Now more than ever, businesses are grappling with the challenges of uncertainty on a weekly if not daily basis. This naturally impacts many key decisions at every level of every business, committing to costly investments like expanding into larger warehousing is riskier than ever with the cloud of unpredictable revenue generation weighing over many of these decisions.
Larger premises means more heating and electricity, which in the current climate can be a big enough prohibitor alone. But if businesses are experiencing periods of growth or have a need for temporary expansion, then how can they facilitate it whilst mitigating the risk?
Expectation & Purpose
As you can likely guess, our solution is the humble marquee. For businesses, when we talk about marquees it’s key to shake the stereotypical gazebo image, we’re talking more about semi-permanent structures or large scale tents like this:
We hope you agree this is a far cry from your garden gazebo! It’s essential to note, for some businesses these huge scale structures may not be a complimentary fit. The image above represents a temporary warehouse more than a marquee, these are extremely handy for many businesses with physical inventory, especially those with periods of seasonal demand when they have a short term requirement for extra stock warehousing. Or for many logistics companies that facilitate the movement of goods.
For other businesses, however; this may well be overkill. Perhaps you simply need a small extension of your existing property on a short term basis like this:
Benefits
The benefits may already be crystallising for many here, but it’s worth taking the time to clarify them. The primary initial pro here comes from commitment and investment.
It’s always nice to have investable assets for your business, but there are times when the short term risk outweighs the long term pay off. Over the past few years that risk has become more pronounced than ever, demand and forecasting is less predictable than ever which means understanding your space requirements for inventory or transport needs to be more fluid than ever. The beauty of these temporary structures is you can have them for a period of a few months, cover a monthly fee and then take them down when you no longer need the space.
They also act as a trial for additional space, you’re testing the waters for how much you need that additional space. If you find after 6 or 12 months you still need the space, it can then build your confidence that your demand has maintained enough to justify investing in long term expansion.
On the flip side, if demand tails off after a few months and you’ve invested in a large new property that you’re struggling to cover the overheads for then it quickly becomes costly. If this happens with a marquee, you can quickly free up cash by having it taken down so you’re only using the space you need.
Cost Effectiveness
So how does this make a marquee cost effective for a business? When we use the term cost effective here, we’re using it in the broader context of being cost effective when we factor in the elements like risk mitigation and flexibility.
A marquee can be cost effective for your business because it prevents the need to get tied into a long-term contract for additional warehousing or larger premises, when compared against this large investment it’s comparatively very low, significantly more flexible, whilst facilitating the same short term requirements.
You aren’t adding an asset to your business as the counter to that, but it does provide a trial framework to test if you’re ready to invest long term in a larger asset. In this respect, storage marquees can be a very cost effective, safe and low risk solution to many storage requirements.
How much cost is subjective to what type of marquee you need. Before you head over to our storage marquees page here, it’s worth considering the following:
- Will racking be needed to go within the tent to a certain height?
- Are specific workspace areas required?
- Is there a specific volume of stock required to go in?
- Do you need multiple roller shutter doors in place?
- Are there restrictions on the premises as to the size of the structure?
- Does the structure need to be placed a certain distance away from other buildings?
- Is there a capacity for how many people will be working in the space?
- Is certain clearance needed for vehicles to be used within it or stored?
Once you have these questions clarified, or you need guidance working through them, you can get in touch with us here or call us on 01482 348700
