LAST month we spoke with Sam Bucknall, managing director of Pro Tiler Tools, about the company’s impressive ascent in the tiling industry since its launch in the late 2000s. For this continuation of our discussion, we decided to dive a little deeper into the details of Pro Tiler’s approach to some of the sector’s most modern challenges: social media and environmental sustainability, as well as how it has navigated the volatile economic swings of the 2020s so far!
A very modern origin
“To be honest,” Sam tells us, “I actually pin a lot of Pro Tiler’s early success on social media. It was a huge part of what we did.” In those early days, the former tiler would spend evenings and weekends on Facebook Messenger, chatting with customers and sorting out orders. Indeed, though it makes up a very small part of the company’s business at this point, certain customers still reach out to Sam directly online, and though it’s inconvenient, he’s always happy to help out.
While its scope is obviously limited, this method can offer some advantages over more traditional in-person or phone sales, mostly notably in how customers communicate over the platform! “It’s good fun,” Sam says. “I get to hear things I wouldn’t normally hear as well. If a customer wants to complain about something, they will message me directly on Facebook, so I actually get to hear it from the horse’s mouth.” For many directors, easy access to critical comments wouldn’t be a high priority, but for Sam it was a vital part of building a company that worked for the industry, rather than merely for profit.
This type of engagement is likely why Pro Tiler receives such a positive reception on social media, particularly on the industry’s most popular Facebook group. “Tiler’s Community is obviously huge for us,” Sam says. “I think Sam [Hoffmann]’s doing a great job running that and there’s real value in it.” In the rush of the last few years, particularly with the company’s rapid growth, says Sam, Pro Tiler has taken its foot off the gas on the social media side, but that’s something he’s hoping to change soon. We are looking to focus and re-engage a bit more, and I want to bring the freebies back in a bigger and better way.”
Getting green
Now Pro Tiler is part of Topps Group, the supplier has had to grapple with a set of new responsibilities, and the drive towards sustainability now sits near the top of the agenda. “We follow Topps on sustainability,” Sam explains, “because although we’re all separate companies in the group, we do still have the same legal and moral obligation as well as Topps to do what we can.”
The headline example of this commitment right now is an initiative to improve the sustainability of the company’s packaging. “Any packaging that’s generated by Pro Tiler, we want the plastic content to be zero. Obviously, that’s not an easy thing to do. We’ve done a lot of it already, but there’s still a bit of a journey ahead of us!”
Even at an employee level, the supplier is doing what it can to minimise its impact. For example, at Pro Tiler’s new location at Prologis Park Pineham in Northampton, the landlord offers a service which helps facilitate lift-sharing and bus services for employees, based on where they’re travelling from and their shift patterns.
And, while sustainability often garners a reputation for bogging businesses down in red tape and dragging them away from their core competencies, Sam is happily able to report that hasn’t been Pro Tiler’s experience. “We do as much as we possibly can at the minute and, yes, it creates a bit of additional work internally, but it’s not as much as you think.” The company’s sustainability committee meets once a month which is then fed back into the larger group. Thanks to its size, Topps Group has significant infrastructure in place that makes the whole process much smoother, Sam says.
In fact, even the most controversial part of sustainability – its cost, doesn’t trouble Pro Tiler too much. Particularly when it comes to reducing the plastic content in its packaging, Sam explains, the company has actually found some cost efficiencies. As governments continue to disincentivise less sustainable materials through targeted taxes and as it begins to produce plastic-free packaging at scale, Pro Tiler will only benefit further from these efficiencies.
Thriving in hard times
It’s no secret that the last few years have been tough on businesses, and the tiling industry has struggled as much as any other. Pro Tiler has continued to thrive and grow, however, and according to Sam this resilience can be attributed to three factors. The first is its service level, with the headline offering in this department being the company’s 9:00pm cut off for next-day delivery, an offering unmatched by any other supplier on the market, according to the managing director. The second element is its wide product range, with an offering of 7000 product lines across categories as diverse as cutters to adhesives to matting to backerboards.
The final factor is the biggest, in Sam’s opinion, and that’s the staff. The managing director relays a story of a recent new hire, who remarked after a few days that everyone in the building walked around with a smile on their face. “That’s something we’re really proud of,” Sam says. “I love coming into work, I love what I do, and I love the staff.”
This focus on culture is a large part of why Pro Tiler took home the award for Best Supply & Service for the third year running at the most recent TTA Awards, held at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole in May. Of all the awards it could win, Supply & Service is the most important to Pro Tiler, Sam says. “If I could only ever win one award, it’s always that.” After hearing the story of how the managing director personally delivered an underfloor heating kit to a customer on Christmas eve – with his family already in the car – it’s not too hard to believe him!
“And don’t get me wrong,” he concludes. “We are far from perfect. It’s impossible to be perfect, we just try to do everything we can while offering the services at a fair price to the customer.”
www.protilertools.co.uk
