Apeer
Address: Omco Industrial Estate, Woodside Road, Ballymena, County Antrim, BT42 4HX
Tel: 034 5672 9333 – Email: sales@apeer.co.uk – Website: https://www.apeer.co.uk
Key Contacts:
Asa McGillian – Managing Director
Even better than the real thing
‘The appeal of Silka is that when paired with any high-quality aluminium products, it represents an authentic alternative to an aluminium entrance door, without the high price tag.’ Apeer’s MD, Asa McGillian
With many homeowners now keen to invest in aluminium windows, but put off by the price of an aluminium entrance door, Apeer’s smooth-skinned Silka offers an unbeatable combination of style, performance and value for money. With stylish, slim sightlines and a reassuringly expensive price tag when compared to its PVC-U counterparts, aluminium is very much the material of the moment. Its resurgence in the residential sector, thanks largely to the increase in popularity of big bi-folds, has sent systems companies scrambling to introduce new aluminium product ranges.
And the corresponding increase in popularity of anthracite grey foils – and also of ultra-life-like wood grains it has to be said – demonstrates that those consumers who perhaps can’t quite stretch to the genuine article, are also just as happy to pay a little bit more for a convincing alternative. Especially so, if those alternatives can deliver the aesthetics of aluminium, combined with all the performance advantages that PVC-U has become so well known for… For Apeer, the Northern Ireland based composite door manufacturer – one that is also behind the G-Award winning range of ‘frameless’ Lumi products – the introduction of its smoothed-skinned Silka door at the 2019 FIT Show has proved to be a perfect example of how successful such an offering can be.
“Prior to Silka, we had enjoyed a degree of success with our smooth Lumi Coloro door, but really it was the increase in popularity of high-end aluminium products that really gave us the incentive to work on a solution of our own,” explains Apeer’s MD, Asa McGillian.
“The R&D team here at Apeer spent over a year working on the development of a brand new, smooth fibreglass skin,” he continued. “It was a huge effort and involved several trips to the mould manufacturer to ensure we got it just right. It also included a new, unique paint finish that means that Silka doors are air dried, rather than processed in our usual infrared lines. We were absolutely overwhelmed by the response to all this hard work when we unveiled Silka at the FIT Show, and the initial feedback has contributed to the final Silka product that we now sell. To say that it’s proved to be very popular, is something of an understatement.
“With a smooth, matt finish, Silka not only looks like aluminium, it also has all the benefits of a double rebate, triple glazed 70mm composite, one that is inherently more robust than aluminium skinned doors – and one that’s also positioned at a much more competitive price point,” adds Asa.
“While the special paint finish means that each Silka takes longer for us to produce, it’s also worth noting that we have the facilities and skills at our Ballymena factory to justify manufacturing something that’s a little more exclusive, plus the flexibility of our systems also allows us to offer a huge range of colour options – more in fact than any other aluminium alternative doors on the market.”
There is also an unforeseen bonus for Apeer, says Asa: “While we didn’t necessarily intend for Silka to suite with our Lumi windows and doors, the fact that it has a flat surface finish, and can be specified with a Lumi-style frameless glazing option, certainly means that it does complement Lumi, especially Lumi2, which is our latest double glazed version of the system that has been designed to be more suitable for the retrofit market,” says Asa. “Ultimately though, the appeal of Silka is that when paired with any high-quality aluminium products, it represents an authentic alternative to an aluminium entrance door, without the high price tag. It’s this combination of performance, style and value for money, that has since proven to be such a big hit with our customers and made Silka one of our most successful launches ever.”
