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Canada’s Glass Associations: August 2021

AVFQ
After two years of absence, the Omnium AVFQ is back on Sept. 9, 2021, at the magnificent Le Blainvillier Golf Course, near Montreal. Our 288 golfers are enthusiastic to meet up as  are the many sponsors. Let’s hope that the sanitization rules in effect at that time will not hinder the dinner with 350 attendees.

It’s also time to book Feb. 10 and 11, 2022, for the AVFQ’s annual conference at the spectacular Chateau Frontenac in Quebec City. The program and registration will be available in early September at avfq.ca. The Prix Lumieres Gala will be back to reward the most beautiful projects in the industry. It will also be an opportunity to launch the AVFQ’s 60th anniversary celebrations.

The labour shortage continues to trouble Quebec, hitting door and window manufacturers as well as the glaziers.  The AVFQ supports its members in this issue through various communications and government representations. Combined with the unavailability of certain materials and the increase in their prices, the challenges are major for managers despite an economy that is running at full speed.

In collaboration with the Fenestration and Glazing Industry Alliance and the Fenestration Association of British Columbia,  AVFQ is working with other associations related to our industry to develop an educational piece on the two compliance thermal performance pathways for fenestration products in Canada. The target audiences for this publication are homeowners, builders, architects and other specifying authorities, building code officials and even the fenestration industry itself.  There is a lot of misinformation surrounding the U-factor and ER path and this publication is being developed to address this misinformation and market confusion about what each pathway represents and when it is appropriate to use one or the other. The work is well advanced.

AVFQ has collaborated with Transition Energetique Quebec as part of the re-evaluation of the Novoclimat program. This program encourages the construction of new homes with high energy performance, according to specific construction requirements. It targets houses, small residential buildings and large residential buildings with four to 10 floors. For the part of the program dedicated to large buildings, discussions with TEQ will allow more types of windows to qualify and thus increase the use of energy-efficient products at a reasonable cost.

Architectural Glass and Metal Contractors Association
As Ontario slowly begins to re-open, our unwavering member glazing contractors are ready to respond.

They have truly stepped up and outperformed to combat the spread of the virus on their jobsites and in their shops. AGMCA members have always placed health and safety as priority number one and this has led to some impressive numbers. Workplace transmission of COVID from construction sites accounts for just 0.065 percent of the total number of reported cases.

But combating the virus has come at a significant cost to our glazing contractors. The industry is highly competitive, projects are won to a significant degree on the lowest bid and profit margins are thin.

It’s been tough sledding over the past 18 months. Our members have embraced the stringent but necessary health and safety protocols, absorbed the increased costs of PPE and workplace sanitation and accepted reduced worker productivity caused by the necessary health and safety measures. Some sites have reported that with elevator restrictions it takes up to an hour just to get glaziers to the floor they are working on. If your site has on-site testing, count on losing at least a half hour per man. Our members are also faced with expensive de-mobilization and re-mobilization costs as the industry and specific sites rotate in and out of shutdown. Rental equipment costs escalated as delays continued. Other issues being faced are delay claims for not meeting contract schedules, along with large price increases on glass and aluminum products. The supply chain issues continue to add another roadblock to productivity. None of this could have been anticipated when our members entered into their contracts at the outset of the pandemic. It certainly has been a long journey,and coming out healthy on the other side has been goal number one. Unlike the Maple Leafs (sadly), our glazing contractors have gone hard into the corners and gutted this thing out.

Ontario’s unionized glazing contractors stand ready to do their part to rebuild the economy once this virus has been defeated. We will be called upon to build out new and expanded manufacturing facilities and transportation infrastructure and to adapt office workplaces to the post-pandemic way of working.

The good news is that at the time of this writing second doses of vaccines have started to be administered. Case counts have dropped. Patios have reopened and things are starting to look up for our battle-tested members.

Ontario Glass and Metal Association
Tentative plans are in place to hold our fall golf tournament on Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021, at the Hidden Lake Golf Club.  If COVID-19 restrictions have been lifted by early August and we are able to facilitate an indoor dinner we will be proceeding and members can expect to receive a flyer in their inbox by mid-August.  If we are unable to host a dinner we will postpone our golf outing until the spring of 2022.

Mark Thursday June 2, 2022, in your calendar now so you have our spring golf tournament at Pipers Heath Golf Club to look forward to over the winter and so that you do not make any plans that could conflict with this most important event.

We are hopeful to be able to hold our fall seminar in early November this year.  More news will follow as COVID-19 restrictions are relaxed.