(A brief overview of the Ventuer history: Ventuer (the brand you know today) was born out of a restructure of Insol in 2019. Insol are the leading architectural facade experts in New Zealand and built a deserved reputation for their aluminium louvres and ability to solve compliance issues with clever and innovative designs. During a company restructure, the Insol division that manufactured ventilation louvres was set up as a separate company and rebranded as Ventuer.)

When Insol was alerted to the need for performance ventilation louvres for the F&P project, despite having never designed and manufactured them before, they decided to pitch a new concept. Armed with experience in aluminium and in louvres, Insol put forward drawings detailing a new solution which would exceed both the project and code requirements.

They correctly identified that many performance ventilation louvres were assessed and specified according to their percentage of Free Open Area. This is not the most accurate method for measuring louvre performance as it fails to factor in any unique pressure drop characteristics of the individual louvre profile. Additionally, it also fails to consider the weather performance characteristics of the louvre.

The Insol ventilation design, which would go on to become the nucleus of the Ventuer Performance Louvre range, would offer a lower pressure drop and provide a better defence against wind-driven rain, as tested to AS/NZS 4740 and BS/EN:13030.

‘Prove it’ came from the builder in response to Insol’s claims regarding the new product’s performance. So Insol built an inhouse testing rig, identified the correct testing protocol and employed an independent engineer to oversee the testing and compare the results against competitor louvre options. The results proved the Insol designs performed better in both pressure drop and air flow, and final certification was then carried out to BS/EN:13030 at the BSRIA laboratory in the UK.

This demonstration of performance was more than enough to convince the client, and after being awarded the project it was delivered and installed throughout 2011 – 2012. Seven years later, the now well-established ventilation louvre division was spun off into a separate company and rebranded Ventuer.

As for those original louvres, they are now known as the Ventuer 104D Drainable Louvre and the Ventuer VL-77EX Exhaust Louvre. For us, they have a special place, having started it all. For Fisher & Paykel, they are performance louvres that work better than anything else that was available. We’ll take that as a win-win.