Builtview Article | Issue 14 | Summer 2022
In 2000, Kömmerling became Australia’s first supplier of uPVC window profiles, importing product directly from Germany to support the then small number of emerging uPVC window and door fabricators. Twenty-two years on, with demand for uPVC window systems now growing exponentially in Australia, the business continues to invest and develop, most recently moving into a 4,400 m2 warehousing and distribution facility in Ravenhall, Victoria.
The new facility helps support Kömmerling’s future investment strategy and is the distribution hub from where it now supplies stock uPVC profile to its Australia-wide fabricator network for subsequent manufacture into a broad range of high-performance window and door systems. Still sourcing uPVC profile purely from Kömmerling’s European manufacturing facilities, the investment has been key in providing not only additional stocking capacity and capability, but also how continuity of supply to fabricators has been maintained. This has been particularly important more recently, where product availability and logistical flexibility has been paramount.
In turn, this has been crucial for its fabricator network, which, while a group of independent companies, is an extension of the Kömmerling brand and all the inherent values and foci on quality of product, service, and customer care which it represents. However, it’s not just been about investment in its product range and expanded warehousing facilities. Recent investment in personnel to work alongside Shane Hawkins, as Head of Sales for Kömmerling in the Asia Pacific Region, has seen the creation of a senior management team focused on not only warehouse, product and logistics management, but also on how to best support and create best value for its fabricator network through various technical and marketing driven initiatives.
Kömmerling Australia is particularly proud of successfully becoming one of the first companies to secure accreditation to the Vinyl Council of Australia’s Industry Code of Practice. This ICP sets defined targets for profile composition, weathering resistance, colour and strength requirements, with performance assessments being undertaken by third party, accredited testing laboratories. These tests include specific requirements regarding the products’ performance against one of the highest UV exposure standards for products anywhere in the world ... which is crucially important when one considers that Australia has the highest level of solar radiation per square metre of land of any continent. The accreditation not only assists in supporting AGWA accreditation and compliance procedures for our fabricators, but also provides an in-built assurance and confidence associated with the products durability, UV resistance, strength and overall weathering performance characteristics which may not be inherent to alternative uPVC profiles or material purchased directly from overseas.
Further, with Kömmerling’s long held core attitude and cultural approach towards sustainability being re-emphasised through the recent brand philosophy statement; ‘It’s about taking action today and making the right decisions for tomorrow’, it should be no surprise that Kömmerling in Australia has partnered with a leading Victorian recycling business to begin to roll out their ReKönvert uPVC window profile recycling program. Designed to preclude the need for waste uPVC profile being sent to landfill, waste uPVC material is recycled and subsequently used in the manufacture of cabling, piping and other products. As a proud member of the Australian Glass & Window Association (AGWA), the Vinyl Council of Australia (VCA) and the Australian Passive House Association (APHA), Kömmerling Australia is passionate about not only developing the benefits associated with and use of uPVC window and door products throughout the Australian building industry, but also supporting our fabricators to provide market leading, consistently high performing, energy efficient and sustainable solutions across a wide variety of market segments and end uses
