Starting out

[greghusler]

Hi all,

I'm being made redundant at the end of the month and am looking to set up my own business as a tiler/plasterer/plumber. I have a years experience as a plumbers mate and am going to do a few courses with my redundancy retraining package. I'm tiling my mum and dads bathroom and replacing and tiling my brothers but was just wondering if anyone has any advice on how to get business/how to quote etc

any help would be much appreciated

cheers

[faithhealer]

Hi Greg, This forum must have a weeks reading for starters. have you contacted your local 'small business' centre ? different regions have different levells of help. Good luck. (Redundancy is what got me into this)

[greghusler]

hi,

yeah contacted my local business link and the princes trust etc, they all being very helpful and i have a good idea of the grants/loans/help etc that are available to set up on my own. I think my biggest concern is how to get those first few "real" jobs? i'll have a look around the forums for more start up advice. can you point me in th right direction?

thanks for your help

[david campbell]

organise a meeting with buisness gateway,they will help you with buisness plans,advertising ideas and tax stuff etc.and it's all free!

[greghusler]

thanks for that david
anything thats free in this day and age has got to be worth it!!

[faithhealer]

hi,

yeah contacted my local business link and the princes trust etc, they all being very helpful and i have a good idea of the grants/loans/help etc that are available to set up on my own. I think my biggest concern is how to get those first few "real" jobs? i'll have a look around the forums for more start up advice. can you point me in th right direction?

thanks for your help

Keep away from yellow pages and similar, post office windows are cheap enough, dish your cards out to everyone who comes within three foot of you (The Devonmark rule) and call every tradesman you know as they are usually your best contacts but at present it is gping to be tough.

[david campbell]

thanks for that david
anything thats free in this day and age has got to be worth it!!

get used ti it! thats what a lot of customers expect! working for free lol

[timeless john]

A years experience as a plumbers mate!
I hope you spend a bit on Diamond training first before you start tiling relatives bathrooms. You can choose your friends but .... you'll need good recommendations.
Difficult times for some so check your area first to see how much work other companies have on and if they are employing/reducing staff. Not to take you on, just to see how the market is before you invest.
Good luck.

[cornish_crofter]

When you've done your course, start on the simple stuff. Don't go straight into mosaic wetroom susing travertine tiles and a boarder etc.

Kitchen splashbacks and simple bathroom projects would be a good start. Your experience as a plumber's mate may stand you in good stead to take on bathrooms as a whole (fitting and tiling). But don't come too near me

[Verona]

If you have plumber's experience I would take that up if I was you. The plumbers I know have plenty of work to do and customers seem to pay the asking price where as tiling customers expect 'free deals' almost these days.

You should be able to search this forum for ideas of how to take off with new business. Other than business Gateway, it would be a good idea to tell all your friends, family, any contacts that you are starting up to get that word to mouth started.

Best of luck!

[Danny@ Diamond]

Hi Greg and welcome to the Forums,

We have various courses available at the moment, all of which include expert advise on marketing / business start up / managing and building a successful business etc.

We also have FREE accommodation available on certain courses.

For more information please have a look through our website and should you have any questions please do not hesitate to give Zoe our Course Administrator a call on 01903 739 407.

Good luck

[chris.tiling]

Follow all of the advice above. Also badger your friends / family / existing colleagues to try and get work from them. Buy some cheap tiles / seconds from tile shops and practice on old bits of ply doing patterns etc. Take photos of everything you do and show them to the tile shops. Keep going into all the local tile shops, chatting to staff, showing you are reliable, trustworthy, good at both customer interaction and the most important bit - tiling. Offer to tile some of their displays if they are unsure - then they can see what you have done and show your cards with the work.

There is loads of other stuff too - search the forum and you will find it all.

And ,from what I have heard of it (as I didnt go myself!) book in with Diamond!

[cornish_crofter]

...... Buy some cheap tiles / seconds from tile shops and practice on old bits of ply doing patterns etc........

...or ask the tile shops if you can have the ones they're throwing out. I found a load of 13x13 porcelain at Topps ready to be thrown out. I just picked out a few good ones to practice cutting on.

Also, they may have the odd box of unusual tiles that are in fact a line end. With the right tiles you could knock up some fancy displays on some ply and get some pics of it for your portfolio.

I would suggest you go into the tile shops and introduce yourself to the manager and ask him/her.

CTD branches tend to be very helpful.

[NETT Darren]

Hi Mate
It depends on how much of your redundancy your wanting to blow really, if you want fast track straight to the point plastering and tiling courses, we have hundreds of people on here will vouch for the training you will recieve at North East Tililing Training (NETT) as well as the business advice, i have run a business myself for the last 22 years and i do the teaching so you get the info first hand,
Check out the course feedback section for indepenant learner reviews and visit the website at Tiling Courses | Tiling Training Courses | Tiling Courses in Scotland | Learn to Tile | NVQ Tiling Courses or click on the link on the left

Regards
Darren