Is there a market for marble plastering?

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lenster

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Hello all
I have just joined the forum and would like a little help with a question that has been on my mind for a few years!!!!
Is there a good market for polished plaster work?
I completed a course at gold trowel around 8 years ago and then set up as a self employed plasterer,I have had plenty of work over the past years (and earned decent money) but I now think I would like to add another skill.
I would book the course with gold trowel and invest in the equipment required but am unsure whether there is a market for it (I live in the east midlands)
I would also appreciate any ideas you guys may have about advertising and marketing it.
Thanks in advance,lenster
 
in all honesty in all the years i have been in the building trade from 1976 /2012 i have never had so much as an enquiry , and speaking to other plasterers in carlisle nobody else has either,nothing,zilch,zero, at the end of the day it all depends which part of the country you live in , so the moral of the story is anybody who specialises in marble polastering do not set up offices in carlisle,all the best hector
 
Or Grimsby hector in fact there is more chance of that silk plaster from russia taking off.
 
lenster said:
Hello all
I have just joined the forum and would like a little help with a question that has been on my mind for a few years!!!!
Is there a good market for polished plaster work?
I completed a course at gold trowel around 8 years ago and then set up as a self employed plasterer,I have had plenty of work over the past years (and earned decent money) but I now think I would like to add another skill.
I would book the course with gold trowel and invest in the equipment required but am unsure whether there is a market for it (I live in the east midlands)
I would also appreciate any ideas you guys may have about advertising and marketing it.
Thanks in advance,lenster
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Modern renders are the way forward ,or get into areas like your wall create systems ,i know loads of lads that had a go at the polished plastering ,and come out with no call for it ,that could be down to their own promotion skills ,before i get torn into
 
I saw a full house in Notting Hill ,london, done in polished plastering £100 a metre , their quality was not even top class...
 
Fair comments and all the new render systems are the way forward. There is defo a market for polished plastering and it is a niche market. Not alot of people can do it or have seen these products so its a bit harder to sell to an everyday private customer. Some spreads are over pricing this work, i wont talk figures but £100 per m2 as john said there gona scare the custom away. I think more like £100 per 1m2 minimum call out sounds about right.
Am spreading approx 1-2 jobs a month for my estabilished custom and a local interior designer, without me having to go out and push for the work. I dont over charge and like a told my new paddawan jph10- it all boils down to what ur happy to work for per day. Putting a decent gauge on and breaking a sweat for eg £100 or spreading polished plaster on the same area for x5 as much over 2 easy days playing around with them little trowels clayman is selling whilst drinking coffie and looking at ur reflection in the wall. These type of finishes are more to do with the contacts uve made and if u market it right. Invest in your self and u should be ok, dont over charge and start driving round the east midlands doing chimney brest walls for an above, above, above average day rate untill u build ur speed up :RpS_thumbup:
 
LongstrokePlastering said:
Fair comments and all the new render systems are the way forward. There is defo a market for polished plastering and it is a niche market. Not alot of people can do it or have seen these products so its a bit harder to sell to an everyday private customer. Some spreads are over pricing this work, i wont talk figures but £100 per m2 as john said there gona scare the custom away. I think more like £100 per 1m2 minimum call out sounds about right.
Am spreading approx 1-2 jobs a month for my estabilished custom and a local interior designer, without me having to go out and push for the work. I dont over charge and like a told my new paddawan jph10- it all boils down to what ur happy to work for per day. Putting a decent gauge on and breaking a sweat for eg £100 or spreading polished plaster on the same area for x5 as much over 2 easy days playing around with them little trowels clayman is selling whilst drinking coffie and looking at ur reflection in the wall. These type of finishes are more to do with the contacts uve made and if u market it right. Invest in your self and u should be ok, dont over charge and start driving round the east midlands doing chimney brest walls for an above, above, above average day rate untill u build ur speed up :RpS_thumbup:
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It was £100 per square metre, wish I was getting it, the full house except ceilings was done with it, bathrooms, kitchens , the lot, the concrete floor was done in the same colour by another firm also £100 a square metre, maybe only in London would this be paid but I often hear £100 a metre square, I was interested in getting into it as you might imagine but at almost 47 I have lost interest in courses
 
Them prices are ridiculas lol i bet they lock all the doors and dont let anyone see there technique! I re done a few walls once because the first applicator messed them up and wouldnt tell the customer who supplied the gear or what the code/colour/batch number was. It all had to be done again as i couldnt match it..... But not for £100 per m2 unfortunately.
 
I asked them about it on another job, was it hard to learn etc, they said"no point getting into it when others have lots of experience doing it already" lucky they could not read my mind, ps none of them were plasterers...
 
It's all well and good if you live in a well to doo area but joe blogs ain't gonna pay those prices. in my opinion marble plastering epic fail....!!
 
There is a call for it and im quite busy with it. been pulled out the last few weeks with different jobs. even worked this morning and tomorrow morning (sat,sun) just to get a job done as im too busy next couple of weeks. I have work set up in pipeline for manchester and a nice job in warwickshire.

Its all about getting word out to potential customers that are generally hi end showing what can be achieved. As for quality of work by different people I looked at a job yesterday that wasnt up to much of a standard. Well, half the house was done well but a few walls i looked at were a bit ropey. It was in alderley edge. The house was previously rented to carlos tevez and there was a lot of polished plaster in the property. Someone made a lot of money putting it on. There were cracks in some of the walls due to the sub strate. I was asked if i could patch repair the polished plaster. Try to figure out what material has been used in what shade from what supplier and also mimic the technique of the previous applicator. Not a chance. ended up giving a quote to re do the entire wall.
 
you've got all on getting customers to go for a re-skim over woodchip in Barnsley never mind venetion or modern renders or that black majic weird fiberous shite or even screeding for that matter....its a good job im just a grunt ex site price spread float and set / board and skim bred and butter guy or it would be quite disheartening having other skills lol!!!!

would have been a right waste of time me going to college for 86yrs like you old guys instead of just labouring for a 2&1 gang like a dog and learning the hard way!!!!
 
smoother09 said:
It's all well and good if you live in a well to doo area but joe blogs ain't gonna pay those prices. in my opinion marble plastering epic fail....!!
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I disagree completely. Ive done venetian work in a 2 up 2 down before. Im also starting a stairway on wednesday in a 3 bed semi in queensferry. decent meterage in it. As far as the property goes its the opposite of high end and it smells of the owners 2 large dogs
 
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