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Cliff Pottle who recently signed up with BeLocal for his own BeLocal Site – was interview this morning on LBC 97.3. Cliff talked about how he is having to drive miles every day outside of his local area to get work and how this is starting to effect him and his clients through rising costs.

Here’s Cliff:

http://blog.belocal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/System-Audio-20120305-0850.1.mp3

Simon Grice, Founder & MD of BeLocal, was interviewed this evening on BBC London by Eddie Nestor. The interview followed the publication today of the BeLocal Business Survey which shows the impact of rising fuel costs and working outside of local areas is having on Britain’s tradespeople.

Here’s part of the interview with Hugo Cheston of Ne-Build.com

http://blog.belocal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/System-Audio-20120305-2048.mp3

Here’s part of the interview with Simon Grice of BeLocal:

http://blog.belocal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/System-Audio-20120305-2028.mp3

Britain’s Tradespeople ‘Going that extra mile’ to help the UK economy

– But it’s costing a fortune AND SET TO RISE FURTHER

UK tradespeople travel up to 60 miles a day for work costing over £11k a year in fuel

A new study from the UK’s local social and business network, BeLocal has today revealed how hard tradespeople will be hit by the imminent fuel tax hike.  Hundreds of thousands of the UK’s self-employed tradespeople are forced to travel up to 60 miles return trips outside their local area for work, costing a fortune in fuel, and time – and now it’s going to get worse.

The survey asked 202 tradespeople, ranging from carpenters to bricklayers, chimney builders to glaziers, how far they have to travel outside their local area for work, and 62% said they had to travel outside their area most the time – up to 30 miles, some said.

One in five (20%) tradespeople travel a 60 miles round trip outside their local area, costing an average of £47 per day, £231 per week, £924 a month and £11,088 a year.  The survey revealed that around a third (29%) of all tradespeople travel a 20-40 mile round trip every day, costing approximately £31 per day.

To add insult to injury, George Osborne last week announced the end of Britain’s fuel duty freeze – from August prices will increase by £0.03p per litre, making it even harder for tradespeople.  The fuel cost per mile will increase from £0.77 to £0.79.

Cliff Pottle, a Suffolk-based builder travels an average of 20 miles out of his local area for work (40 miles return journey). He has calculated the cost at £30.80 per day, £154 per week, £616 per month and £7,392 per year, not including the time spent sitting in traffic.  He is nervous about the increasing price of diesel:  “When you read that diesel prices are at a record high, it’s hard to believe the government is about to make it even harder.  In these tough times customers are already asking for lower prices, while we’re having to pay more and more to actually reach them – something has to give before we all go out of business.”

Quentin Wilson, spokesperson for the FairFuelUK campaign commented on BeLocal’s research:  “FairFuel has always maintained that small businesses – the one’s we should be protecting right now – are at the greatest risk of failure because of high fuel duty. It’s morally and financially wrong to tax these hard-working tradespeople off the road and into insolvency. This data proves absolutely that cutting fuel duty is The Right Thing To Do. We need to cherish the UK’s grafters.”

Who’s paying the price?

Around two in 10 tradespeople (20%) said they always pass the cost of fuel onto the customer, and 60% admitted they do ‘sometimes’ pass the cost on.

Why travel so far for work?

When asked why they are forced to travel so far, the majority (57%) of tradespeople said it was due to people in their local area being unaware that they exist. 17% of respondents said people contact them and say they’ve just ‘found them on the internet’, but haven’t looked at where they are based.

Can going the extra mile be avoided?

The majority of tradespeople (51%) said it would help their business survive if they could stay closer to home, and service their local community. To confirm this need, during the last 3 months over 34,000 businesses have started to use the local social network www.BeLocal.com, to find local customers, while saving money and supporting their businesses.  Potential customers simply enter their postcode and find local, recommended tradespeople in their area.

Simon Grice, founder of BeLocal comments on the findings: “We all know from sitting in traffic in the morning, that tradespeople do go that extra mile for work – it’s quite common to see an unfamiliar dialing code on a van in your area.

“This research now shows how big the problem is now, which is only going to get worse in August. We all need to think local more often, and that’s exactly what BeLocal was designed to help us to do.”

-Ends-

For more information, case studies, or interviews, please contact Lisa Malyon on 07525204402 or email lisa@sensecommunications.co.uk

Notes to editor

-       www.BeLocal.com is the UK’s only local social and business network – it launch in November 2011.

-       The five-question survey was responded to via email by 202 tradespeople who have recently joined www.BeLocal.com to reach local customers.

-       The survey was in the field from 15^th February – 1^st March 2012.

-       The calculations are based on:

• The current cost per litre of diesel is £1.42 per litre (4.5 litres in a gallon).
• The average diesel SUV used by a tradesperson does 16.52 miles to a gallon.

-       FairFuelUK (www.fairfueluk.com) and hundreds of tradespeople will lobby local MPs for a cut in fuel duty at the National FairFuel Day on March 7^th.

As the co-founder of mashup* I get to contribute to the theme suggestions for upcoming events. Clearly having recently co-founded BeLocal I think the opportunities being created as ‘local goes social’ are significant but in societal and commercial terms and following the Networked Neighbourhoods events earlier this week (see earlier post here) and next weeks LeWeb11 event (the theme is SOLOMO -  SOCIAL-LOCAL-MOBILE) I suggested that mashup* holds an event specifically exploring the opportunities arising as ‘local goes social’. And so it is – Locial – on the 31st January (6.30pm – 8pm) at the Innovation Warehouse in London.

If you’re interested in contributing to the event please get in touch with the team at mashup* (team@mashupevent.com) as whilst I help steer mashup* I don’t run it (anymore!).

Love thy neighbour no more: Disappearance of community spirit as 70% admit they don’t know who lives next door

• Only 6% say community spirit is strong in their area
• 51% wouldn’t ask neighbour for help
• Main reason given for decline is lack of time to meet those in the community

read the full article here.

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Our sense is that first step to helping people (re)connect with the people, events & information around them (if they want to!) is making it really easy to do so.

What do you think ? Should we collectively be concerned about this ? Should we be ‘trying’ to do more to meet local neighbours ? Do you know your neighbours ? What tools do you use to stay connected with local people and information ?

We’re proud to announce that BeLocal is sponsoring Weston Rugby RFC who have their 1st home game on the 3rd December. We’ll be there cheering Jason & the team on.

If you run a local sports club – we’d like to hear from you as we’re currently reviewing our local sponsorship options for next year. Please get in touch – team@belocal.com

One of the things I hear a lot is “I’d like to buy more local food from independent local shops, markets and producers … but … I just don’t know where they are.”. I think for many people this isn’t the main reason they shop at the major supermarkets – it’s simply one of convenience and price (people generally think it’s cheaper at supermarkets).

However – there is some truth in it – over the last 30 years or so the rise of the supermarket and their associated marketing/awareness capability using mass media has to some extent made the smaller, independent retailer less and less visible – unless of course you know or live very close to them.

At the weekend I was visiting Norfolk and came across a ‘local food market’ – full of some great local (to Norfolk) food producers. Many of them had joined the Norfolk Food and Drink Co-operative as a way of pooling their marketing and purchasing capability which seems like a very good idea for local producers.

As social & digital media continue to grow in importance – particularly to local businesses I sense that an opportunity is emerging for savvy independent food retailers and producers to engage with local people (who in turn will engage their local friends) to ensure they know what they provide, where they are and how they can order from them.

So what do you think – Are you interested in buying local food ? Do you know where your local producers and independent retailers are ? How do you find them ? Are they recommend to you ?

Over the last few years there’s been a demise in the local newspaper industry – quite a dramatic one according to some in the industry. Local newspapers have long been the principal source for local news, events, classifieds – getting your ‘picture in the local paper’ used to be very exciting. The front page above is one of our local newspapers – the East Anglian Daily Times.

If local newspaper readership is dramatically reducing where are local people getting their local news from ? Local radio, local TV, Facebook, Twitter etc. – of course it’s a mixture but my sense is that the local newspaper isn’t quite ‘dead’ – far from it – the local newspaper has the potential to become the digital hub for local people providing they move with the times and invest in digital products – across the web, smartphones, pads and of course community platforms.

So, if you do, where and how do you read your local news ?

We’ve just finished watching the 1st episode of new BBC documentary – ‘Calling Time‘ – a series looking at pub landlords and how they are coping with the recession, smoking ban & cheap booze from supermarkets.

I admire the landlords they profiled – particularly those taking on pubs that went bust years ago. A common theme echoed by the locals that used these pubs is that they won’t have anywhere to socialise and get together and that is probably the single biggest thing they’ll miss. With around 14 pubs a week closing at the moment across the UK there are a naturally a variety of view points on the issue. One particularly interesting article I recently read by Christine Bohan from the Guardian – “There’s no need for nostalgia over closing pubs. Britain’s pubs may be closing at the rate of two a day, but with good examples rare, is this especially bad news?” points out that good pubs are few and far between and even highlights George Orwell’s idea of the perfect pub, his main suggestion being that parents should be able to bring their children, to help create “the family-gathering places that they ought to be”.

In summary pubs will survive, the British love of a good pub will guarantee this – however the emphasis is on the word ‘good’. Pub’s that make a big effort to appeal to a wide range of customers – drinkers, eaters, young, old, single, families – will probably do the best simply based on some pretty fundamental business logic.

What do you think ? Is the great British boozer destined for history to be replaced by X-factor, a bottle of wine and a few friends around at your house ?