A guide to starting a painting and decorating business
These days, construction trades are in very high demand. Bricklayers, plasterers, electricians and decorators all earn good money, and the call for skilled tradies is steadily growing. If you’re looking at branching out and starting a business, painting and decorating is one of the most solid trades you could go into.
Here’s everything you need to know about starting a painting and decorating business from the experts at PaintTech.
Article contents
- How to start a painting and decorating business
- Expanding your painting & decorating business
- The advantages of your own painting business
How to start a painting and decorating business
Once you’ve decided to start your own decorating business, the difficult part is figuring out how to get started. Below, we’ve outlined the different stages involved in starting your own painting and decorating business. Follow the steps below:
- Invest in equipment and workwear
- Decide your work scope
- Create an identity
- Register your business & get insurance
- Market your services
- Apply for funding
- Secure your first jobs
- Train in other service areas
1) Invest in equipment and workwear
You need to have some equipment for your chosen area of work; if you have done a painting and decorating course, you will know what equipment you need. You cannot do any work until you have the right tools, so now is the time to get them. It would be best if you also looked professional.
- Workwear – Choose the right trousers and tops with your company name on them. You will be surprised what a difference this makes when customers meet you for the first time. Get more than one so that you are always clean and presentable.
- Equipment – If you are already an experienced painter and decorator, you’ll have a good idea of the kit you need to buy to get going. Think about the brushes, spray machines, accessories and paints you might need to take on a job with you.
2) Decide your work scope
First off, you need to decide on the services your business will provide. This means making a few decisions. Is your business going to be mainly domestic, or commercial?
- Commercial work involves more significant contracts such as hotels and nursing homes. These contracts can generate a higher volume of revenue, but might be harder to secure for a new business.
- Domestic work involves painting and decorating for homeowners. These jobs can be easier to secure for newer businesses, and are a good way to build up experience and trust.
When you’re just getting started, offer services that you feel most confident offering, especially if you’re going solo. You can expand the services you offer as you go.
3) Create an identity
Deciding on a business name and branding is tied to what kind of work you want to be known for. Choose a name and a byline that describes what you do rather than just your name with ‘painter and decorator’ tagged after it. “Wall Wizards – specialist wallpaper installers”, for example. By choosing a business name rather than your actual name you allow for scope in the future, you may want to hire staff and expand for example.
You can get a logo designed at this stage, too. Either hire someone to do this for you, or keep costs down by using an online tool like Canva or Fiverr to create something that is simple but effective.
4) Register your business & get insured
If you’re operating in the UK, you have to register your business with HMRC when you start trading to ensure you pay the correct taxes. Do some research to decide whether registering as a sole trader or a limited company would work best for you.
You should also take out insurance at this stage to protect yourself, any employees, and your customers.
5) Market your services
Now that you have your type of work and branding ironed out, you can set up some marketing. You’ll often hear people in the trade discussing marketing, and it’s clear that so many of us in the construction sector simply don’t do enough to develop our business.
It seems like some of us believe that just putting a business listing on Yell and placing an ad in the local newspaper will magically make the phone ring. Maybe you have gone a step further and posted on Facebook, asking family members for work or recommendations, and that’s a great start.
Use social media
Social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram are brilliant tools with the potential to boost your visibility and attract potential customers, but there are a few key things you need to know and implement to make them work for you.
- Create dedicated pages for your business – Avoid relying solely on your personal account, which is limited to your friends and family
- Use ads effectively – Don’t just hit ‘boost’ without checking the audience you’re going to market to. It’s crucial to know your ideal audience before running ads
- Join and engage with groups – Utilise groups to connect with people, engage in conversations, and make sure that you don’t focus solely on selling. The people in these groups are local to you so if you know the answer to a question that someone else has posted in the group then
- Post consistently – Consistently post on your business page whether you gain likes and comments on them or not. As you build your page and your following, these posts will show how long you have been posting and build up “social proof”
Platforms you should look at using include:
- Google My Business
If you are doing work for other businesses or want to focus on more commercial work, you could also consider setting up a profile on LinkedIn.
Set your website up for success
It’s easy to believe that your website should be little more than a glowing reference for your services. But your website should be a place where potential customers can gather knowledge and information about your trade, not just about your business.
Despite 70% of the buyer’s journey happening before they contact you, people don’t reach out to be immediately sold to.
Your website and all your marketing efforts should focus on building trust, creating an environment where individuals believe they are reaching out for more information about your decorating business.
So, what should be on your website?
- Case studies, before-and-afters, and videos of projects
- Pages for each service, including average costs, related previous projects and answers to any questions you’ve been asked before
- Reviews and testimonials from previous clients
- Blogs answering common questions to show you know what you’re talking about
6) Apply for funding
There is Government funding available for new businesses that is well worth exploring. This is an ever-changing scene, so it’s worth contacting your local council or local enterprise schemes to find the latest funding available.
Once you have set up your decorating business, you can check out CITB (Construction Industry Training Board) funding, through which you can claim up to £5000 per year to help your business grow.
Download Now – Find Out How To Access Funding For Training – Get £5,000 Free Funding [FREE DOWNLOAD]
7) Secure your first jobs
It can be difficult to secure your first jobs without a portfolio of work to show customers, so consider doing some jobs for friends and family at a discount for marketing purposes, or ask for references from previous companies that you’ve worked at. You have the tools and skills, so now is the time.
8) Train in other service areas
Once your painting and decorating business is established, you can take your earning potential even further by upskilling. Is there something your customers always ask for that you can’t offer? Or a better decorating technique that you’ve never had a chance to explore. Now is the time to reinvest your hard earned cash in expanding what you and your employees can provide for customers.
If you have only been offering painting as a service so far, these are some of the areas you could consider branching into and courses you can take to develop more specific skill sets.
| Skill | Courses for further skill development |
| Paint spraying | Airless paint spraying course |
| Decorative finishes | Worktop refurbishment course |
| Wallpapering | Introduction to paper hanging course
Hanging wall coverings on complex surfaces course |
Expanding your painting & decorating business
Before you get into what’s next, take a moment. Think about this year so far. What went well? Where did you struggle? And most importantly, what did you learn? There are some decorators that have tried to shift entirely over to just kitchen spraying, for example, but it didn’t go so well. They picked up no new clients, and work started draining away, so they switched back, and everything is now better.
But there are those who made it work and are booming with kitchen leads. Consider what and why. It’s not necessarily you; it could be the environment around you, but it’s essential to know.
It may sound like being back at school; you just want to be a decorator, head into a room, paint, and get paid. You want to enjoy doing what you’re good at and not worry about the business stuff. Unfortunately, as a business owner, the business stuff matters too.
1) Build your relationships
It’s not just about the walls you paint but the relationships you build. As you think ahead, consider strengthening your bonds with:
- Suppliers
- Clients
- And even competitors
Build a network of referral partners that always have you in mind when someone asks for a decorator. A recommendation from a past client or a favourable deal from a supplier can make a world of difference.
2) Take feedback
Constructive criticism can offer insights into areas of improvement you might not have noticed; it’s also a great way to show your clients that you value their opinions, and it’s fantastic marketing material.
Having good feedback that you can share on social media or email might be the final thing to push potential clients over the line and fill your calendar for the next few months.
3) Learn how to project manage effectively
Whether it’s a small decorating job or a large-scale renovation, effective project management is the foundation of efficiency, client satisfaction, and, ultimately, profitability. It’s about planning, coordinating, and executing your work effectively. It’s the difference between chaos and control, between scraping by and making a profit.
Your knowledge of the trade can only take you so far sometimes. If you’ve found yourself hitting snag points as you scale your business, it might be time to consider a business development course to help you take it to the next level.
The advantages of your own painting business
AutonomyOne of the big advantages of starting your own business is that you call the shots. Many studies have been carried out to find out what is the biggest factor in providing job satisfaction, and it was found that “autonomy” was number 1. Autonomy means calling the shots, deciding what is important to you and doing it—deciding how a job should be done and to what standard and then doing it. Your own business will give you the freedom and control that you deserve. |
OwnershipAnother benefit to having your own painting business is the fact that you own it. If you work hard for 20 years and build an exciting and profitable business, then it is yours. No one can take it away from you or make you redundant. When you decide to hang up your hat, you could even sell your business for a nice “retirement” sized sum of money and call it a day. Not many jobs will give you that.
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Start writing up your painting business plan
All the trainers at PaintTech have had a decorating business at some point in their career. We remember the paint runs, the long hours, and the satisfaction of a job well done. And, just like you, we faced moments of change and decisions about our future. But we learnt to analyse the past year and forecast the future.
If you need any help, support or guidance on improving your business, please reach out. We’ve been there and have helped many decorators do the same in previous years.
