Achim: 00:00

This is the Marketing House podcast.

James: 00:14

Hello, and welcome to Marketing Passive House, the podcast where we hear from architects, designers, builders, suppliers, owners, and other experts in the passive house and high performance building space. We'll be talking about what's working and what's needed when it comes to marketing buildings that meet or aspire to the Passive House standard. I'm your host, James Turner. And today, I'm joined by Laurence Hamel Dorais, director of business development and marketing at NZP Fenestration.

James: 00:42

Laurence, welcome to the show.

Laurence: 00:44

Hi, James. How are you?

James: 00:46

I'm very well. Thanks.

Laurence: 00:48

Great.

James: 00:48

So before we get into it and for people who are just meeting you for the first time, could you share a little bit about who you are, what you do, and how you started on your Passive House journey?

Laurence: 00:59

Yes, of course. So NZP, we're a manufacturer of Passive House certified windows. We're located in Quebec, and I started in the window industry in the passive house industry all at the same time. So we're a family business and I was studying marketing at UQAM and then my father asked me to join the business about eight years ago. So the way NZP started, NZP stands for Net Zero Performance.

Laurence: 01:29

So it was always about building windows for passive house or net zero homes. So that's how we created the business almost fifteen years ago. And my family was never in the window industry, but my father started doing flips on houses and he was trying to source good materials to do better house, better flip. And then he saw that there was no manufacturer locally that you could get any passive house windows, they're all coming from Europe. So he said, hey, why not do it?

Laurence: 02:02

So we started the factory and then we grew a lot. And then now we have a big factory about 15,000 square feet here in Quebec. And then we're one of the leader in Passive House windows. So I grew with the business and became very passionate about it.

James: 02:22

That's very cool. You're sort of a Passive House native.

Laurence: 02:26

Yeah, when we started, nobody knew what Passive House was about fifteen years ago. We would talk to architect and it was such an unknown principle. And nowadays it's become a lot more known and popular. So we hear about it a lot more often. So it's to see how the evolution of the construction in Canada.

James: 02:50

I bet. That's that's actually a perfect lead into the the main topic, if you will, or, like, the whole thrust of this the idea behind this podcast is is to talk about marketing Passive House. And so I thought what a great thing that you've started so long ago that you must have been a real uphill battle at the start.

Laurence: 03:12

Yeah. For sure. And I yeah. At the beginning, when we like I said, when we're talking about it, people didn't know. So we were really more doing the marketing on, because our product allows us to be very, do very large dimension.

Laurence: 03:27

So we have different customers. Some want the performance that we can get the Passive House certificate, but we also have people who want like very large windows that regular manufacturer cannot do. So I would say that at the beginning, that was most what we would get. And then with year going on, then we get more requests for Passive House and all that.

James: 03:50

Interesting. Now, the windows you make always Passive House certified? Like, you don't have like a not Passive House line. Is that right?

Laurence: 04:01

No. We used to. And so maybe that's why, maybe that's because we didn't get such as much requests for PassiveVault. So we used to have three lines of windows and we had the PassiveVault certified one. And then we had two other lines that were more locally, always tilt and turn, always in like high performance insulation, but that was not certified.

Laurence: 04:24

And then over the year we said that's not our market. We want to push passive house, even if the project is not going for the passive house certification, you should always try to put the best windows you can because that's that's what's gonna make or break your envelope and your whole installation on your house. So that's why we try to focus and now we only do Passive House certified windows.

James: 04:47

Nice. Nice. Yeah. Did you have you ever been in a situation where you're convincing someone to kind of go up? Like, I don't know when you dropped the product lines, but did you ever have a situation where you're, like, saying, not like upselling, but trying to say, yeah, you know, you might want this other one.

Laurence: 05:07

My whole career. My whole career, I'm trying to, it's a, the window is a principle that's very misunderstood and that is people tend to, when we try to lower the costs, it's one of the first thing that people try to save costs in, and it's one of the most important part of your envelope because it's your thermal bridge. So my whole career is what we've been doing is try to educate people on why windows are so important. It's just not to fill a hole in your house. It's where you're gonna cut all your thermal bridge.

Laurence: 05:43

So yeah, of course. And even when we had the other lines and right now, like we have triple glazing or we have double glazing, but I'm never gonna suggest someone to go in double glazing. I'm always trying to let them know the difference and why it's so important and what it's gonna do. So we're trying to always, we have a blog that we try to push content on why it's so important. But, so we always try to do new blogs and new studies on the difference it's gonna make us.

Laurence: 06:13

It's hard to understand an R value. It's hard to visualize it and the comfort you can't really like tell someone, make them see like you're gonna be comfortable. Like you can't put a number on it. And there are numbers on the R value and the U value, but it's hard to understand it for anyone. So we're trying to really educate and make people understand what an r value is and what the effect is gonna be on your comfort.

James: 06:43

Nice. Yeah. That's one of the things I find most fascinating about Passive House in general is that it's like it's not a product. It's like an idea. And Yeah.

James: 06:54

It's an it's an intellectual idea, but the way that it seems to sell it is a really, like, emotional put you in a place and imagine that this place feels like this kinda Yeah. I find it just endlessly Yeah.

Laurence: 07:11

And I feel like people understand it after because you tell them and all the time, and that's one of the thing that I love the most is when people come back after and they tell us, now I get it. Now I would never go back. Or a lot of our customers, they went to a friend's house that have our windows or that have a passive building. And after this, that's what I want because you can feel the peace, it's quiet, the air is very like healthy, but it's a feeling that it's very hard to explain why a passive house building is gonna be so comfortable.

James: 07:46

Right. So let's dig into that. What are what are some of the things that have worked? Like, are there any are there any cases you could think of where you were able to phrase it a certain way or do you have to build someone a house first and then sell them the house?

Laurence: 08:07

Well, a study that helped a lot that we gave to contractor and architect that we work with to, for them to be able to explain to their customers like why they should do passive is, and when we say passive, it's not necessarily always going up to the certification. I think that a building that they think of the passive ways can be just as good as one that goes all the way to a certification. I think it's important to say because some people get scared and it can be a long process or extra cost. And I don't like the mentality of if I don't go all the way to the certification, then I'm not going to do anything. I think that any step in that direction is a good step.

Laurence: 08:47

And so I think it's important to start with that. But, so one of the studies that we've done is talking about the effective R of a building, because most of the time we talk about the R value of each component separately and the effective R is gonna be your whole envelope. So we did this study with wall of 70% wall and 30% windows. And then we switched for the double glazing to the triple glazing window. So that helped because we did like a graph and I could share that with you after if you wanna share it as well.

Laurence: 09:29

But we did a graph and then from a regular casement window, which has like an R 4.5 glazing and with our windows, which had a time an R 10.9 glazing. And then we did three combination of walls. So an R28 wall, R50 wall, R100 wall. And we wanted to see, should you insulate more your walls or your windows? What are you going to get?

Laurence: 09:53

Because most of the time we hear people say, I shouldn't put passive house windows, I just have regular walls. What's the point? So we wanted to dig into that question and then it's easier when you see the graph, it's gonna be a little harder for a podcast to explain. But at the end, the conclusion was with a passive house window and an R28 wall, you get better values than with an R100 wall and a regular casement windows. And the numbers are so far apart that to compensate with your wall, because Passeval says like, you can always compensate if you lose somewhere, but at what cost, how much should you compensate?

Laurence: 10:39

So at the end, the conclusion was if you keep your regular casement windows to compensate, you would need an R-10,000 wall to reach the minimum we get with a passive house window. So it's like, it's crazy. You're not never going to read that. So I think that helped a lot to put like a vision and when you see the graph and then when you see that, like you're never going to be close with a casement regular double glazed windows. You're never going to be even close to what you can do if you just replace your windows and you don't change your building.

Laurence: 11:13

So that helped a lot to visualize it.

James: 11:16

Wow. Yeah. Well, I definitely would like to see that graph and I will definitely link to it if it's a shareable thing.

Laurence: 11:22

Yeah.

James: 11:23

Yeah. That's amazing. That's such a We almost

Laurence: 11:28

want to have

James: 11:29

the whole wall out of window instead.

Laurence: 11:32

Well, the wall is still more insulated, but the idea and the image behind that is that if you have like a leak, if you don't patch it, even if you thicken your wall or anything, the leak stays the same. So you're always going to lose everything by that leak. But we also pushed it a little more for people to understand it. Because people always ask on when am I gonna get my money back? Am I gonna save electricity and all that?

Laurence: 12:05

So we pushed it a little bit. And with these two scenarios, like passing from regular casement windows to a tilt and turn passive house windows, the economy and electricity was 57%. So it's major, yeah. So in Quebec, our electricity is cheap at the moment, but you're still saving 57% of your electricity bill over the year, every year. So it's major, but it's mostly going to be in comfort that you're going to feel it.

Laurence: 12:38

You're going to be comfortable.

James: 12:41

Yeah. Yeah. It's not like a monetary payback. It's like

Laurence: 12:49

That's not why you do it.

James: 12:50

Yeah. Yeah. Just enjoy your life more. What's the price of that?

Laurence: 12:54

Yeah, exactly. For sure.

James: 12:57

Oh, that's great. And so did you do this study because you realized that you needed something more to convince people? Is that

Laurence: 13:06

Yes. It was mostly contractors that wanted to do passive house buildings and they were telling us our clients don't understand like why. Why would I pay more for windows? And at the end, like the overall cost of a passive house building is not necessarily more. I think some studies say it's 5% more than a regular building.

Laurence: 13:27

It always depends how you separate your costs and what the priorities are. But a lot of our contractors were telling us, our customers do not understand like why they see a regular casement window that could be like half the price. And then they ask us, well, what's the difference? And they always told us, it's hard to explain to them, trust me, you're gonna see, you're gonna feel it. So we're always trying to find tools for them and for architects to educate their customers directly and explain, because, but we see that it helps and we see that more and more contractors wanna go in that direction and do better buildings.

James: 14:09

Nice, nice. Going back well, no. There's two directions I wanna take at the same time, which is obviously impossible. Cool. One thing I thought was interesting earlier, you said about not having it be a well, you didn't say this, but not having it be all or nothing.

James: 14:26

Not like if you aren't certified, you might as well just build the bare minimum. Mhmm. I think that's really interesting. And when I was thinking about this podcast in particular, I didn't wanna just like, it's got the name passive house, but I think that, like, aiming toward passive house is kind of Yeah. Right?

James: 14:45

Like that whole, you know, shoot for the stars and you'll hit the moon or something. It's a clunky analogy, but

Laurence: 14:53

Yeah. Because sometimes in retrofit, for instance, it's hard because you're not going to choose how your house is, the windows south, is the view south. So it's going to be hard to do it perfectly in new built, it's a little easier, but even then sometimes the city has restriction, so you can't always do it. So I think that it's important that you do try to at least little steps of what you can do. I think that's already one big, big change to not try.

Laurence: 15:27

And especially like here, the construction we're a little behind if we compare it to Vancouver or Europe. So I think that any step is already good to try to achieve better buildings that are going to be more durable and, you know.

James: 15:43

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Well, like, I think about that too. It's not even just you, the person with this house, although that's great. It's like the you're improving the the stock of places we all have to live in or our children can live in or their children.

James: 15:59

I mean, depending on

Laurence: 16:00

that. Yeah. And that's something that we say often to customers. It's your, these house and these windows, they're going to outlive us. You're not going to have to change them.

Laurence: 16:10

You're not going to have to redo your whole building and installation and all that. They're going to outlive all of us. So, you're also on the resale, if you give it to your kids or just on the next generation, we're gonna have buildings that are gonna still be normal and durable and insulated and comfortable. So I think that's a big thing also.

James: 16:34

Yeah. A legacy. You're you're building a legacy.

Laurence: 16:36

Yeah. That's the word I

James: 16:37

was looking for. Yeah. For sure. Nice. The other thing that I was trying to say when I was trying to go in two directions was just the I I like the idea that the contractors are like, they're kind of an outlet of the marketing arm.

James: 16:53

Like, that was something I've I've thought about a lot is that marketing passive house to whom? Because it's not just people buying the house. It's like the people building the houses have to be convinced. Otherwise, they won't really wanna get in those conversations because they're, like, on more on the ground. Right?

Laurence: 17:09

Yeah. So yeah. Good point. Yeah, it's a big part because if the customers have contractors that are not on board, that there's gonna be a lot of resistance because you do need to take more your time and I always look at the window aspect of it because that's my field, but in any field, any part of the construction, if the contractor doesn't want to take the time to do the tapes and the air tightness correctly, then it's not going to work. Everybody has to be on board and have the best intention.

Laurence: 17:41

So, but having the contractor understand the benefit and wanting to do better, it helps a lot because they have a lot of, the customers have a lot of trust in their builders. They're not trying to sell them something, so if you listen to them a lot. So when the contractor can understand the plus value of doing a passive buildings, it helps for sure.

James: 18:04

So is that something that as a company you work on that side of it, like the contractor relations as opposed to

Laurence: 18:13

Yes. We have a little bit of everything. So we have some contractors that do only, like, these types of buildings, eco buildings, passivhaus, PHIUS or whatever. So these contractors, it's easier for sure. So that's a part of the business that we try to meet contractors and explain to them and educate them to try to make them have the switch towards a more of a passive approach.

Laurence: 18:39

And one thing that I always tell them when I meet contractors is even if you don't go with us, it's okay, but at least go for a passive office, tilt and turn windows. Like, at least if I know that you've made a switch for a better envelope, I'll be happy. And if it's not with us, it's okay. I did my job and I explained to you the benefit and you understand it. And then after it's a question of what windows you want, but for sure that that's a big part of it.

Laurence: 19:10

But then after there's the architect as well. So when the architect also is drawing, because even if the builders wants to do it, if there's an architect involved, needs to be thought at the conception of the plans if you want to do the path of the build. So the architect has to be also involved and on board. So we do meet a lot of architects as well. And then we get some customers that are just, they find us online or they have friends that went with us and then they asked our architect and contractors, I want NZP, make it fit.

Laurence: 19:45

So that's, So we talk with everybody, which is fun because it's always different.

James: 19:50

Yeah. Yeah. And I like that you said that, you know, your goal is that they have a higher quality house build. I've noticed that in this industry, in this space, the Passive House people all seem to be kind of it feels more collaborative cooperative, like

Laurence: 20:10

Yeah. One thing direction. For sure. And one thing that is is really nice about the community is a lot of contractors are gonna help each other between them. So a lot of them are gonna be consultants.

Laurence: 20:22

So if they did, like, passive house buildings in the past, even if they weren't certified, but they they have the knowledge, they're going to be hired as consultant for other contractors to help them achieve these standards. So there's like no competition. I think there's place for everyone on the market. So it's really nice to see contractors between each other, trying to help each other to do better building and learn and do like teaching class and all that. So I think it's a nice place to work for

James: 20:51

sure. Yeah. Very healthy. We should have more of that. We should find more places to to be like that.

James: 20:57

Yeah. Question about tilt and turn. I I love that the dis like, you've used that phrase again and again, and it's a very not, like, obsessively, just when you've mentioned the windows. But I I really like that it's so descriptive. Do want can you tell me a little bit about that?

James: 21:15

Like Yeah. Is that the official name?

Laurence: 21:19

Of the tilt and turn? Yeah, well, it's a type of window. So our windows are called passive Canada. So, cause they're, the line is passive and it made in Canada, but the tilt and turn is the hardware. So it's a system of window, which is very European style.

Laurence: 21:37

It's an European technology, but it's the way the window is gonna open. So the hardware allows us to open it kind of like a fridge, so completely towards you. So it always opens inside, but you can also tilt your windows like an oven door. So just a little bit, it allows like very good air circulation, but also if it rains, it's going to drip outside. It's very safe as well because you have a multi point lock all around.

Laurence: 22:08

So when you do close your windows, it really puts a pressure all around the sash and it's going to lock it on four sides. So that's why it's the window that achieves the best airtightness, but also it's so the hardware is so strong that it allows us to do very large opening in triple glazing, and then we can put a thicker triple glazing. So that's why our triple glazing achieves an R11.4 and regular casement window, we're normally around like R5, R6 are the best ones. It's really the thickness of the glazing that our frame can allow to put. So that's the main difference with the tilt and turn, but the hardware is so strong, so robust that it's going to be so durable and it's never gonna, the longevity of the product is very, very good.

James: 23:04

That's great. Yeah. I like that. You you need you you meet the task of this heavy window with

Laurence: 23:10

Mhmm.

James: 23:10

Yeah. This the strength. And I that's an interesting that's a good point. Like, I hadn't thought of particularly, like, but a huge window with three panes, that's really heavy. That's really heavy.

Laurence: 23:22

Yes. You want it to be smooth. That's for sure. And you want the opening to be easy and feel comfortable. But for sure it brings some challenge for the installation because it's But apart from that, once it's installed, don't feel the heaviness, especially with, we have some lift and slide doors that we can do with the same glazing that we can put R11 in it.

Laurence: 23:49

But these doors, I can go up to 21 feet in two panel. So you need the system to be strong and to feel like super light when you open them.

James: 23:59

Nice. Oh, I could I can picture it. I can picture the feeling. Seriously, I don't know if that's weird or not, but there's, like, a really satisfying it's really satisfying to open and close a a well made window.

Laurence: 24:11

Yeah. Especially when there's a lot of noise outside and then you close it, the the feeling of, like, closing it and then the the sound goes away. It's it's a nice feeling. Yeah. For sure.

James: 24:23

Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. That's one of those those visceral, I think, selling point things. Like Yeah.

James: 24:30

Yeah. Yeah. People like their like, the the comfort of space, but then the comfort of how it would be if you didn't have to hear all the honking or trains or whatever you you live near.

Laurence: 24:43

Yeah. And you a lot of the time, you get used to it. You don't even hear it anymore. But then when you close it the first time, that's when you realize how noisy it was.

James: 24:54

Right. Yeah. I've been stressed out for ten years and I didn't know why.

Laurence: 24:59

Yeah. It's because I've had the

James: 25:01

window open the whole time.

Laurence: 25:03

Exactly.

James: 25:07

Well, this has been great. Before we go, where would be a good place for people to interact with you to to get their own NZP fenestration?

Laurence: 25:19

Yeah, you can visit our website, nzpfenestration.com or write to us, info@nzpfenestration.com . We're located in Quebec, but this summer I'm going around the Maritimes. So I'm going be in New Brunswick. I'm going to be in the Gaspesie. We have some projects in the Magdalen Islands and in Nunavut.

Laurence: 25:41

So we have projects all over Canada and USA. So, but this summer I'm planning on visiting the Maritimes a lot to go see the project we've done and meet with contractors and clients. So if ever some people want to meet me, I'll be around, just send us an email or call us and I can come visit you. We also have a lot of studies online if people wanna look at our blog or we have videos on YouTube. But or just write to us and I'll send you some information.

James: 26:13

Awesome. Okay. Well, this is this is just great. Thank you so much. Yeah.

Laurence: 26:18

Thank you for having me.

James: 26:19

Of course. You've been listening to Marketing Passive House. I'm James Turner, and I hope you'll join me again next time.