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We’ve all heard the phrase one-stop…. Does it work for Trades based businesses?

Savvy Trades have come to discover that building a recognisable brand and having values to it, which reflect who and what you do can help achieve more in business.

Over the last few years, we’ve worked with multi-faceted construction businesses, one-man plumbers, country-wide gas and plumbing engineers, groundsmen and landscapers. What rings true is when they take their identity and use it to not just deliver the basics but tie the visuals and communications together.

HAD-Print – understanding your needs…

It often starts with workwear, which has numerous benefits, and promotion, builds awareness of who and what you do. With customers, it also sets a tone of professionalism with a standard of apparel that reflects the business. As one trades business said to us, “We even get sub-contractors wearing our kit, and then they take ownership of the job they are doing”. Customer expectations have shifted with the rising cost of everything, and labour charges reflect this, equally, customers do expect to see professionalism and presentation. We have a wide range of workwear, from high visibility through to thermal protection

Building on professionalism; Regulatory requirements also mean that ownership of site health and safety can mean localising to make it relevant. Here at HAD-Print, we are well aware of the requirements to produce compliance (Health and Safety (Safety Signs and Signals Regulations) 1996). We have access to a library of standard Prohibition, Warning, Mandatory and Safe condition signs. So, site access boards combined with your branding and office details and relevant site marshals can be developed appropriately.

Over the years, we have been well aware that project sign-off, and authority to proceed following inspections all require necessary paperwork with signatures. Whilst digital technologies might provide some solutions in certain parts of the construction trade, the need for a physical document is the benchmark which provides the authority and sign-off on the job. We have a wealth of experience with No Carbon Required (NCR) sets providing duplicate and triplicate. Plus, we know what you expect to make them hardwearing on site.

More than just print – relevant marketing

Whilst every business runs social channels and other marketing, people still like people and referral is the strongest. Referral cards and business cards are probably key items. We do get asked for a bit more. One Gas and Plumbing business, left it late to ask us, can we do some flyers for an event… yes is the answer. However, what the owner wanted to develop the business into was maximising some of their recently high-value bathroom work. When running a team of lads, sometimes you just don’t get pictures of work done, equally pictures which sell. Thankfully through our connections, we were able to source the right pictures to meet the aspirations and benchmarks of the business. Combined with some careful copywriting finished flyers were artwork approved, printed and in the hands of Ben within 36 hours of the request.

Another top reason for using HAD-Print for your trade business, is we know/understand you (we’ve grown up with mates and friends in the trades); we can reflect this in any branding work. Make sure it will work across workwear, van graphics, site boards, traditional print and also into your socials. What makes it different, unlike “creative designers” that be architects and interior designers to you as a tradesperson, we suggest functional designs which work across multiple print and production methods. Plus, in our approach of being honest, like yourselves, we know how to bring it in on budget, plus our range of knowledge allows us to specify more efficiently.

All about the difference…

Anyone with any common sense knows it’s not what you do, but how you do it. With a wide variety of print service providers out there, some purely online shifting products without any relationship. To us print is an art form when done well, it adds value, understanding what you want to achieve is at the heart of how we do it. So distinguishing what matters and why, makes a real difference to the result. With over 70 years of combined experience within HAD-Print, the small differences are what make the difference, so here are a few examples.

What makes us different?
“More than box shifters” at the very heart of what we do – is understanding your needs as our customer. Easy words, but here’s one example.
It’s not just understanding you, but the needs of your end users. The work we’ve done with Simon Ferris at Flat Stan First Aid is about maximising the learning of the children partaking in the programme and after the learning. We’ve helped Simon to evolve his resources into something more dynamic which is engaging on many levels. Simon doesn’t just use us for the print, but as a sounding board to help his develop ideas – it is a pleasure to be valued in this way.

What makes us different?
“More than box shifters” at the very heart of what we do – is understanding your needs as our customer. Easy words, but here’s another example.
When you meet a business person regularly you get to understand them and their business. Ben at Phoenix Heating and Plumbing was one of these customers. Seeing, talking, understanding, and knowing his “pain points” really helped auto meet his aspirations of where he wanted to take his business. Introducing a brand identity for Phoenix Heating and Plumbing, was probably the first significant thing we did, we amazed Ben when after a few words, we were able to hit the brief on the nose for him. Workwear for his team provided the opportunity to raise the level and put pride in the business. We’ve since helped get marketing collateral to hit the mark as well. Quick response due to circumstances, favours pulled from some of our contacts, and leaflets with the right professional high-end images he required to help them pitch for the work they knew they could achieve.

What makes us different?
“More than box shifters” at the very heart of what we do – is understanding your needs as our customer. Easy words, but here’s another example.
A very recent example. And a very sweet one at that. Mrs H, whose husband had recently passed, wished to ensure his legacy was a positive one. He had extensively researched the mills in 2 local valleys and the documents whilst useable, they were in no format to be shared or passed on. We took the documents, and a wallet of photos, and worked our way through and artwork up the book professionally, after a round of proofreading, the 2 volumes (books) were printed on a limited edition basis, enough for the family, placing in local libraries and history centres.

What makes us different?
“More than box shifters” at the very heart of what we do – is understanding your needs as our customer. Easy words, but here’s another example.
Over the last 2 years, we’ve produced all sorts of card decks. A lovely item to work on, as they are usually so diverse in content. At the end of last year, we had a referral enquiry which said… “Can you…” well, the answer is yes, as ever. It was a different size, a different number of cards. Gareth had in his mind’s eye exactly what he wanted. Getting to know, and understand is the usual key to creating a specification which works. It was nice that it was 2 decks of the same specification, different designs running in parallel, which makes things easier in production. Gareth in asking the right questions to us, enabled us to tweak and develop what he was looking for from an existing reference point. Here’s why it works with us, we are truly bespoke, unlike your online portal funnel web-based printers, we use, knowledge, and experience to devise the right solution for you.

Need your print to work smarter for you? Why not start a conversation with us?

No hiding… honesty is one of our values

We often get asked to competitively pitch on projects. And occasionally we say no, we’re not going to quote when we see what we’re against. We don’t do race to the bottom. However recently we’ve had feedback from an end user who showed us what was advertised and what they got. The original specification sheet and the supplied polo shirt were nowhere near a match.

What we do…

  • Our garment proposal sheets, feature clear positionals and photos of the proposed garments.
  • We only specify garments we know and trust.
  • We provide honest advice on what will work in different print and embellishment methods – some are better than others at different things.
  • Honest charging and can suggest the right breakpoints to achieve cost performance points.
  • We provide options to enhance the end-user experience – tagging and bagging or packing.

So, with the case study above, we’d ensure that a heavier-weight garment was specified to match the end user’s environment. It also takes a detailed print better. The proposed garment had opportunities for further trimming or embellishment to add value to the merchandise proposition.  We would offer an option for branded tagging, if you wanted an end-user experience to be delivered more “branded” we can recommend easily branded pain packaging to deliver within a cost budget. This packaging can also be nearly plastic-free for better environmental credentials.

If you are in a specific sector, we understand that your market audience has expectations. A good example of this is motorsport, where attention to detail, and specification of the performance vehicles is matched by the specification and detail of the apparel used. Whether two-tone garments, garments with colour panels, or piped trim, detail in print and embroidery is absolutely critical.

Part of our service is the fact we spend considerable time getting to know the products we use. Whether this is getting touchy-feely at trade shows and roadshows, getting samples in and putting them to the physical test.

Talking of physical tests… in the last year, we’ve rejected 2 items on our testing programme. These include workwear boots, which were inconsistently manufactured and the product support through wholesale and distribution didn’t match our expectations. The other was a Hoodie, which bobbled on after the second wash.

The crux is, if you value your brand, doing the right thing sometimes takes a bit of a bottle. If you are doing merchandise, think about the sales journey, reviews, product evaluations, and user-generated content is now major selling points. If you go on a race to the bottom and don’t have honest sales collateral you will get adverse responses from your valued customers, audience, followers or the better description for them – stakeholders.



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