The Christmas decorations are down, the mulled wine bottle is empty (though still waiting for the recycling dustman to collect!) and the last of remaining mince pies has been eaten. Another Christmas has left us as quickly as it arrived and 2010 is done and dusted and my, what a year it has been for Fulcher Edwards Ltd!
2010 was a hard year and like most companies we worked ‘our butt’s off’ harder than ever before, I’m pleased to say we made it through the other side but it was not by far an easy ride. We went from months of pure craziness where we contemplated taking on more staff, to months of wondering if we would come out of it without making any redundancies. I’m pleased to say we didn’t have to make any.
We did a lot more marketing last year than ever before and learnt a few valuable lessons along the way, good and bad. 2010 was very much trial and error for our marketing campaign as in previous years it was never something we had to do on a large scale to gain more business. We started our own Facebook page last year as well as our very own blog and we even jumped on the Twitter bandwagon to interact with our customers, I admit both are very time consuming, but it’s been very worth it!
Twitter has been great with connecting with other electricians like Stirling Electrical in Scotland @StirlingElect, electrical suppliers like Sparks Electrical in North London @sparksdirect and other electrical tweeps like Gary Pratten @mylocalelectric a Publisher for the My Local Trades network of online magazines. We have learnt a lot from these industry professionals and the rest of our Twitter family. I feel like everyone we interact with on Twitter either by our business account @FEelectricians or my personal one @FulcherEdwards are all incredibly helpful and I wish I could thank everyone personally in this blog post but I fear it will take me well and truly over the recommended 500 characters! You all know who you are I’m sure : )
We gained a lot of new customers in 2010 despite ‘the recession’ some have been very good to us by calling us time and time again throughout the year and even recommending us to other companies, friends or family. Like many other companies though there were a few chancers, time wasters and some terrible payers also. On the whole though the good outweighed the bad and in this type environment you have to take some risks to succeed.
We were lucky to be involved with some of the projects happening at our home, the Eurostar terminal in Waterloo Station last year too. The Ark Charity Dinner where we even got to help out The Killers! The Railway Children production, London Fashion Week and TV drama Luther were some others. Who knows what the terminal will be used for this year but one things for sure it’s nice to have some life back in the place.
Who knows what 2011 will bring, our first week back in January has already seen a VAT increase, calls from new customer’s as well loyal ones and even calls from ones who we quoted months and months that are now ready in getting the works done.
I don’t doubt that it will be an equally challenging year ahead however I feel like Fulcher Edwards Ltd is that little bit wiser now (or maybe that’s just me!) We may still get bruised and battered along the way but I think that will make us an even better company at the end of the day.
Happy New Year everyone, here’s to a prosperous 2011!
