Liniar, the UK’s leading PVCu systems company and subsidiary of Quanex, is delighted to announce the successful transition of Safestyle UK plc to Liniar profiles. Safestyle is the UK’s largest fabricator of windows and doors into the retail market and announced the change to its shareholders in October 2022.
The Safestyle team underwent a management change in 2018 and has since been focused on a continuous improvement journey across all levels of the company’s operations, including a full review of its supply chain partners.
Prior to the switch, Safestyle UK carried out a lengthy due diligence process with Liniar to ensure risk mitigation. This included site visits and audits, allowing both parties to be assured of a good cultural fit and partnership.
Thanks to Liniar’s robust operational systems, capacity and forward planning, there have been no compromises necessary to the product range or processes to enable the Safestyle volumes of over 4,000 frames per week to be serviced without any operational blips; since the start-up in January 2023, the whole Liniar customer base has continued to see On Time, In Full service levels above 99% every day.
This has been possible thanks to a carefully planned and managed transition between both teams. Safestyle’s sales team have been trained on Liniar product familiarity, the service team have received on-site training at Safestyle HQ in Barnsley and the switch over was supported by the Liniar Technical team, who were on hand to address any challenges as they arose.
Liniar’s joined-up internal approach was key to the success of the switch, with production planning, product design, stock control, warehousing, transport, customer services, sales and marketing working together with the technical team on the ground to ensure nothing was missed and the Liniar operation continued as usual for all its other customers.
One of the main factors in the decision to switch to Liniar was the systems company’s continued investment in capacity through plant and machinery, explains Phil Taylor, Safestyle’s Procurement Director. “Safestyle has ambitious growth plans over the next few years, so we need partners that are able to support that growth. The relationship with Liniar has been developed over a long period of time and after such a smooth start-up we’re delighted with our decision.”
Andy Cadman, Safestyle’s Group Technical Manager, was responsible for the profile changeover internally and adds his praise: “The communication and interaction we’ve had with the whole Liniar team has been first class from the start. Any change of this nature obviously posed a huge potential risk to our business, but we’ve been reassured at every stage – the two companies have worked seamlessly together to make it happen.
“The feedback from our production and quality teams has been overwhelmingly positive and the change has been managed well. We have noticed significant improvements in product quality and expect this will have a positive impact both in our manufacturing and field-based operations. This is particularly evident with the Liniar patented bubble gasket system which provides unrivalled performance and longevity.
Our fitters are also sending positive feedback and are impressed with both the quality and the ease of installing Liniar products!”
Another key factor in Safestyle’s decision is Liniar’s long-standing and ongoing sustainability credentials. Phil comments: “The recycling and environmental focus at Liniar is of great importance to Safestyle as we continue on our own ESG journey – it’s rapidly become one of our key criteria when choosing supply chain partners.”
So too is Liniar’s investment in new product innovation, with Andy adding, “We always want to be able to offer consumers the latest and most energy efficient products. Joining the Liniar family will give our team access to the full Liniar product range via its existing network, which will be of great benefit to us as we continue to grow.”
Martin Thurley, Group Managing Director at Liniar adds a final comment. “I’m delighted the transition to Liniar has been such a positive experience for the Safestyle team. The relationships formed across both our teams have proved that we are synchronised in terms of successfully and seamlessly managing such a large-scale project. We look forward to a mutually beneficial long-term partnership.”
