With all the recent goings on in the world its hard to know if things will ever be the same again. One thing that is for sure is going forwards things are going to change in the industry. whether that’s through work volumes, an influx of new comers to the trade or the fact we need to pick and choose which jobs we attend based on risk factors we wouldn’t have previously had to think about.
Here’s the main issues we see cropping up
Reduced amount of work
Obviously at the height of full lock down in the UK many locksmiths experienced a lack of work. That is probably for a number of reasons. The fear from customers wanting a tradesman in the house and the fear of tradesman not wanting to go into customers houses will of played a big part. That is also something that is likely to continue for quite some time. If the customer is vulnerable and the job non urgent then its highly likely that job will be put off until the world is in a better place. Equally if the locksmith is vulnerable then they might be having to take the time off for there own safety. With many children also not being at school there’s a high possibility that some locksmiths will be working around trying to home school there kids.
If people don’t use there locks then locks don’t break! With many people following the government guide lines correctly people were forced to stay indoors. This means operating doors and locks much less often reducing the chances that something will break.
Less burglary’s, nobody wants to see somebody else get burgled. However this can be a decent portion of a locksmiths work, repairing the aftermath of a burglary is something most locksmiths do quite a lot of. With more people staying at home indoors hardly any burglary’s will occur resulting in less work in this area.
Business’s have been closed. Commercial premises are often in need of lock work been carried out. Commercial property’s tend to be much bigger than residential property’s. With commercial property’s having more doors, more locks and more key holders than residential, as locksmiths we find a decent portion of work normally comes from commercial property’s. But that been said with most commercial business’s been closed for so long that too has impacted on the amount of work. Even as things return more to normal after the governments easing on restrictions on the 4th July there are still many commercial business who’s staff are working from home. As a lot of locksmith work is also contract type work this also tends to be for commercial customers, again meaning a drop from yet another revenue stream.
New Locksmiths and training courses
As things start to return to normal unfortunately we are likely to see a huge recession with thousands of people loosing there jobs. Not only this but due to the amount of company’s which will likely go under those people will struggle to find a new job.
Just like with the financial crisis of 2008 people looking for work will be enticed into training to be a locksmith. With the promise of locksmith qualifications (not worth the paper they are written on) and the £100k a year wages we are likely to see a huge increase in competition. Read our post on how much you can earn as a locksmith.
As most of us that have been in the trade a while know these people will come and then quickly go. But there will always be another one that comes along to take there place.
What lies ahead
With a recession looming and reduced amounts of work for many locksmiths in the UK it looks like we are set for tough times ahead. However we’ve done it before, anybody that was around in 2008 knows you’ve just got to get your head down and ride it out. Its not all doom and gloom as a big portion of the work we do simply cannot be put off. Emergency work will still always be there you’ve just got to go out and get it!
Use this downtime wisely to plan for the future, do some work on your website, keep things fresh, contact potential new contract customers and above all keep your chin up! We can get through this!
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