Removals and the Credit Crunch
Posted on 05/08/08, filed under News | No CommentsToo often what we read in the financial pages is reporting of a trend that we as a business felt three months previously. An example is September/October last year - the phones literally stopped ringing round about the time of the Northern Rock fiasco. It was a good while later that reports started filtering through that small businesses were struggling and the economy was looking shaky.
July and August have been our two busiest months with most days being fully booked and having to turn away many move enquiries yet reports are that the housing market is in the worst slump for 19 years. We have certainly felt a slight upturn in our fortunes and hope that long may it continue. Will we be reading reports of an upturn in October/November?
Of course it takes time for statistics to be gathered, results to be published etc but looking at the day to day fortunes of a typical small business may well be a more accurate prediction of how the economy is faring.
It is fair to say that some of our business is as a direct result of the credit crunch - companies downsizing, redundancies and restructuring always results in office relocations, churning and closing offices down. On the domestic market front, sellers are taking the attitude that they may as well sell now before things worsen and their moves have been in the pipeline for several months. A number of our clients are selling and putting their possessions into storage while they rent and consider their options.
We have kept our prices steady whilst trying to cover rising costs, especially diesel, still offering the same level of service. There is no point in offering cut price jobs just to keep ticking over, as we intend to survive the slump and still be in business, stronger and wiser at the end of the recession. In the boom time every man and his van set up a removals company but this blip in the economy will be a true test where hopefully the good guys survive and the cowboys move out.