The cost of living crisis is making everything more expensive, particularly energy. At Wickes, we have a wide selection of products that can help you save energy, or at least try to use less of it. Demand for eco home improvements, which will help you bring your customers’ bills down, rose by 44% in 2021 and that’s a trend that’s continuing now.
As a tradesperson, doing your bit for the environment can also save you money, and there are many ways to do this, both in how you run your business and the type of products you use or recommend to your customers. You could consider quoting jobs remotely and working as locally as possible, in order to save car journeys. It’s also possible to reduce waste by reusing materials or buying second-hand parts. A recent survey found that 70% of tradespeople are planning to extend their skillset to take on more eco jobs because that’s what their customers are looking for.
Insulating houses properly has never been more important, to save the planet and to save money. Homeowners’ interest in insulating their roofs shot up by a massive 419% in 2021. Insulation doesn’t just mean laying loft roll, though; of course, this is the main job that can be done, but there are other options as well. It’s worth remembering that insulating foil behind radiators can also stop heat escaping, and there’s also pipe lagging, draught excluders and secondary double glazing. All of these can help homeowners save money in the short term, but in the long term, can also have the effect of increasing the value of a property: installing insulation can add £11,000 to its value.
Other green money-saving jobs that could be undertaken include installing a water butt, particularly important when there are hosepipe bans in place, replacing older light bulbs with more energy-efficient versions and installing dual flush toilets. Wickes can help you with all of these jobs.
At the moment, for a lot of people, it’s not feasible to heat the whole house, but rather just one or two rooms at a time, so if you do know of any families struggling, a good alternative to standard heating is our range of space heaters, from as little as £12. If your customers are using an open fire or a log burner to heat a room, you’ll need to check what kind of fuel is allowed in the area. Our range of logs and kindling can get you started.
It’s worth bearing in mind as well that at Wickes, we always do our utmost to keep prices as low as we can; we’re here to support you in doing the best job possible for the right price.
