how are you all finding business.
busy or quiet.
what trades are doing well at the moment.
'kin awful still
Crazy busy for the last 6-8 months. We do a lot of work for BT. I could work 24hrs a day and 7 days a week if I could be arsed.
This years been pretty good so far - revenue just slightly over target but costs much lower than budgeted. We've even recruiting for several roles.
Not sure it's generally true for our sector though (IT consulting and managed services) as we're getting quite a few approaches from people at competitors who've either been laid off or are expecting to get axed.
crazy - the University I work at (a post-92) is experiencing a 30% + increase in UCAS applications in a single year + even higher growth in postgrad
Where I work, business is booming, with plans to more than double the work force within the next 9 months, as theve just got a couple of big contracts, and there's still a couple more in advanced talks.
Slow but improving. Got a couple of decent sized jobs coming up.
I'm multi trade and multiskilled doing full house refurbs, kitchens, bathrooms, joinery, plumbing, electrics, pretty much everything except roof work.
It was mad untill xmas, but since then I've mainly been doing small handyman type jobs.
Manchester based
Awful ...... since they had a major clampdown on calling cards in phone boxes last year 😥
Quieter than last year so far, but it'll pick up. Even considered going to London for work but ernie scared me off 😯
fine at the moment we got a new 5 year grant at the start of the year
and the institute iteslf has won a lot of big grants recruiting new staff members etc
but our finacial people are reckoning a lot of government funding will be cut after the election possibly leading top lay offs
though i dont trust finacial bods opinions so right now id say pretty good
Dreadful in the electrical trade, really bad.
With people not buying, no extensions, conservatories, re wires etc.
And the industrial sides dead as well, not many companies expanding or even wearing out what they've got.
I built my businesson the back of quarrying and the aggregates industry, but when recession hit they just stopped no one it seems wants roof tiles, sanitary ware or bricks and mortar.
I suppose I'm dealing with the base level businesses and they ain't getting help anywhere.
Grim. I've been in business 12 years and never seen anything like it. It makes me feel slightly better that it's not just me.
Around here (South West), most people I have spoken to over the last month are on their arses - this was confirmed to me by my bank manager this afternoon.
Howdens and B and Q,totally dead,and they seem to have got rid of a lot of staff as well.
B and Q,have choosen this time to introduce a new trade scheme, big fancy catalogue, and dedicated trade entrance, you choose what you want and the staff fetch it for you,pity they sacked the staff to start with,oh and the prices have all gone up,much more expensive than TOOLSTATION.COM.
Oh and the muppets from the directory companies have stopped ringing,pretending to be your best ate and saying could you do more work etc.
Mowed out. Order book full for 18 months.
Busy for us.
Now booked into April for workshop diary.
Picked up almost vertically from Jan and Feb - lot's of pent up demand.
It's good.
It will pick up slowly!
Its not been bad, january was quiet, but then that was no surprise, February has been up on last year by about 30%, and this month isnt too bad, lots of workshop jobs and repairs, and hopefully the new shop will be open in April so lots to aim at this year, taking on a few new staff, though quality staff are hard to come by, had to do some poaching.
So is C2W good for you guys I assume it's here to stay?
oldgit - not really.
we give away 10% to cyclescheme then pay the VAT then it costs us workshop time to build/PDI then give a free 6 week service.
In the meantime we have to wait 5 days for the payment to reach our account after sending the voucher away...
Not the best but it brings people in over the year for more accessories and service work which we can claw back the lost margin on.
It's good for getting more people into the world of cycling and we view it as a long term customer coming on board - we make something from c2w in the long term but not the short.
Not to bad, It was slow in Jan but rolling on well.
I dont feel you are going to get the free spending
and confidence for a few years to come
(Exeter area)
bike shop busy, loads of (cyclescheme) sales, and the workshop is rammed.
cycle training busy busy busy and getting more busy by the minute.
🙂
Nice and steady although I'd like a few more commissions booked in but that's always the case....
I'm a self employed furniture maker/boat fitter. Summer is a busy time usually as I get more boat work in and there's no better place to be when the sun is shining 🙂
We dont do a lot of C2W so its not made much of a difference.
Swamped, recruitment is through the roof right now.
Really busy, the recession doesn't seem to have affected us too badly - been flat out for last two weeks. (design agency - advertising)
Busier than ever. Outside projections for new products are huge, big meetings to determine how we are going to deal with it. Working in top end hi-fi manufacturing.
Who do you work for Rich?
I used to be in hifi stuff.
Construction. Dead on its arse and only getting worse.
The amount of lads on their arse is just depressing.
I've had to lay off nearly all our guys and taken a big paycut also.
It's been total madness, spend most of the day firefighting what to order, sales are up 184% on last year. I just don't know when I'll next get to sleep.
It's been the worst 12 months I can ever remember. Then again I am one of those rare people who do manufacture something that's British.
This little new business venture however seems to be on the up http://emmyjane-design.blogspot.com/ 🙂
I'm in the print business and things are very steady.
To be honest being 'steady' in my trade is very good at the minute!!! Printers are dropping like flies.
What line of work are you in Ton?
What's annoying is that I've just reached the point where everything is paid for, no business loans, no overdraft but sadly no work. I just need to hang on for the balance to tip a bit.
Is it massively generalising to assume that all other businesses are doing well because no ones spending their money on bricks and mortar and all that's associated with it?
aerial, satelitte and cctv wholesaler.
and with the digital switch lurking in yorkshire, you would think it would be very busy.
but to be honest it is not, we are probably 25% down on last year so far.
we deliver nationwide, and the installers all over the country are in the same boat.
it appears people are not spending their cash.
I'm in the private medical device business and its been quite, but picked up in the last few weeks so I am hoping the trend will continue as confidence grows, unless the media start reporting doom & gloom in large portions again.
Wow! how depressing. Well we've had 15 new customers this week & we're guaranteed their business for at least 2 years each to the tune of about 25K a year each, give or take. We'll probably get another 12-15 next week too, then when our extension opens we'll have another 300 (yes 300) customers within about 10 weeks of opening which means we'll have about 800+ customers on our books!
And that's just one prison.
Wer'e doing great thanks.
😆
Well I'm an IT contractor (does that count?) and I've been pretty damn lucky due to being good and useful 5 years ago which has had really positive effects. However most of the other contractors I used to work with on that job have got jobs now too - things don't seem as bad as they were last time the sh*t hit the fan.
Ridiculous silly busy here. Working longer hours than ever. Company turn over breaking new records and the fastest growth in our sector (Retail). Not really sure why? Think its because our business model lends its self to investing in longer term growth in a recession.
we were dead in jan,feb a bit better...unfortunately itll take till may unitl weve paid for the slump...shame cos it was on the back of a great year! lots going on this year though! im very optimistic.....off to fort william with a stall as usual,website is expanding,2nd shop nearly signed,new staff/training...its all good!
Corporate Events.
Busy up to Christmas (as expected)
Manic Jan/Feb/March, which is unusual. Margins are bloody tight, and cashflow is appalling, which means that the hard work isn't showing much benefit. Too many freebies/at costs/mates rates in return for exposure and advertising too.
Missus works for a budget supermarket chain. They're doing *really* well... 🙂
Busy as usual with demand increasing while resources are squeezed 😕
Quiet but that's good. 😐
If we are busy then its seen as a failure. It means that our Fire prevention has failed, so the quieter we are the happier the bosses are. 🙄
Then the quieter we are the more likely they are to shut fire stations.
Corporate tax advisor (FS specialist). We had a big dead patch in May/ June/ July last year but have been flat out since then. People seem to be doing a lot of restructuring and streamlining of businesses, and M&A is now on the up with (apparently) plenty of bargains to be had from distressed businesses, but that's only really open to those with their own money to spend. Plenty of recruitment activity in my sector as well.
Good to hear a reasonable number doing well. It seems it's either really good or really bad.
Utter s***e here, no business at all, everyone I know still working is hanging on to their job from week to week. The idea of "recruitment" is a fantasy. (Central London, financial services).
Mark has already commented on the bike shop. My former employer has been sniffing around looking for contractors to fulfil some roles (including the one I got early retirement from) for 3-6 months. So far, I've declined.
Who do you work for Rich?I used to be in hifi stuff.
He's in Salisbury so I'm thinking Naim. Hope so as I've used their kit for years and it'd be good if they're continuing to do well.
Can we get an STW discount from Naim please? Please?
Pretty busy, not like the past, but enough.
Just finishing a job that gives us enough profit for 2010-11 that we don't actually need to do any more work to get through the year. Not bad given that the financial year in question hasn't even started yet 😀
But then folk don't stop pooing just because the economy is up the swanny... though they do resent paying when their poo shifting devices or poo cleaning devices stop working... they still pay up though 😉
Consultant / contractor accountant. Busy. To the extent I've dumped my general practice clients to focus exclusively on contractor sector. The market isndping well andnthe areas I specialise in - generally IT consultants and oil & gas - are doing ok. Lots of new contracts around but rates are being cut a bit. But maybe that's the markets correcting becuase some of the rates were bonkers.
I am busy enough (too busy)
oil industry
Bairn, I have crap accountants now.
EDIT: Well not crap as such.. just.. standoffish.
Molgrips. There's a lot of that around. Not me though I'm great. 🙂
manic in slabstock polyurethane foam (massive large scale production), the group came very close to folding last March but then picked up. End products are mostly automotive-eastern europe clients, medical, and industrial products-tapes, seals, gaskets etc.
Dreadful in the electrical trade, really bad.
With people not buying, no extensions, conservatories, re wires etc.
What part of the country are you in? Seems to be business as usual around my neck of the woods(Surrey). Was ticking over up to July last year, then it took off and we've been busy ever since(Retail/commercial Electrical installation/Maintenance).
People still seem to want to drink plenty of good quality real ale, so we're doing fine.
Do notice that lunches are quieter due to half empty offices though. They seem to be staying in business with less staff.
we're picking up, but it's difficult to tell whether it's sustainable
HR consultancy
Variable as usual. In the last month I've been working in London Munich Berlin and now I'm in Hong Kong. Hopefully a quiet week coming up and not sure after that but it's either all or nothing. Overall work is probably back to normal but with less notice.
Fairly flat for us (IT consultancy/managed services), some new contracts but also a lot of pressure from existing outsource clients to cut costs meaning using more off-shore resources so a few local redundancies. We're pretty much cut to the bone now though so if/when we do win another big contract it's going to be a lot of long days 🙁
Rubbish fitting floors .
2 weeks work in every 4 weeks
but better than this time last year
redundant on march the 31st!
Work picking up, managed to keep everyone employed with no redundancies over the last 24 months, now looking to recruit.
specialist software developer
getting better - jobs for my skillset up about 30-40% from last year
had to go abroad for some of the time, and had to take 12.5% pay cut to keep a job in UK
Rubbish fitting floors .
2 weeks work in every 4 weeks
Well get back in the garage and make a dynamo light then! 🙂
Automotive Design..(contract)
Picking up in the UK, a slight movement on rates too. But lots of blokes I know had a 9 month holiday (i managed to stay in work though)
Germany, a traditional bolt hole when the UK is flat, is still dead though.
Busier here than last year but like some others, rates have been cut (drastically in some cases).
Those who i did work for free for when they had no cash are making it up to me now (paying) and the ones who are cutting rates, well, I'll get it back when they are screaming later this year.
for me, it's gone mental :)doesn't feel like a business or work!
we've been run off our feet over the last couple of months and are actually (thank goodness) going to be taking on new staff
IT consultancy here. It's gone slow but we've kept busy pitching for more work, a fair chunk of which should pay off. Still profitable though. A good proportion of our long-term customers are local gov, education, NHS so not battening down the hatches quite so much.
Personally, I specialise in Novell to Microsoft migrations and Netware finally going end-of-life this month along with Novell's change in support policy (must have support/maintenance contract to get patches) has focussed a few minds, so that's steady work.
We have had a load of time-wasters recently though. Presumably people out there wanting to make themselves look busy, important and irreplaceable to their bosses so have been coming to us to do pre-sales and proposals for things, only to get to the point where they need to sign and commit and suddenly it's "sorry, I've had my funding for this pulled".
The change in pace has been quite nice for me - went from spending 4-5 days a week on site (which could be anywhere) and lots of driving, to a day or two at most and the rest of the time working at home. Not sure how I'd feel about going back to "busy" really.
IT Consultancy.....its been slow, but ticking over slowly.....
The major downside is that I have more time for riding... 😉
Finished my degree (Town Planning) in october, just in time for a massive reshuffle of Aucklands 7 city councils into 1 creating a dead stop on new recruitung.. have scored 2 days a week with a one man band consultancy and work 4 days a week in the boozer to keep a roof above our heads while my wife is on maternity leave,overdrawn, too skint to do anything but exist and keep the family housed and fed. theres worse off people everywhere but i'm having sleepless nights regardless.
2008 and 2009 were pretty dead, which is actually fortunate as we were having to totally rewrite the software, as we discovered that the original iteration was completely hard coded (after the gibbon responsible for it had left), now it's picking up a bit we've got a contract from china and are currently having a trial with a pharma company which will sort us out for the year if it's sucessful...
We're a process safety software firm.
bloody terrible here, think there are very dark times ahead, got a baby on the way aswell.
we make shiny things for ducting for the offshore, industrial, ncuclear. tunnel markets....
we have quoted like hell but nothing is coming back our way, all the big boys are holding onto their budgets and not releasing funds...
there's only so much longer the pot will last.... horrible feeling but i guess i am still employed!
Theres a bit of movement in the mortgage industry at the moment with some nice low fixed rates available for those looking to borrow below 75% of the property value and some even lower tracker rates (certainly below alot of lenders standard variable rates) and as a result people are looking at remortgages and moving house more than they have been in the last 6 months.
I'm based in Sussex but my client bank is spread across the UK.
If things continue as they are at the moment then I'll be ok but i can't afford to have another winter like last year, it was dire 🙁
Recruitment Industry - I need not say a word.
Dead since october/november - i'm a garden designer (at the moment) so some of that is seasonal, but there's usually a big pickup in late Jan/Feb and what with the cold weather & all i've hardly had a sniff of new work this year, so it's mainly last year's projects rolling on at the mo. Interestingly some of the contractors I use are still quite busy so people are doing bits & bobs, just not the higher value stuff that I tend to get involved in.
A good proportion of our long-term customers are local gov, education, NHS so not battening down the hatches quite so much.
They will be soon however. Our public sector customers are expecting around 15% cuts in their budgets.
Part-time academic, part time consultant. Both okay at the moment, but cuts are on the way so who knows.
Burrowing away my earnings, guess that makes me as much the problem as the solution for the immediate economic outlook.
busiest I've been in years, completely flat out at the moment
Budgets are tighter though, having to work a bit harder for the money but i'm certainly not complaining
Audio Visual Engineer, self employed
Designer
Deader than dead. Last year I was getting through at least 30 design jobs a month - now scraping by on about 10 a month and freelance projects are zilch.
I've been made redundant twice already and we're facing more cuts within the department over the next month or so...
Last year my wife spent 8 months Jan-Sept looking for work- 600+ job applications before she got offered two jobs.
This month, two weeks of casual looking got 3 job offers, all at good rates, two of them as long term (12 month+ expectation) roles. Strangely, there seems to be lots of work at the banks now partly taxpayer owned
Investment banking, contract project manager.
I'm still looking after the kids. 😆