If you have looked across the internet or in the pages of glossy magazines, in search of a garden room or garden office, you will have noticed that, for a good size summerhouse or garden building; say 6m x 5m, you could easily spend £35,000 or more, and end up with no more than a nice looking timber building (or shed).
So why does it cost so much to install a garden studio, garden man cave or garden gym, when essentially we are talking about a simple room?
The answer is simple too. If a company supplying garden rooms relies on a single revenue stream, their income is limited by their turnover, and most only sell the one product. That income must then pay for the workforce, their premises and offices, as well as the directors profits. That is a lot of salaries and overheads. This might not be an issue if the company were selling a large number of units per week. Invariably though, they are not and their overhead is high.
The problem then is that the profit margin needs to be high because the turnover is low. So what can we do about it? How can we get a bespoke garden room that is also a cheap garden room?
Well for the answer to that, we need to have a closer look at the problem. If more contemporary garden rooms were sold, the companies selling garden rooms could survive on less profit, and prices would come down. That though, is not going to happen in time for you to install that extra room in the garden for next summer is it?
For the solution, we should look to material suppliers. Companies that have hundreds of different revenue streams, sold for thousands of different purposes, and as such can operate on very small margins. That however, does not solve the issue that someone still has to build it.
We are however, getting there. We are on the right track
What if there were a company that supplied the structure of your contemporary garden space, i.e. the complicated high labour bit, but factory produced to bespoke specifications? And what if those structures were made for hundreds of other purposes and not just for your garden office? And furthermore, what if production for those other purposes numbered in their tens of thousands, what could such a company do with their profit margins? That is right, keep them low.
Such a company is Arkitainer who specialise in modular and container architecture. Arkitainer supply modular units based on the same design as a shipping container frame, giving them outstanding strength and durability. The units are used to create large office and residential accommodation buildings, all over the globe.
With such a turnover and an automated production line, as we talked about earlier, margins can be low.
But if you are to have a bespoke garden room, you are going to need more that just a structure. What about insulation, double glazing, electrics, lighting, heating and plumbing?
Arkitainers modular buildings can be customised during the manufacturing process, cutting out the need for costly labour. The wall panels come with a choice of different types of insulation, so how insulated you want your insulated garden room is up to you. There is also a choice of internal finish.
You can choose where your windows go, where you want the electrics. Everything in fact, that you require, but at considerably less expense.
Arkitainer have a recommended example on their website HERE, which offers all of the above, but leaves one wall open for the addition of 6m of bifold doors. A fully glazed bi-fold opening wall to the garden can cost less than £5000.
Now consider, Arkitainers’ 6m x 5m unit is only £12,750 so even if you allowed £5000 for glazing and £2000 to have a carpenter put a nice red cedar cladding around it, you have your Bespoke garden office for less than £20,000.
Roof is included, complete with lighting
Even better, there are savings to be made still on that figure. With a great variety of sizes, maybe reduce the size; We noticed that most images of garden rooms on line are of buildings half size, or reduce the amount of floor to ceiling glass, replacing it with insulated panels from the factory. The advantage with such a tailored offering is that you can customise it to suit your budget, and still have everything made to order, and importantly, made for the very purpose you intend for it, not just converted from something else.
Check out the modular units on arkitainer.com for a selection of sizes and specifications. Also, the nice thing about the site is unlike many others, the prices are on the site. No need to telephone or email until you are ready to do so.
Arkitainer also offer free advice and services regarding materials, installation and anything else you have questions about. If you do want to talk to someone the telephone number is 020 3858 7880.
They also have flat pack versions to avoid the need for a large crane!
So there you have it, the way to get the ideal garden room, is to buy your garden room from different suppliers that have a high turnover in the thing they do best, keeping the price of each element to a minimum. That is to say, The room structure from one place, Bi-fold doors from another, cladding from another, should you require it. Many of Arkitainers’ customers are very happy with the simple choice of colours provided as standard, and have no need for cladding.
That is how you get a Garden Office or Garden anything else for Half Price.
Look out for other articles. I will be posting regularly on a variety of Modular Building and Container Architecture topics. Next Up, I shall be talking about – Planning and Permitted Development, or to put it another way… “What can I build without having to apply for planning”, but If there is something in particular you would like me to cover, just let me know.
All the best,
Matt