Why ‘made in Australia’ matters for every builder, big or small

‘Made in Australia’: these three simple words carry so much weight and mean so much for builders and homeowners alike.

There’s huge value represented in those three small words, and in having your windows—and a highly experienced, committed customer service team—being 100% local.

That value comes from 45 years working in close partnership with Australian builders and knowing local needs.

‘Made in Australia’ means fast lead times you can depend on. It means quality, trust, and credibility. Reassurance. Peace of mind with compliance. Intuitive design for ease installation and guaranteed durability in Australian conditions. It’s comprehensive support when you need it, with commitment to the highest levels of service.

Our local manufacturing is hugely valuable for our partners and customers, and a huge source of pride for us here at A&L. Here’s what ‘manufactured in Australia’ means for builders: large, small or family-owned, and everything in between.

Faster lead times you can always depend on

Foreign importers usually won’t stock product in Australia. Instead, they’ll manufacture everything to order. This creates an average 12-week lead time.

In contrast, A&L keeps all materials for manufacturing locally onsite. At any given time, we can make 80% of the windows in our product range locally, within one hour. In the past—as part of delivering windows to a house for an Australian charity—we’ve made full house slots and had them out for delivery within four hours.

Our lead times are currently 5-7 working days in Queensland and 7-10 in Victoria, with a current DIFOT rate of 94%. We are always working collaboratively with builders to reduce these times.

When you’re running on lean construction timelines, with contractual guarantees on 18- or 24-week build times, you need trades reliably completing milestones. On time, in sequence as scheduled, with absolutely no delays.

Window delays due to 12+ week shipping times from overseas suppliers will create knock-on disruptions for other trades. The impact? Delayed handover, liability for liquidated damages, delayed milestone payment, and disrupted cash flow.

When it comes to lead times, it’s always worth asking: can you afford the delay?

Flexible options help you deliver what homebuyers want

We pride ourselves on a fluid approach to manufacturing. This gives builders the flexibility to accommodate unique variations and requests from customers.

Changes to surrounding walls, roof lines, cladding materials… they all have impacts for builders. In addition to a huge range of options available off-the-shelf—with many different choices for reveal types, sizes, flashes, accessories, and more—we can also collaboratively deliver one-off custom windows to accommodate any build type or unique customer request.

With most overseas manufacturers, you choose from a stock standard window, with one choice of hardware, and one type of flashing. That is, if you get the option of flashing at all.

If you don’t have the flexibility to deliver on custom requests, can you really give your customers what they want?

Expert knowledge of local standards and regulations give you complete peace of mind

Our team is 100% committed to meeting every Australian standard, code, and regulatory consideration. That means, when it comes to your windows, you don’t have to worry at all.

We have Board-level representation on the National Construction Code, and strong links into the Board of Standards Australia. We are also a member of the Australian Glass and Window Association (AGWA). As a result, we’re miles ahead of the curve when it comes to awareness and understanding of codes and standards. We put all that knowledge into our products, and you benefit directly.

It means you don’t have to find and learn all the information yourself. It means you don’t have to contact your overseas supplier and instruct them on what to do. All that effort and learning, A&L takes it completely off your hands.

It’s why we started working with customers to develop thermally broken windows nearly four years ago, to provide improved energy efficiency options in response to the updated requirements for 7-star energy efficiency performance in the NCC.

We train our staff—and in many cases where applicable, your staff too—to thoroughly know and align with all codes and standards.

This means everyone in our team is an expert. We pride ourselves on identifying things that competitors don’t or won’t.

We’ll proactively look at building plans and tell you if certain rooms don’t meet light and ventilation requirements. We’ll pre-empt issues and deliver practical solutions before you’re even made aware of the challenge. The small things that accumulatively make a big impact: if there’s an articulation joint running down a window, we’ll automatically add a larger bulb seal to avoid the gap.

We do what it takes to reduce your work and eliminate your worry. When it comes to meeting regulations, standards, and code, can you put a price on peace of mind?

You can certainly put a price on the re-work associated with non-compliance, or faults with products that aren’t sufficiently tested or manufactured for Australian conditions.

Experienced support on hand—and on site—when you need it most

The value of a local approach doesn’t stop once the product is manufactured. We pride ourselves on offering experienced, easy-to-access, and comprehensive after sales support.

Everyone in the team is an A&L employee. Our transport and delivery drivers. Our onsite service technicians. No aspect of our service is outsourced; the only exception is when enlisting glaziers to help deliver glass over 80 kilograms, in line with occupational health and safety requirements. In these cases, we partner with local glaziers.

This means we can take accountability and ownership for every aspect of each customer’s experience. It also means we own our own standards, through training, transparent feedback from customers, and a commitment to ongoing improvement.

Many of our service technicians and on-site support staff have extensive experience in manufacturing A&L products. So, you have experts on site to eliminate issues, provide support, and get things solved and sorted quickly.

When you buy local, you get the benefits

If locally made windows—and all the value that comes with Australian manufacturing—is meaningful to you, contact our team today.