Architects keep specifying the same makers because every name on a drawing carries their own reputation, and a maker who has delivered before is the lowest risk they can take. Add tight deadlines and little time to research, and the safe choice is the name they already know. To become one of those names, you need to be known and trusted before the project starts.
What does an architect risk when they specify a maker?
When an architect writes a maker's name into a drawing, they are vouching for that maker. If the doors arrive late, the glazing fails a test or the finish is wrong, the client does not call the maker first. They call the architect.
So every specification is a small bet with the architect's reputation. A maker they have used before is a known bet. They know the quality, the lead times, how problems get handled and whether the phone gets answered. A new maker might be better, but the architect cannot know that yet.
That is the main reason the same names turn up on drawing after drawing. Changing costs effort and carries risk. Staying with a maker who has delivered costs nothing.
Why don't architects shop around more?
Because they rarely have the time. In an NBS survey with more than 500 responses, six out of 10 specifiers admitted to rushing the specification process. That survey is from 2017, but the pressure it describes has not gone away.
There is also more checking to do than there used to be. In a recent survey of 80 UK architects, commissioned by a manufacturer, architects estimated they spend an additional 4 hours each week reviewing product claims, certificates and performance data.
When time is short and every new product needs checking, an architect reaches for the maker they have already checked.
Why don't brochures and ads change their minds?
Because architects do not trust marketing much. In a Building Boardroom survey of more than 300 architects, only 13% said they had near or full confidence in marketing information, the least trusted source in the survey. In the manufacturer-commissioned survey above, 58% said they do not fully trust manufacturer product information.
A glossy brochure tells an architect what you want them to think. It does not tell them what you are like to work with when a site goes wrong. Only experience does that, either their own or that of someone they trust.
When do architects switch to a new maker?
Loyalty has limits. Architects look for someone new when their usual maker cannot give them what the project needs. In the messages architects sent to one of our clients, a steel door maker in London, the same few reasons came up again and again.
The product cannot meet a performance need.
"Do you make fire rated doors? ...that's where these systems usually let us down."
Director of Architecture, day 12
The usual option compromises the design.
"...hoping this time we have someone who can provide the solution without compromising the design intent."
Director of Architecture, London practice, day 16
Good options are hard to find at all.
"Elegant steal doors are hard to come by."
Senior architect and associate, day 46
Each of these is a moment when an architect is open to a new name. The question is whether yours is already in front of them when it happens.
How do you become one of the names they reuse?
You cannot buy your way onto that short list, but you can earn it. It comes down to a few things, done for a long time.
- Be known before the project. Architects specify when a job comes up, not when you send a brochure. If they already know your work, you are on the list when the job arrives.
- Show how you think. Post real jobs, the details that were hard and the problems you solved. That is the closest an architect can get to working with you before they actually do.
- Answer technical questions fast and straight. An architect with a deadline remembers the maker who replied the same day with the right detail.
- Make yourself easy to check. Finished projects, real photos, certificates and a showroom or workshop they can visit all cut down the checking they would otherwise have to do.
- Deliver, every time. Once you are on a drawing, the job itself decides whether you get the next one.
The last point matters more than it looks. In one of our client's posts, she tells the story of a homeowner who came back for a second, much bigger house. He told his architect to use her doors and windows and nothing else, and she only found out when she went to photograph the finished job. Being specified often starts with a name passed on in a room you are not in.
This is also why we work in the maker's own name on LinkedIn, rather than through a company page. Architects build relationships with people. The guide How to get specified by architects covers the full method step by step.
How long does it take to become a regular name?
Months, not weeks. For the steel door maker above, the first architect messages arrived within the first two weeks of us running her LinkedIn. One architect went from her first message to saying she would be "more than happy to specify" the doors in 18 days. A six-figure window package came up on day 86.
That is one example in one category, not a promise. But it shows the order things happen in: architects get to know the maker first, and projects follow.
What should you do next?
Start by making sure the architects you want to work with know who you are, in your own name, before their next project lands. If you want to see what that looked like for one maker, the case study on our home page has the screenshots and the architects' own words.