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Trade Talk: Garden Rooms - A Networking Opportunity for Installers (2/8/2010)

By Claire Scholes, LairdKing

Summer is here, and everywhere I look at the moment I am confronted with advertising and articles taking a new look at the traditional garden shed - or how it is now essential to have some über-contemporary space in your garden for a multitude of uses.

I personally keep a bike and a lawnmower in mine, but am now seriously considering how I can turn it into my own personal music room. A recent report in The Times shows that construction industries in the UK have grown 6.6% this last quarter, but this could mainly be due to a final burst of public sector building works and not because of the new-build house market booming again. Therefore, perhaps during the summer months many home owners are now considering expanding their 'Improve not move' ideas to incorporate their gardens.

The humble garden shed can be adapted to serve as another room.

The integrated shed

As an installer, we can make a real difference to the garden shed and change it from being just another space to store junk or toys in. We can convert it to a fully-integrated area of the home which offers high-speed data networks, shared music and video services and telephone. This integration keeps the space controllable as well as keeping it as a separate, away from the main home, such that it continues to function as a home office/den for your teenagers/reading room or whatever you want it to be.

The DIY option

Most people may think that this is easily achieved without a professional installer - they will just run a bit of armoured cable, put up some lights, put in a couple of power sockets, a cordless phone and a wireless router, and think they are good to go. And in a way, if that is all they want from this space, they are right. However, what they risk by buying all of their components from a high street chain, from sales assistants who sell just what is on the shelf, is not sourcing the range of reliable and stable components that are needed to provide a robust and flexible service within this space.

An office in the shed will require reliable power, telephone and Internet connections
(image courtesy of Brian DeHamer).

Time for the professionals to step in

Realistically, most of these garden shed spaces will use a wireless system, but the end user won't understand how easily wireless communications can be interrupted and interfered with by weather, building materials, where the components are placed and how much data is being transmitted. As experts in the market who understand what the customer wants to achieve, installers can offer their services to perform a Wi-Fi survey, and this can also open up the opportunity for us to sell the correct configuration and additional useful components to the network.

The Fincube by designer Werner Aisslinger, can be a guest house or home office in the garden. Certain models include automation as standard.

The simple extension with all of these garden rooms is control. How cool would it be for you to still be able to check up on what the children are up to, even if you have to work late in your garden office and do not want to traipse up to the house once an hour. Or, what about the garden lighting or house lighting if no-one else is in? Most clients are ever more concerned about energy wastage, and using a custom installer to extend or install lighting and AV control into these new garden rooms will mean that house and pathway lighting is only used if the client wants it on. No more stumbling up the garden path in the dark because you forgot to flick a switch, and no more lights on for three hours waiting for it to get dark, whilst you are working.

Working when it gets dark - a contemporary garden room designed by Roost.

Conclusion

Some might argue that a shed is just a shed, and if that is all which is required, then that is fine, but some of these garden rooms I have seen on sale cost upwards of GBP18,000 plus installation, and even a posh summer house can cost over GBP5000. With this sort of financial investment in mind, it is realistic to assume that the extension of whatever type of lighting, AV or total home control that is installed in the main house, should be extended to this space to make the most effective use possible of this new addition. And if there is not currently any intelligence within the main home, then we see these garden rooms as an ideal selling opportunity to reach new customers.

Claire Scholes is Managing Director of LairdKing. LairdKing provides complete building automation systems from design and specification to installation and programming.

www.lairdking.co.uk