, but we go, let's, let's maybe be the seventh that it might work here.
[00:34:50] Andre: Yeah. There, there, there really, there really is. Uh, there's, there's just such a. Resistance. Yeah, that's the perfect word to, to change, [00:35:00] right? Some, some of these fundamental things. Um, yeah. Look, I, I dunno, I, I guess maybe the policy makers don't wanna make too drastic a policy change too quickly. And, and I, and I get that, but there's gotta be a roadmap, right?
[00:35:16] I mean, there's, there's gotta be. You know, I think that that's my,
[00:35:19] Hamish: that's my
[00:35:19] Andre: biggest
[00:35:19] Hamish: problem. That's my biggest issue at the moment. There's no, there's like, oh no, it's too expensive. Let's freeze the code. But, okay, well, show me how we're getting there. Yeah. And that's not happening at the moment. Yeah. So I wanna circle back to the windows.
[00:35:28] So, how are your windows solving this condensation problem, this comfort problem, this health problem? Okay.
[00:35:37] Andre: So again, full disclosure, we, we actually for a little while. We tinkered with aluminum window, like as an importer product. We thought, okay, and the reason we did, it's because we were only manufacturing timber and we felt like we were alienating some of our, particularly our builder clients, because builders were often using aluminum.
[00:35:54] They'd only come to us maybe once a year, once every 18 months for that timber project. We thought, okay, well this might [00:36:00] be a way for us to, you know, to strengthen that, that, uh, that relationship. And we tried it. We, we, we build on it pretty quickly. Um, for lots of reasons. The import thing just didn't, didn't work for us.
[00:36:10] We're a manufacturing business. Um, but the second thing is it's just, it's not what we're about.
[00:36:16] Matt: Yeah. You know,
[00:36:16] Andre: you, you, you knowing what we know, like we, we can't, you can't unlearn it. Right? I, I know how badly this aluminum windows are gonna perform. Um, and I just, I can't bring myself to convince a client to buy them.
[00:36:28] Right. Even though it's an easier sell because it's a, it's a cheaper product. Right. I, I just, I just couldn't do it.
[00:36:33] Matt: When is cheaper? Ever better?
[00:36:36] Andre: Uh, look up. I don't know. I'm sure if I thought long and hard enough. There, there, there is an example, but, but often it's not, you know, I mean, often market forces prevail, right?
[00:36:44] You know, you, you, you, I think that's the un that's the underlying, um, uh, concept behind everything, right? I mean, I mean, if, if it's, if it's really, really cheap, you gotta think, well, how is it that cheap? There's, there's gotta be a reason. Right? Um, so yeah, but I mean, there, [00:37:00] there are, there are some outliers, some exceptions, but yeah, generally speaking, I, I think, I think you're right.
[00:37:04] You know, you've, you, you just need to be, I think, open-minded about it and, and make an informed decision. And in fact, that is one of the things that I really promote with my clients. I'll always, to my clients, I said, I'm not here to sell you anything, right? It's in my interest that you buy from me, but I'm not here to sell you something.
[00:37:22] What I'm here to do is I'm here to give you information. You make an informed decision because you are spending a fair chunk of your money on doors and windows, and I want you to be comfortable and confident that the decision you made is the right decision with everything in front of you, right? Yeah.
[00:37:36] And that I, I think that doesn't happen often.
[00:37:38] Hamish: So I wanna go back to something I was asking about before, like, I guess what separates a good window versus a bad window? So what are some of the things that, um. People should be looking for when, when they're comparing windows, because we shouldn't just be looking at price.
[00:37:53] We should be looking at, okay, what are, what are some of the, the, some of the, the three or four things that people need to be looking at? Yep. [00:38:00] When they're trying to make a selection about Windows.
[00:38:03] Andre: Three key, three key things to start, start you off with. The first is, uh, U value. Yep. The second is your SHGC, and the third is air infiltration.
[00:38:14] Matt: Can you add a third water ingress? Fourth. A fourth? Yeah. I can't count. Well, I'm sure there's a pressure of like water ingress. The, the
[00:38:19] Andre: rea the reason that I, I, I didn't specifically mention that, is because that, that's, that, that's, yeah. Right. You get water base level requirement. I mean, you can't have a window that that leaks water.
[00:38:29] You know,
[00:38:30] Matt: I don't, quote me, I'm pretty sure the n CCC says a window has to have the ability to be sealed,
[00:38:38] Andre: the ability. Yeah. There, there, there are, there are lots of those types of statements. Yeah. You know, in, in the code.
[00:38:44] Hamish: And what kind of u values are we looking? Are we, we wanna be looking at
[00:38:47] Andre: Okay. You, you really want a u value that's, that's, that's around the 1.5 or lower.
[00:38:52] Yep. Okay. So at 1.5 or lower, you are getting a window that is inching very well. Yeah. Okay. Um, [00:39:00] the SH GC is a little bit trickier because in the colder climates you wanna hire SHGC 'cause you want that, that winter warmth to reduce your, uh, your heating load.
[00:39:09] Matt: Yeah.
[00:39:09] Andre: But as you get further north, and when we do projects in Sydney, north of Sydney, Queensland, it's very much about the cooling load.
[00:39:15] And so we have to use different, different glass to keep the insular value low. Uh, but also keep the solar heat gain low as well.
[00:39:23] Hamish: Yep. So SHGC is solar heat gang coefficient for those playing along at home.
[00:39:27] Andre: Yep. And, and then all of that I think is all but useless if the window leaks air, like,
[00:39:36] Matt: yep.
[00:39:37] Andre: Alright.
[00:39:37] It doesn't matter how, it's like having, having a wall with the highest installation you can get in the wall, but having a great big hole in the middle of it, you're gonna be
[00:39:44] Hamish: cold. And, and just further to that, you can have the best window in the world. And if it's not properly installed. Correct. Then you may as well just go and buy an aluminum window from down the road.
[00:39:53] Andre: Correct? Correct. So, you know, for the longest time, you know, we, we were, we really were very, very focused on the [00:40:00] manufacturing and the delivery of a product. But over the, over the last two or three years, um, we've, we've shifted focus a little bit, um, only because we are confident and comfortable that the product we're manufacturing now we've got, we've got that worked out.
[00:40:16] Yeah. There's not a lot of effort that we need to put into that. Um. What we do need to do is we need to think about the, the full, uh, the full picture. It's not just, uh, specing up a window properly and making it, delivering it, but what happens after that? It's that total ownership to the client is, is what we, and, and, and as part of that we do, we, we run these workshops, online workshops as part of the confirmation process.
[00:40:38] We, we get the wall type drawings. Uh, we'll put our windows into the wall drawings, and then we start to talk to guys like yourselves about, Hey, where do you want in the wall? Where do you want this window to sit?
[00:40:48] Matt: Yep.
[00:40:49] Andre: Um, how are you gonna wrap this up? How are you gonna fix it? How are you gonna get it airtight?
[00:40:53] All all of those things, all that detail we capture and improve on, and we doing a project, a project basis and
[00:40:57] Matt: improve on it. Yeah. So, [00:41:00] uh, opening in a wall is the worst part of any house. Like, we're cutting. Uh, a square in most instances out of our membrane, which means water can get in, but it also means we have a thermal barrier.
[00:41:11] And that's why we talk about the U value. And what I was just double checking then. So your values are down about, you say U value of two, which is one and a half. One. Yeah. So 0.5 and a half. Yeah. Which is, which is nearly the equivalent of like, uh, R 0.75 roughly. Mm-hmm. So we wouldn't sit there and put 0.75 R insulation in our walls.
[00:41:34] If that makes sense. We, we we're putting R four at minimum. At minimum. You think most people putting an R two, 2.5, that's a one of the highest performing windows in the Australian market is sitting at 0.75. You are, you are down the point ones. If you're looking at something crap, like substantially worse, and I don't think we, people understand how.
[00:41:56] Quickly that value can really drop. And how that increase in the window [00:42:00] performance can actually have huge effects. Yeah. And, and
[00:42:02] Hamish: the reality is that the, on the performance, the, the easiest way to combat that is not to put, is to live in a dark box. Yeah. But we're not gonna live in a dark box. Yeah. Yeah, that's right.
[00:42:10] 'cause the views over there and we wanna see that and we want. We wanna live. Yeah. We wanna have connection with, we wanna get as
[00:42:15] Matt: insulated as possible too, in that
[00:42:17] Hamish: glazing
[00:42:17] Matt: value.
[00:42:17] Hamish: Yep. Yeah. But, but people, you do need to understand the impact that a really poorly performing windows is gonna have on your thermal comfort.
[00:42:24] Yeah.
[00:42:25] Andre: And look, the other thing too that I think is really worth noting right, is that this isn't my opinion. Yeah. Right. If you, if you, without too much effort, you can find, um, you can find information that, that. That supports what I'm seeing at energy, uh, dot gov. Sustainability of Victoria. There's, there's like a whole bunch of these places that actually will tell you outright.
[00:42:50] Yeah, you probably don't, don't wanna use an aluminum window. You want to use double glaz, you wanna use better performing glass, you want to use, uh, low conducting materials. And they, and they're too, all this stuff, right? All this thing, [00:43:00] new thing called cha ETP, you could type it in and it'll give you a pretty clear answer across the world.
[00:43:03] Uh, yeah. Look, and, and it, and, and again, like, you know, you can, you can, you can validate that stuff, right? Yeah. So it's not, and again, it's not just chat GPT coming up with. Someone that's written up a little blog on their own. It's, it's not, it's not b written, it's credible. It's credible references.
[00:43:17] Matt: Right?
[00:43:17] It's not
[00:43:17] Andre: bko have flooded the market with false
[00:43:19] Hamish: information. Maybe they have, I dunno. Maybe they've got a really good essay.
[00:43:23] Andre: Well, you know, I, I'll walk in the principle that, you know, if you, if you provide, you know, 90% of, uh, of, of, uh, fact. Uh, 10% fluff, uh, probably goes, uh, unnoticed.
[00:43:32] Hamish: Oh yeah, that's right. So just for everyone that our battery went dead in the, uh, in the camera before, so we're trying to figure out where the fuck we're up to.
[00:43:38] So No, no, no. Keep it in. Keep it in. Oh, okay. Yeah, keep in. I think we fixed it up. Keep it in. We fixed it up. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So, so I think we're talking about, um, we're not living in a big dark box. Yeah. Right? And, and it's not just you pushing an agenda around, well you should use my windows 'cause LOU values and all that kind of stuff.
[00:43:55] Like, we want to have that connection with nature, but we need to understand. Why [00:44:00] we don't understand why we need to have good performing windows. And, and you are
[00:44:03] Andre: not making it up? No. This, this is, this is information that's widely available. In fact, we started down this path because we were looking for the information and this is what we came across.
[00:44:13] And it, it just made sense. You know, we, we, we traveled overseas and did a lot of research and, and then everything just pointing it points all in the same direction.
[00:44:21] Hamish: Yep.
[00:44:21] Andre: You know
[00:44:22] Hamish: how long's Bink been in operation for 16 years? 16 years. So. I'm curious to understand maybe what the last five years looks like.
[00:44:31] 'cause I reckon up to that point, trying to get across the line, these high performance windows, you know, trying to sell like high performance probably wasn't even something that we'd talked about. Yeah. Five or six years ago. Have you seen the market change now and have you seen like that in sales and growth in Bink over the last few years of, of that kind of knowledge growing?
[00:44:53] Andre: Uh, yes. The market has changed significantly. Um, I'm always watching it. Um, are you aware [00:45:00] of the diffusion of innovation? No. It's a bell curve. So you know what a bell curve is? Obviously you draw a bell curve and it's, it's separated into segments. Yeah, yeah. Of the bell curve. Right. And at the very, very start of, of the left hand side of the bell curve, it's like bleeding edge, like people that are just looking for whatever's brand new.
[00:45:17] I want it just because it's new Then, then you get like sort of the early adopters, which is like the mean Yeah. That's like the. Hmm. Is
[00:45:23] Matt: that like the, is that, is that going back to
[00:45:25] Andre: old? No,
[00:45:25] Hamish: he's talking about outliers in on.
[00:45:28] Andre: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, so then, so then next to that is like your early adopters.
[00:45:32] Yeah. Right. So people that are quite progressive and they're, they're watching what's going on and, and they jump onto the, the trends quite, quite early on. Then you've got this next section, right, which, when you get into that, it's called a chasm. When you, when you switch from, uh, switch over from early adopters into this kind of mainstream, once you get that, it has its own momentum.
[00:45:53] And then the rest of the market just kind of follow suit. And at the very, very end of it, you get the laggards who just go down kicking and screaming. [00:46:00] Right. But they, but they're like an equally small portion on the other end of the bell curve. Yeah. Right. And so what But they're usually the loudest they can be.
[00:46:08] The loudest, I would say
[00:46:09] Hamish: they're both.
[00:46:10] Andre: So what, what, where I reckon we are is we're at the, we're at the tail end of early adopters. And I reckon we're about to get into a really exciting stage where we start to get that, that critical mass that, you know, the, where the majority of people have a tilt and turn window or, or just, just generally a window that actually works well.
[00:46:31] Right? That's such a weird concept that's airtight that, you know, when you close it, the sound really dies down. You know, look, you are in control of the environment, not it's leaking just because it's leaking. Right? Um, and once that happens. All of a sudden it, it just becomes, that's like, that's the normal.
[00:46:49] Then all of a sudden you look at this other stuff and you go, oh, is that what I've got? I don't really want that anymore. Right. Let's, let's ask some questions. Yeah. And I reckon that's an, it's a really exciting time for us.
[00:46:59] Matt: So what's the [00:47:00] next innovation of Windows that you see being the game changer?
[00:47:04] Andre: Uh, I, I think as a, as a broad, as a broad, um, category, I think it's gotta be the composite windows.
[00:47:11] For sure. So Ali clad, so yeah. Uh, timber window with aluminum. So look, it, it's not gonna be for every, everyone and every project, right? Um, but we also recognize that, which is why we've got PVC windows, we've got timber windows, and at some stage we will have Ali clad as well, right? Ideally. The vast majority of clients would have an ACL window because they, it's the warmth and the beauty.
[00:47:35] Yeah, definitely. On the inside
[00:47:37] Hamish: it's, it's usually, it's usually the, uh, the doesn't mean on the,
[00:47:39] Andre: on the
[00:47:39] Hamish: want of the Yeah. Correct. High on the wants list. Correct. Yep.
[00:47:42] Andre: Right. Um, so I think that's the, that's the next thing, but watch the space because we've got, as part of that, that release, when we are ready to release, it will be a suite of windows that I think is actually gonna get some really good traction in the market.
[00:47:59] And [00:48:00] I think it might disrupt a few things. Where, where do you go in a very positive way? Where do you
[00:48:04] Matt: go? Do you just go see what's happening in Europe? Is that there?
[00:48:07] Andre: Yeah.
[00:48:08] Matt: Yeah. You probably just go observe. Um, yeah, there's,
[00:48:11] Andre: there's a, so every two years there's a, uh, there's a window exhibition, uh, called Feal in, uh, yeah, yeah.
[00:48:17] Nuremberg in, in Germany. Uh, Joel and I first went to that.
[00:48:20] Matt: That's, that's the biggest building conference in the world, isn't it? Or no,
[00:48:25] Andre: you, I'm thinking Bau. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. That's bow. So different. Okay, different. This, this is specifically for doors and windows. So
[00:48:31] Hamish: fence, fence. There is
[00:48:32] Andre: windows, isn't it?
[00:48:33] Fence door is windows. Yeah. Fencer windows. Yeah. And BAU is construction, so that's
[00:48:36] Matt: like crazy when you'd go to like a full window was seminar, whatever conference. And everyone's trying to showcase their little bit of technology. Oh yeah. I like, and, but they're all competing, but they're all like probably spying on each other too.
[00:48:49] Andre: Yeah. Look. A hundred percent. Look, it's a, it's, it's, it's, it's a, it's a way of. Rapidly expediting your knowledge of what the industry's doing. Right? You [00:49:00] go there once every two easy and go, yep, that's new. Seen that before. Okay, that's getting traction. That's not, I saw this last time, but don't see it here anymore.
[00:49:07] So one of the things that's happening is the Europeans are getting really big about, uh, fly screens. They never used to be. Yeah, I saw way more fly screen manufacturers and supplies than I've ever done at that, at that show. Interesting. And it's climate change. Ah, lots more mosquitoes. And I was just about to say,
[00:49:25] Hamish: is so climate just because there's more?
[00:49:27] Yeah.
[00:49:28] Andre: Okay. And so Italy has a massive problem because of all the imports from China. And this is not a slur on China in any way, shape or form. It's just factors what happened. There's a particular type of a, of an insect and they call it a stinkbug, right? We have stinkbug alerts here in Australia. Every now and then we get the alerts from, from, from port.
[00:49:46] Um, and, and the stuff gets quarantined, right? But they don't have the same level of controls there. They've got an infestation of stink bug. Apparently these things, they, they smell like sewer. So the Italians are going ballistic, putting screens on, on all their windows to try and keep these things out, [00:50:00] right?
[00:50:01] So there, there's all of these sorts of things that are happening, right? So, but, you know, you find these things out when you go to these, these places. But you have to do the work. You've gotta, you've gotta get outta your comfort zone. You've gotta get in the plane, you've gotta go over there, you know, the cop, the 24 hour flight there and, and all the rest of it that comes with it.
[00:50:15] Hamish: So all I'm hearing is that you are saying that Australia was ahead of the curve with us having fly screens on our windows.
[00:50:21] Andre: That's probably given us a little bit more credit than you. We, we didn't have a choice. We just had, we've just got shit loads of fly screen flies around.
[00:50:28] Matt: Alright, we're gonna wrap this up and jump into our mindful moments.
[00:50:32] Sponsored by MEGT, Australia's leading apprenticeship experts. You've just brought up a word, uh, comfort zone. Um, and it kind of treated a really good idea in my brain, is doing an apprenticeship is getting out of your comfort zone. Um, I had a bit of beef in my own head recently around the whole, uh, I see a lot of social media stuff trying to build up the whole [00:51:00] university thing and try build up, Hey, go to uni, do this.
[00:51:02] But we don't see enough on trades and I feel there's still the stigma attached with trades and, um. The, it's not seen as cool, and we have a huge shortage of trades at the moment in Australia. Um, and the reason I say comfort zone is I feel there's still this, um, stigma that it's a dirty work. It's not fun.
[00:51:25] Um, I, I know you loved your apprenticeship ham, but at the moment, just for clarity, I
[00:51:30] Hamish: never did my apprenticeship, but I, but, but, but I definitely did my time.
[00:51:36] Matt: Yeah. So doing apprenticeship is getting out of your comfort zone. Yep. Majorly like you are in the trenches sometimes it sucks. You're working out in the rain, you're working out in the heat.
[00:51:45] But, um, I think, and I'll ask both of you, I don't think there's ever been a ti better time to get into an apprenticeship with the huge shortage we have. If someone, if you care in this industry, you will go far just from the fact [00:52:00] of caring. I think. Well, I, I
[00:52:01] Hamish: think, I think the jobs are safe as well. Yeah. So God, from a, from a, from a technology and AI point of view, like I feel like hands-on practical.
[00:52:09] Um, trades or, or jobs are probably one of the safest around. Yeah.
[00:52:14] Matt: And I know the government at the moment, the Australian government have given is I think $10,000 to anyone looking to get into a residential trade as a bonus over three years. So there's a government Australian subsidy that if you've signed up from the 1st of July, 2025, there's Yeah.
[00:52:29] There's a, there's a turn ground bonus that you will get across the years to, to jump into the residential side, not the commercial side. And that's things like carpenters, brick layers, uh, plasterers, glas, like it's the, the trades that we need way, way more of tilers. It's not your electrical on a data center.
[00:52:44] It's not your plumbing in a commercial sector or a carpenter in a commercial sector. It's hitting the residential market, which is where we need to Yep. Get more people in. So that's my mindful moment of this week. But anyway, um,
[00:52:57] Andre: can I just add something there very quickly? Yeah. I've just got a little [00:53:00] story if that's okay.
[00:53:02] You, you mentioned before, you know, that the, the, the stigma attached to, you know, being a taken on a trade vocation. Right. So. Make reference back to the flog. Yeah. Um, when he finished school, went to uni. Right. And he just really wasn't enjoying it. And he, and he's told you a story and I know that I've heard the heard, heard the, uh, the podcast.
[00:53:25] Um, he, he had the conversation with me about, he said, look, I don't really wanna do this. I actually think I wanna be a carpenter. And my immediate reaction was, Hmm.
[00:53:39] Matt: Okay.
[00:53:40] Andre: I, I always thought you had to go to university. Right? That's, that's the way to do it. And I had a chat with a few, uh, a couple of people in my family and some other friends as well, and gotta put a, put a bit of perspective on it and, you know, then I came back to him and, and I gave him my counsel and I said, you know what?
[00:53:59] If that's [00:54:00] what you wanna do, do it. You know, I, I think, I think it's a, it's a really good path. I, I think, um, if you love it, you'll do well at it. Um, and in any case, you're a smart guy. I think you'll do well. Well at anything. Yeah. Right. And imagine if he didn't overcome, or if the situation didn't overcome the stigma or attachment being a trade.
[00:54:20] Mm-hmm. And if he didn't become a, a, a carpenter and then didn't become a builder. We, we wouldn't have another quality. You wouldn't have bink Well, we, we, well, we wouldn't have bink, we wouldn't have another quality person in the, in the industry. Yeah, I agree. Doing all this sort of stuff. Right. And so a hundred percent, you know, they, that, that, that stigma that that's gotta go a hundred percent.
[00:54:39] I totally, it's, it's, it's gotta, it's gotta go. We, we need more people going into trades and, and doing, doing all this stuff. It's, and, and there there's, there's, there's plenty of money to be made in it. Yeah, totally agree.
[00:54:51] Matt: If anyone wants to get their windows. Now, are you Australia wide?
[00:54:55] Andre: Uh, we are Eastern Seaboard.
[00:54:57] Yep. Um, Adelaide and WA gets a little bit, [00:55:00] logistically a little bit complicated.
[00:55:01] Matt: Makes sense. Yep. Um, but if anyone wants to get onto you, what's the best way how they contact you? Uh, website, Instagram.
[00:55:11] Andre: Yeah. Jump onto www.bink.com au And that's probably B-I-N-Q-B-I-N-Q. BINQ. Yep. Um, and that's for brothers Incorporated.
[00:55:24] Hamish: Sorry, Jo Joel, stop your thumb. You worry more about that. So he's such a, if want, he's such a flog. You want, he knew what
[00:55:30] Andre: he was doing. He did it deliberately. Miserable prick that he is.
[00:55:34] Hamish: We did, we did. We, we probably did bait him a little bit. We probably did set him up on,
[00:55:38] Andre: probably
[00:55:38] Hamish: gonna
[00:55:38] Andre: have
[00:55:39] Hamish: to
[00:55:39] Andre: take some responsibility for that.
[00:55:40] Look in, in all fairness, I don't reckon he wouldn't taken a lot of bait. He, he was ready to bite anyway, so.
[00:55:45] Matt: Look, both Hamish and I have worked with your windows multiple times. I've used your timber and your UPVC. We've got your UPVC in multiple certified passive US projects. So they do work from a performance perspective, um, when we get down to the nerdy stuff.
[00:55:58] But thank you for [00:56:00] everything you've done for both of us. We're super excited to what you guys have in the future. Um,
[00:56:04] Hamish: and also thank you for your support for SBA as well. We really appreciate that. Pleasure, mate. Any, anything that we can do to keep promoting, give us more money. Yeah, that's what you just, that's what you can do anything you want.
[00:56:19] Alright, thanks. Thank you.