GasSafePlumberFrance

We have been here three months and have been doing all the necessary applications for a Siret number, re registering the car and transport, kids in school and loving it for a change, and my attention is now turning to work. Obviously funds are being used up and I'm starting to advertise around our local area of Limousine, Creuse, Limoges.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what works best here. Is it local advertising, should I spend my time advertising in local papers, or should I concentrate on internet advertising. My credentials are great as I have been An Accredited installer for Worcester Bosch for years, And have been Gas Safe Registered and Corgi registered since it began back in 1984. so my professional reputation I'm hoping should get me beyond word of mouth.

As your probably aware coming to a new country and setting up as basically a sole trader can be quite daunting. Were taking French lessons and they are coming on great. "But Here is the question?" Do I advertise in French or English to the huge amount of Expats coming to the area and hope to pick up more French speaking customers as my language understanding and capabilities get known.

Heres to A great future x

bigglesworth

I cannot help with the advertising, IME most seems to be word of mouth. But when you say you are registering with SIRET, does that include accreditation as an artisan plombier, chauffagiste?

I for one would never consider anyone who did not have the necessary certification. The decennale is a powerful advert and incentive. I also happen to like the fact that with the artisans we have used, the price is the price. No extras, (unless they genuinely are). Which seems to me to make everyone's' life easier.

Advertising I think splits two ways. There are the French and those of us who speak French, and who therefore have no trouble finding local tradesmen in the yellow pages or in the local community, newspapers, builders merchants etc.

Then there are those who do not, and who use the English magazines, papers etc. (I think it is unlikely that French people would read those).

Just my two pennyworth. Good luck

Chatter Static

Gas Safe wouldn't be acceptable to work here. But these people will know and this makes for a very informative read with regards to the regulations.

Advertising all I can suggest is get it in the papers shops and online I know in this area the enterprises tend to cover Gas Electricity and Plumbing and typically have at least one person in each trade accredited for a particular service.

dmu

Hi, and welcome to the Forum!
I, too, wonder whether you've had to retrain (in French and to French Standards) in order to be accredited and able to sign off work?
I can't really advise about how best to advertise - our gas-fired central heating was installed by the local plumber, otherwise we would have asked neighbours for recommendations. Once you've got your SIRET number, put ads everywhere, in both French and English - I may be wrong, but adverts in a language other than French are forbidden. This doesn't apply to Connexion, of course, and a look in the business pages will show what the competition for English-speaking expats is.
I was interested to see on your other post that your teenagers are enjoying French schooling. Could they speak French before you arrived? Most adolescents who arrive without French find it difficult to settle in Collège, let alone follow the French syllabus. Just goes to show that there are some who cope better than others....

InVinoVeritas

Hi GSPF,

I've found that AngloInfo works wells for getting anglophone clients. For where you are it would be:-

http://limousin.angloinfo.com/business-directory

PS. I like the way you give yourself a !!!

Tweedpipe

I wish you all the best in your venture.

My experience is, that in these particularly difficult times, more and more folks - when they have to spend money on repairs etc - look for the best possible deal. This doesn't necessarily mean the cheapest, but they are more and more inclined to look around, and get several estimates for a particular job. I suspect you will experience this too, and find a fair amount of competition.

Quite recently we had to change our chaudiere, which was 15 years old and frequently troublesome. We wanted a wall-mounted, propane gas-fired condensing boiler system of approx 4500W/5-25kw modulation, to provide hot water for domestic purposes and also underfloor heating to all rooms. We needed something very reliable, efficient, not cheap & cheerful, but not costing the earth either.
I requested and obtained 3 different estimates. One of my preferred options was that the heating contractor was affiliated with CICE so we could recoup the max crédit d'impôt.
I guess you have already established a French supplier for your hardware needs. Have you considered bulk buying (and storage) of certain high-costs components to optimize costs and thus remain as competitive as possible?
Price aside, may I ask, what chaudiere(s) you would have recommended?

EuroTrash

Hi, sounds like you got off to a good start so well done.
Regarding advertising, as others have said the type of work you will be looking for will depend what business structure you have chosen and what insurances you have. Because of the system, French artisans tend to concentrate on their own area - if they've paid out for expensive decennale they don't want to fanny about doing tiny jobs that don't need decennale, and on the other hand there are other artisans who don't want to work on the decennale scale so they concentrate on those jobs, they can do them cheaper because they don't have the overheads. If you want to do the small stuff, ads in shop windows might be cost effective. It sounds like you are wanting to do the serious stuff, so get yourself a website (in French) if you don't already and get yourself into the search engines as well.
I also get the impression that things are more local here, artisans tend to have their own 'patch', so it may not be cost effective to spread advertising outside of 50-60kms from where you live unless you have a special niche.
FWIW, whenever I need to find an artisan the first places I look are on the firemen's calendar and the diary that the commune dishes out each year. The same local tradespeople have adverts in there year after year. That's where I found my plumber, my roofer, etc, no need to look any further.
Finally -GasSafe and CORGI will be good selling points with UK expats but mean nothing to the French and might even put them off. They might be wary of you working to UK normes and them ending up with non-conforme installations with funny-sized joints and threads and stuff.
If there really are huge amounts of expats moving in, why not advertise in the Connexion and on AI to get a kick start with them, and as you settle in and get to know your French neighbours and get to grips with language, start reaching out to French clients. Relying on expats in the long term is not a recommended business plan.

cardi

Once you have a few well done jobs under your belt the orders should start to trickle through. French and English.
Heavy advertising can do the same but a good reputation is much more satisfying.
Much harder to succeed in self employment in France. The system doesn't like it.