LANDSCAPING
newsletters – this way you can keep an eye on seasonal deals, special offers or promotional discounts, and utilise their digital assets to ensure you’re always up to date. Follow their social media accounts too, as many will share the latest news and product information, as well as customer photos and videos to inspire your own customers’ work.
Bring customer projects to life Most customers will want to see products in real life before deciding what to choose, particularly if there is a lot of choice on offer. Thanks to virtual reality, a growing number of manufacturers now offer the options of using a phone to do this; it’s a quick and free way to visualise a project, get instant feedback and secure the sale. Some customers will still prefer physical samples, wanting to touch and feel the products and lay them in situ, so utilise manufacturers who are able to provide samples on request.
knowledge, so communicate with them as much as possible to ensure you’re offering the most up-to-date information to your team and customers. Keep your finger on the pulse of the industry and sign up to manufacturer
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By building strong supplier relationships and utilising them to understand exactly what’s on offer and most relevant to your customers, you can streamline the information to pass on to those who rely on your branch, providing them with relevant insights and opportunities which have a knock-on, positive impact for merchants’ business, too. n
remium House Builder Castlethorpe Homes is part of a growing number of SME housebuilders who are redefining the design, choice, and quality standards of new build homes – which includes raising the bar for landscaping.
For its development of four detached houses in Bramley, Hampshire, called The Paddocks, Castlethorpe Homes applied these principles, using external hard landscaping to create attractive, outdoor/indoor living spaces and a sense of ownership within the exclusive community.
Chris Warner, managing director of Castlethorpe Homes, says: “The people buying our homes want a high quality, low maintenance finish. The exterior of our properties are important in the buying journey because the quality of how they look puts faith in the quality of the interior. People often see the outside before they see the inside, so we set the bar high at the external aesthetics and they feel comfort that they are buying a quality home.
“The Paddocks is a development of high specification homes and as such, we provide the landscaping and hardscaping to a standard our buyers expect. That includes features such as full width patios that feel connected to the living space, so homeowners have full choice on their seating area. With our commitment to sustainable design and EPC rated A homes, we’ve also incorporated Biodiversity Net Gain principles into the development, having achieved a 10% increase. “The site was originally a horse paddock, so we’ve designed homes that are in keeping with the local area and reflect a farm / barn style look. That means we’ve added in elements such as native hedging,
September 2024 A supplement to builders merchants journal
mature planting, a wildflower meadow at the end of the garden, insect and small animal refuge spaces plus the usual things such as hedgehog runs, bee bricks etc.
“Creating the outside / inside approach is also important to our buyers so where we can, we design our main living spaces to face into the rear garden so the kitchen-diner can breathe out onto the full width patio. This means during warmer months you can sit outside, but when it cools, move into the house while still enjoying the garden. It’s all about the connection.”
“Our material choices are driven by two things. Firstly, we opt for high quality, sustainable products and where possible, natural materials. And secondly, it’s about the look and the feel. We usually opt for Indian Sandstone paving and typically in a grey shade, but for this development we deliberately chose a warmer, more rustic buff to complement the farm-style and location of the homes. Then for the driveways and estate roads, we wanted to use a colour palette that complements the brick façade, while also being in line with planning requirements, and allowed us to create clever details. “Different colourways and complementary paver edging have been used to delineate between each home’s driveway and the shared roads. It’s important buyers feel a sense of ownership and privacy – to mark the difference between what’s their home and world – versus what is a shared space. Marshalls products have worked hand-in-hand with the quality and choice of materials elsewhere – for example we’ve used heritage blend bricks and village reclaim roof tiles – andas a result, the hard landscaping feels part of the design.”
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