Derek Barrett, founder of Derek Barrett Design Limited, joins The Build Up to share his journey in bespoke furniture making and how social media transformed his business. Starting with a foundation course in Ireland and earning a BA in furniture design, Derek took an unconventional path into cabinetmaking. His early experiences managing large projects taught him valuable lessons about efficiency, investment in the right tools, and running a streamlined workshop.

In this conversation, Derek opens up about how Instagram became a game-changer for his brand. A single viral post reaching over 20 million views shifted the way he approached digital marketing, helping him connect with a wider audience and attract new clients. He reflects on the challenges of maintaining engagement, the importance of authenticity, and the balance between showcasing craftsmanship and growing a business online.

Listen now and don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review!

Hello and welcome to The Buildup. This is the podcast for marketing

in the construction industry. I'm

Dan, the creative director at Dissident. We've been working with construction brands for

a number of years. It's an exciting and rapidly evolving industry, and

that's why we created a podcast dedicated to the weird and wonderful world

of construction marketing. I'll be speaking to leading brands, other agencies,

creatives, influencers, and startups. This is the

resource I wish we had when we first started out in the industry. Thank

you for being here and welcome to The Builder. Welcome

to The Buildup. I'm Dan, the Creative Director at Dissonant. We're a social first

creative agency that works with construction brands to create hard hitting

content and social media marketing. Yes, I did it, Key.

And today I'm joined by Derek Barrett. Thank

All the way from, where was it again? High Wycombe. High Wycombe. Yeah, up in Hampshire.

It turns out there's like almost no one locally that

is a viable guest, apart from who we've got

on a little bit later on, Scott DIY. Thank you so

much for being here. I really appreciate it. Just a quick shout out

to Key, because he's back on the Keyland cam, he's back from his cruise.

You got suited and booted, and I'm right in saying you were the youngest person

on that cruise as well. Yeah, pretty much. We

got some cracking, we got, we did some podcasts for one of our

clients this week and there was, we

had the Keelan cam on for no reason. There

was no point in having it on because that wasn't a feature but it just, it was there

so we had it on. And there was like so many great shots of

him yawning and just not being, not being interested. So

I'm going to try and build some sort of like highlight

reel of just Keelan just being like, coming up really close to

the camera like falling asleep. I like that. Absolutely brilliant. I've

gone off topic there. Derek, thank you so much for coming. For the

people who perhaps don't know who you are at this point, could you give us a little introduction

Yeah, no problem. My name is Derek Barrett. My company is Derek

Barrett Design Limited. We set it

up back in 2017. And yeah, we make

bespoke furniture, freestanding, not as much. We do

do freestanding furniture, but anything cabinet related will

do it. So a lot of residential more so than

commercial. So, home bars, mostly

wardrobes, walk-in wardrobes, wow factor, understair storages,

things like that. So, that's mainly what we kind of work

on. How did you get into kind of that area? Would you

call it carpentry joinery? No, you see, this is the thing, I don't class them as either. I

class myself as a cabinetmaker. So, I've come in slightly

different to maybe a lot of the people, usually a

joiner or chippy, or they worked on a building site and they've been

asked to do a wardrobe. And before they knew it, they're like, we like doing this

side of the things, cleaner and blah, blah, blah. And then they

become a furniture maker and they make fitted furniture. So I've

come in from a different, um, avenue. So I did a year after,

so I'm dyslexic. So in Ireland, uh, we did a year in

Galway, uh, called a feet tack level course, which was back

in, my God, now I'm going back, 2001. And it

was just a foundation level course of doing furniture,

touching on restoration, hand cut joints and

making furniture. And then it was a one year course. You

could go on to college in Ireland, but there was very few courses in

Ireland doing it. So we looked into over in Britain and

there was one in Scotland and one down south in Buckinghamshire. Uh,

we, we found out there was a girl that had done our course in Buckinghamshire. So

we organized an interview and before we knew it, um, we

got the interview. I got accepted, but not for 2002 for

2003. So I took a break and went to Canada, enjoyed myself and in Canada for

nearly a year, worked in a sports shop and did, um, and then always

said, if it didn't work out, I'm going back to Canada. Um, but

started the, I did a university degree course. I got a BA honors degree in

furniture, um, in Buckinghamshire, uh,

doing, um, the furniture and graduated in

2006 and then went into working for the real world

as they would say. But at that stage I was probably, I don't know, 22. 23. I

did that for a little while. At the time, the building boom was in

Ireland and all that kind of stuff. So decided to move back

to Ireland and got a job with a furniture maker, which

was slightly different. It's not in Ireland. There is a bespoke,

but you'd want to be near the cities, go to Dublin, things like that. But

I was in the country. And so I

felt I did it for, did a big project in Ireland, decided to

move back to England in 2010. And then ended up

going back into employment and stuff. So I had a company, yeah, I

set up a company in 2007 and

ran it for three years and decided to close it and move to England. So

I think it was the best decision I ever did because I was too young, I felt, when

I set up that company. And what

I know now, I hadn't a clue back then when I was running a limited, we were doing

a half a million pound project in a hotel because what was happening in Ireland,

they were pumping so much money into tourism rather

than the the housing estates and stuff, which were popping

off left, right and center. The government were like, if the builder can put in a

million pound and build a four star hotel, we'll give you

a million pounds. So all the builders were like, oh, I'm going to build a hotel now. And

we, we knew one of the builders. And before we knew it, we

were told we were going in to talk about a reception desk and ended up getting the whole

contract at 22 years old. And it was, yeah,

stressful. So that's the way I look at things now. So when I get like a

six, seven bedroom house, I go, well, I've just done 44 bedrooms. And

it's easy. Like, you're never going to be as stressed as you were then. So

I kept at it, worked my way up in different companies. And

yeah, we ended up making the leap after being a

workshop manager at a company. I always did stuff on the side and

the customers would always say, look, why don't you do this for yourself?

And it was before my second one. born, like child was on

the way. And I was like, if I don't do it now, I'll never do it. I can do what I'm doing now when

I'm 50, 55. Uh, that's the way I looked at it. And I said, look,

give it a couple of years, see, let's see how it gets on. But I

always pride myself in my fitting skills and how fast I fit. And

people used to know, there was a lot of companies out there that would go, how do

you do this so quickly and clean and all that. And

so I thought maybe my service would be. the fitting side of

things and that. And I was

going to set that up as a fitting option for companies, high-end bespoke companies.

You can hire me, I'll come and fit your furniture. And but

then it just grew into my own business. Amazing. From there, like I just

do my own stuff and that. So I never really had to go down that avenue, which was great.

Do you find that, because you mentioned, I think, did

Do you feel like having that kind of experience is

what you need to make a quick go, a

quick success out of a business? And I know that when

I was early in my career as a freelancer, well, I

worked in a couple of studios before I went to and built my

own thing up. I remember coming out of university just being

a photographer, which is sort of my background. You

know, I wouldn't have ever been able to go into like freelancing and owning

my own business from that point. But as soon as I worked my way up to being

a studio manager, that was that was the

thing, because I had so many other bits of experience that I could go like,

I think I heard one of your podcasts, you were saying something about that. And I think

it was very similar to you. because I said it as it was. And that

was the problem. I was, on paper, I was a bad workshop

manager because if you messed up, I told you you messed up and that

Yeah, I'm notorious for my foul mouth. So a lot of my team, especially

Kind of. I'm the same. And I haven't, I was just starting an apprentice and

stuff. And I'm always been told by the, you can't do this, you can't do that. But

that's what it was like. And I, I was never trained in it. I was just, I

went from a, head cabinet maker to now being a workshop manager

and then thrown in the deep end and having to, or

like now start to worry about has the stock is up

to date, is everything up to date and that without any training whatsoever. But

what it did do is it gave me some of the principles and the guides to

when I set up my, like when I set up in 2017, I felt like I

knew my plan, how I want to get this efficient and the

workshop running smoothly and that. And that's what

we've been working at. And through Instagram, it's shown over the

years because a lot of people, I get messages a lot of the time going,

you've grown so quickly and fast. And it's just about investing

in the right machines at the right times and stuff like that. It's

And, you know, we talk about this a lot in in

what we do. The efficiency

is where the profit comes from. The creativity is

the thing that we do, but the efficiency, how you can get that

creativity to that customer in the quickest time

possible, that's the most efficient and with the least

amount of waste in terms of admin time, that's where

your profit comes from. A lot of that is investment in

Absolutely. Like we, I've always had a, so

from day one, I've always had a pallet stacker. So the sheets come

in onto the rack and then you would use the pallet stacker to

remove the mouse. You're not hurting your back bending over all that. So

had a pump one at the beginning, invested in a stand on one and now

have a side forklift and that. where a lot of people wouldn't even

consider investing in those. But at the end of the day, your back is

everything if your back goes. So that's the start. So then

we moved into the edge band, which has

been a game changer. I think it was 2019 I did that jump. And

that was, I call it like printing money. It's so, you've turned a

day's work into 15 minutes and you're literally ready to build it

after it's edged, where you would have a whole day set aside just

to use the contour or the old fashioned

iron and stuff like, but trying to explain that

to people that that is, probably the two most biggest, the edge

band are a decent saw and that. And then we

then moved on to, we have a couple of solid wood machines, which we use

not as often. And then we invested in

a vertical CNC, which was last year

with Homag. And that was, that speeded up the process for

the time consuming bits like shell pins, hinge holes, making

up jigs and stuff like that. I

don't know if it was the right decision. It's the only

thing I look back on and go, should

I, is it actually cost, like, as

a big, so it's something I look back on and I go, I don't know

if I made the right decision, because it is a big outgoing, like

it's the, like, HOMAG is the Rolls Royce of the CNC world

and stuff, but I'm still

very hands on kind of thing and that, and I think we can, We

just can't make a singing dancer, not computer illiterate, as you would say. And

I feel like you have the right people, you could, you could make that do

But because, uh, we have that a lot in, in, in, you know, we

have tons of pieces of, of, of software and

pipeline systems and, um, team, uh, project

management systems. And I'm like, we spend hundreds and hundreds of

pounds a month on these kind of pieces of software that make us more

efficient. And we probably only use about 7% of their ability.

And like, jeez, we could, we just need someone to come in and implement

I feel like there's all these new apps I see a lot of people on

Instagram promoting, PowerApp and Tradeify and

all this stuff. But it's like, I know I'll invest in it

and then I won't use half it or But like you said, if someone came around

and sat you down and literally went through you, it

would make a such a big difference to, to, to, cause

I do need, and that is something I need to improve on is the invoicing. We're

still very old school. We're still say PDF on Word and stuff.

It's what we know. Um, like even coming down to SketchUp and

stuff where we do our drawings, we're still, I can draw very

quickly, but I draw in a 2d form and pull to life. So it's

always drawn to scale. but I don't group and component and

do what other people do, then that can press send to a

cut list optimizer and it automatically does it. Where I find

I can do the drawings really quickly, but then I spend my time then doing

the cut list myself, which I personally feel you

can pick up any errors when you're doing it by

yourself, where if you accidentally draw a line the wrong place on

the SketchUp, doesn't look it and you've imported it, you've just cut a piece of

material. That's the SketchUp. And the computer's not done anything wrong, it's

I think at some point that a process has got to feel right as

well, hasn't it? You know, I think that there are, there are certain elements of a business where

you think, yes, I could, I could implement this and it'll be more efficient, but

it doesn't feel right. It just, this isn't the way I want to do it.

I think at some point, eventually you have to go, well, I'm just going to not do that process

That's it. And I've tried. I'm all for trying things.

And a lot of people get stuck in their ways in our industry. And

they're like, we just do it this way. And that's the only thing. And I

never want to say you're doing it the wrong way. If it works, it works kind of

thing. So I found that We've

tried. We work with Lamello. We have an

ambassadorship with them and we use a lot of their fixings. But

what we found was we went down the route of Lamello and our drawer boxes. We

can run them on our CNC. We thought this will make our training

easier for the staff because I can just put it in, press play, and it comes out

the other side, done. But then it comes down to cost. And

then you're like, well, these are about 80p to a pound of fixin. We

got four of these per drawer. We've added four pound onto each drawer.

We've got an average of four to eight drawers per job. Where

when the Craig, the pocket holes grew, was it actually Less

strong? No. Was it more complicated? The only thing was

actually holding it and screwing it together. But once you've mastered that, it

was a lot quicker, a lot faster and a lot cheaper to build. And

you still got the same structure, strength and stuff. So we've gone

from doing that to doing this to realize, and let's go back. Because

when I worked at these other companies, they used to overcomplicate things

so much in the manufacturing of building a box. At the end of the day, all we do

is we build boxes. We're just screwing boxes together. We

were doing ones where you put three biscuits into it, you were countersinking it,

then you were going in with a pilot and then in with a fiber 50 screw.

So that process, we've gone down to three screws now in the

side, and you can't tell me that's less stronger than what

it was before. Oh, but the biscuits hold it better. I'm like, if

you can't hold two bits of material together, you're in the wrong business kind

of thing. It was like one time I saw a drill online which had a digital

level. And it literally, as you're holding it, the green dot would

float around until you're like, that's how you're doing it. If you can't hold

a drill straight. And the amount of people we get in our workshop that cannot

hold a drill straight is mind blowing. And you think it's such

a simple thing and you've got screws going this way, screws going that

way. And you're like, but to us it's easy, but

It's muscle memory, isn't it? Yeah, it's like, it's so funny,

because we have to sort of be like, every now and again, we have

to be models in our own productions, don't we, Key? And the

amount of times we screw up, because we're just like, We're

just, we're not used to holding these tools. And, and

it's like, you've got to do like four or five different takes until you get it right.

Because you just like, you know, you can see, you can see the outtakes, like

me or Keelan have gone to like screw something and she's like, what? And you're like, damn.

And it's one of those things that you want, you want, when you get like a close up of like a screw going

in, you want it to be perfect. And it just go in.

And even to the point where, like, we're

getting We've got quite a lot of big brands

on the books at the moment, and we've worked in the construction industry for,

I don't know, let's say five years in total. So

we're getting very familiar with specific processes and specific things.

Up until the other day, someone, it was actually Werner, wasn't

it, actually said, you know, you've got the wrong

drill. And I got this Bosch green, uh,

drill, um, uh, like a little combi drill. And

I'm like, this is the one I paid a lot of money for this. It seemed, it seemed like, you know, it

seemed like it was, it was the right fit. I'm like, I'll buy this and this will be great. And

And I'm like, damn, I didn't know. I've been using it in so many productions, but

it wasn't, we did have a Ryobi before then. So not, not, no

Yeah, it's, it's, it's a cheaper route, but like my workshop, I've got about

four or five Ryobi drills just to do a simple process.

Like, why am I going to spend £300 on a drill that just does one little thing?

Riobi is Milwaukee. Milwaukee, yeah, this is it. I love saying

So you can't throw shade on them too much, can you? It's like Fiat and Ferrari. Yeah.

I think the problem that I had, because if you go back far

enough, there is content of me putting up, like doing

DIY projects for our brands with

Riobi. And the problem was it was just, it stuck out like a sore thumb. As

soon as you saw the Riobi drill, you couldn't focus on anything else because of

I had a picture I remember years ago I put up on a story and it had

a marquee put up and it had my

tower stack of Festool, my trolley

Festool, my Festool, the MFT, and

then the pen gun, Ryobi. And everyone just

talked about that. that one thing. And I'm like, you realize

that like the rest of the stuff you're not even saying, but you're slagging me just

because at the end of the day it did the same job. And that's the way I always say

about these, these brands and that there, there's, there's, yeah, there's reliability and

stuff. But at the end of the day, it's not necessarily the

tool, it's the blade. It's like a plunge saw is a

plunge saw, but if the blade isn't a good blade, it's still doing, it's

a spin and water at the end of the day. So there is money to be saved. People

starting out don't have to go down the massive expensive

route, but there's the things with the perks with now

with Merca and Festool is, is the, they'll,

Which is a massive that does do all to Makita. And I don't think

Milwaukee, as far as I know, are doing anything like that. So

if you've got a thousand pound chops or twelve, fifteen hundred pound chops, so that's

something like a hundred pound and they'll replace it for you if it gets stolen. And

that's with no insurance or nothing, just registered with them and stuff.

And I've just heard I've just been with Makita And

they're doing the same. They said, it might sound like we're copying Festool, but

I was like, who cares? You're still offering it. Like that would make me now

But this is the thing. It's like, it's like the first person who ever came up with insurance and

then someone else goes, well, we're going to do the same thing. It's kind of like, it's, it's

But it's Instagram. Everyone's like, it's not the Derek Barrett way. It's a lot of

just people say, oh, that's a Derek Barrett trolley or Derek Barrett. I've

seen it somewhere. It's not, it's just that I may be the first person that you've seen

it. And people slag you for that. But it's something, everything's

There's no new ideas. No, no. But

I mean, speaking about, speaking about social media, Which

is kind of the reason why I brought you on this Derek, I

thought it was a really important thing. We've had guests on here from in-house

in big brands, other agencies, content creators,

who you class to be influencers. And

I put a post out on Dissident Socials the other day. And I

said, who's doing incredibly well on social

media, but not to gain recognition from

necessarily their fellow tradespeople and craftsmen, or

to get recognition from the brands, who's doing it to actually to

promote the work that they do for their customers. And

I had at least a few people mentioned your name, I was familiar with

your work anyway. And so

now, this was the big thing. I'm, I'm,

I'm constantly having communication because I work kind of

brand side as a marketer and as a creative with

influencers who are looking to do pay promotions with other

brands and stuff. I really love that. And

so when I look at their social media presence, for the most part, they're

not really marketing towards their customers. And quite often, they're

slacking off their customers, which is hilarious. I have seen that.

And I think that's brilliant, because that's not what their social media presence is

for. But I got the impression your social media presence is

primarily to show the work that you

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, because we I

always found that some of our workshop videos do better than

some of the finished pictures and stuff like that, because what customers,

they see the whole thing, like they see from either a site visit, and then

the customer then can watch your stories and see the furniture being cut,

see it going up, see it in its raw form, and then it comes down,

gets sanded, gets sprayed. We have got in-house spraying in

our workshop, but it's, we rent that space out to a

sprayer. So that's why you don't see a huge amount of the spraying

happening because it's not my content. Um, uh,

but it's all done in-house, uh, and then they get to see, um,

like I said, we, we were notorious for getting in and

getting out. We're all about get as much of the work done in the workshop as

possible and then get into customers. So I don't want to be one of these people that's

in a customer's house for a week. I just want to get in one day and

get back out. Yeah, we are doing bigger projects now, which

have anything between three to six

rooms, which we do have to give a little bit more time. But

we, we did a job not far from here last Christmas. It

was a big job. It was 17 projects in one house and

it was in Utah. And that I loved it.

I've just built off the energy. Like I was I was doing stupid o'clock

nights and stuff. But we couldn't keep doing

that. We couldn't do that continuously. And I know my staff probably wouldn't

hang around if we did that. But I drive

off it sometimes. But like I said, this year, I feel like I've took a

little bit of a backseat, booked more holidays and

had stuff to look forward to. So we were still paying

wages and rent and the electric's gone up now, which is

one thing we're looking at. We need to be wary of and stuff like that. But.

I've still survived the year and still have money in

the bank where I feel like the last year

we, we felt like we had more money, but then we got hit with corporation and

it's all that kind of stuff. So I got a big corporation coming up in January. I've

just been paid a big quarter and you just sometimes ask yourself, what

am I? I'm just a glorified tax collector. That's it.

Uh, yeah. I think you got to be. to make any

real decent money in a clever way, you've got to

do some pretty shady tactics a lot of the time, haven't you? And I'm not familiar

My accountant, I kind of sometimes wish he would say something, but they're so

like, they're like, why are you telling me stuff? And April,

and you could have told me I could have bought something the month before and it would have

helped. But just advice. I'm not saying shady, but like if you're going to

buy a van, buy it in this time of the year and stuff and plan. Tell

their clients now to be planning the next three months,

rather than say it a month in advance. I remember the first time

getting hit with the car. Because what happened was I spoke to a builder when I set up

the company and I said to him, I said, look, I'm going out on my own. What should I do?

Should I go as a sole trader or a limited company? And he said, look, the

bracket for limited was like, or not limited, VAT registered, 80,000, I

don't know, something like that. And he said, like a kitchen, a

good water, like it's only three or four of them before, you know, you're already at that. So

I said, right, I'm just going to go limited from day one. And that's the best thing I

think I could have done because I got used to being limited.

and the VAT and everything. And all my customers got used to

that from day one, where I find a lot of people go sole trader

and then they, then they have to go limited and then into our

VAT register and then limited and their customers are used to the prices and

then you're going back to them and then it ends up on cash talking and stuff. And

I, I, to be honest, I have to say in the seven years I

had thought I was going to get a load of those cash, cash, because that's a bit like that

in Ireland. A lot of like, oh, can you do for cash? Where this

country, they just respect it. We've got to pay our tax. We've got to pay our VAT kind

of thing. And I could say only probably one hand, there

was probably a conversation never had. But one thing, you can't get

rid of it. You can't use it. You can't use it. I can't even go

to Greg's now and buy with a £50 note and buy something. They won't accept it

and stuff. And it's impossible to sometimes. Last time I

I was just because I don't, although recently, this is nothing

to do with the podcast, to be fair. I'm going to say it anyway. I only

became an adult recently and got a wallet. Because

I haven't had a wallet in like, I don't know, I feel like since I

was a kid, but I will have had one. I think my last wallet was like a Quicksilver or

something like that. But I've only recently got

a wallet. But before then, I just I never had cash. And

everything was on my phone. My cards were kind of like attached to my phone and

stuff like that. Last time I had some cash, it was to go and pay for like a tattoo. and

had it in my pocket, went to I think WH Smiths to get

some water, got something out of my pocket and just all

that cash just went on the floor. And that's like, so

I hate it. I hate carrying it around. It's a nightmare. But

going back to the social media side of things though. loads

of experience, set up on your own, doing great. At

what point did social media become a big, a thing for you? Yeah.

So like when I started out in the airport in

2017, I went with Checkitrade. So I was on Checkitrade. back

when it was good. It was owned by Check and Trade before they sold

out. And the thing with Check and Trade, I think it's great for electricians and

plumbers because it's shorter lead times. Furniture

makers, we have longer lead times and stuff like that. So it wasn't beneficial after

a year. So, but by that time I had a good few jobs

lined up. One was in Cockfosters and a woman at this job in Cockfosters said,

look, you need to get yourself on Instagram. And it's about this week, I think seven years ago,

I only started Instagram. And back then, of course, you had a couple of

personal pages that would forget your password and you'd get locked out when

you set up another account. So I said, right, I'm going to set one up,

set it up. And I just kept plugging at it and posting. And

then over the year, I found out that I figured out

that stories are worth more than the posts. Because if

you're not consistent on the stories, you're not going to come up

in them top bubbles. So you need to be coming in the top five, six bubbles at

the top of any page. Because no one's going to go, 10 bubbles

down. They're just going to go on their Instagram, click on the first few, watch a few stories and,

uh, and that's it. So if you're consistent, you'll always

be coming up if they're regularly watching. Um, so

my views can vary quite a lot, uh, daily. And I, even when

I'm on holidays, I'll always, if there's only one, I'll repost

something in the stories just to keep that current. Um, so

stories was a big thing. I remember hitting 1500 I

don't know, was it over a year? And then I remember doing a giveaway at 5000. But

it took me three years to get to 10,000. So people

think it happened overnight. And then I kept at it and at it

and it gradually kept building, building up to about 50,000 it

was. And that was my target for that year. And around August,

I did a post that went viral. I

think I went. Oh, my God. 9 million,

20, 20 million, 20.4 million views on

just an understairs wine storage with remote control glass. So I

saw that one. Yeah, that one just blew up. And my Instagram,

I've literally a picture of my watch and it's just like for

literally five or six days solid because it went all over the world. I was getting

inquiries from where is your showroom in New York? Can you do work

in Dubai? I'm like, you're telling me you can't make four cross boxes and

stuff. And but literally, yeah. And overnight,

like within two weeks, I probably went close to

100,000. In two weeks, it was from from around 50. And,

and then I get in the comments. And yeah, there was a lot of because

what was happening was, you know, these home pages, they they,

they, they ask you, do you want to put, pay us, we'll put

it on our page. They were already just using it. They weren't even asking me

for permission. I had, um, Ladbible and a few fix and

stuff messaged me and that, um, I even signed something

with Ladbible, but I never seen anything from them and that. But, um,

I think if I, If I knew, if I felt like I did it

now, I'd know how to market it a lot better. And I could

probably, because that's the problem with Instagram. It's going 20 million. There's people

out there with loads of views of silly little tricks of hammering

a bit of four into glue. Everyone's doing it and getting 14 million

and that. But the, you don't

get paid. And that's the problem with that on Facebook. And

I only learned that in the last couple of years. Like my Facebook followings, I

think two and a half thousand. You see when it's weird because

on Facebook, you've got your number of Facebook and then you got a hundred, I'm

nearly 145,000, two and a half thousand. This is like such

a contradiction. But,

but you do get paid for paid ads and stuff through Facebook, which I've

talked to like James Stone dresser and a few people on that. It's

meant to be the one, isn't it? It's the one that none of us want to be on, but actually it's the one

that it does generate. And some people get loads of work from Facebook, but I've never

ended up generating it or that. And then next

year, I'm, I was just talking there, I was, I'm hoping to do

a little bit more. I've, we've took on the whole building now. So we've got

like a room like this, we've got a room that we do hand finish and

Rubio and that, but it's, it's a dry, dust free room. And

I'm trying to do it make it look kind of nice and then maybe do

it as a backdrop for some YouTube videos and stuff and explaining. Because

I've just signed up, I'm working with a light company now and

that's going to be exciting. And we've come up

with a good contract for that. And I want to start doing tutorials and

teaching people how to do LEDs and where they can buy it and how

So, um, specifically aimed at trades or for that would that be more

Yeah. They've always been like a kitchen, but they want to get more

into the furniture industry for buying it. Um, but

going back, like I said, it took me three years to get to 10,000. Uh, then

I did that, um, in 2022, it

jumped up and then the comments were like, Oh yeah, watch this. It's going to drop down

now. You're going to lose about doing. And that was my goal was to

never let it drop. And I used that as my momentum and

I got up to 110, got up to 120, 130. And

then I got to one, my goal of this year was to get to 145. And

my God, it's been hard work. I've been stuck at that 144 and

I've been up within a hundred of it. And then I've

nearly lost about 900 and I've gone back up to

700. And it's just the line, I was talking to Scott DOI about

this today. the algorithms, everything's changed. What

was working so many years ago isn't working now. I don't

know if it's blanket bands or you're using, definitely down to the

music can be a massive thing. So I've just done a really nice walk

in wardrobe and I think I may have used a song that

was kind of like, subtle kind of nice, whatever,

but it's one that was probably done a year ago or something. It's

literally done 2000. Like I, I, I class

anything under 10,000 as bad. Uh, and views. Yeah.

And this is like stuck around two eight or my last post

of just a, about a momentum, like a motivational one

is like 30,000 and stuff. Uh, But again, you

could get like 100,000 views and then you go on the insights and

you literally generated no followers. Yes. But you're getting loads of

views. So the views won't mean F all unless you

you're generating the followers. But for me, I

would say three quarters of my following are trades. So I

do a lot of share, a lot of tips, a lot of tricks and stuff. But it's those percentage

that are clients that is

the reason I'm doing what I'm doing. I'm doing what I love and I'm getting the right

clientele that usually comes to

me and go, look, we want to work with you. It's just if your timings are going to

work for our build or whatever. And what I find is the more you put

out there, I think one of the best things you could do is a Q&A. And

because the number one, number one questions you get in a Q&A is like, oh,

what's your lead time at the moment? And then before you know it, you say like five, six

months, you see your phone light up because they're like, oh,

I had already met up on mine. We were working with you, but we haven't actually reached out to you.

And our build is finishing March. So we need to be letting you know

now. And it gives them that kick to give you that call. And

last night we just had a big job moved in January. Um,

which actually leaves us quite a little bit blank for January. And I'm like to

my wife, I was like, Oh God. So I just put up a post going, we've just had

a slot come up in January and I've had six calls already today. But

that's the power you got. People are watching you that want to use you, but

That's really exciting. It's great

that you've got the massive lead times and it's amazing that

you can keep this kind of momentum going. In

terms of the viral posts, which I've seen, it is really incredible. I

think it's pinned at the top of your Instagram, isn't it? So it's really cool. Go

and check that out if you haven't seen it before. Was that, was

that, was that a one-time thing? Like from, from there, were there

Did it get... So what, what was the main thing on that was probably nothing to

do with me. Yeah. It was the remote control glass, which was done

by a company called, I think the Office Glass People down in London. I

was just fortunate that I had done the work inside and

I did the video. Like the video that went viral wasn't even finished. There

was a gap above the door. But that's what happened. It went viral because

people had like, oh, he has two remote controls in his hand and

the spindles on the stairs are not great. And I'm like, there's nothing to do with

what I've done. But they caused controversy. And that's what

like TikTok and things do. But then I went and posted a

video of it all finished and that and it probably got 60,000, 70,000. Like

it just, it was one of those things. The music was right at the right time. I hadn't

planned it. It was just a quick video. And it's just one of the things, sometimes

overthinking something is pointless. Just do it. And that's why we

say it either work or it won't work. So spell a mistake. You

say something slightly wrong. Don't, don't re-record it. Just post it

We were talking off air about the fact that we'd had

a conversation about the fact that I was trying to

get verified. I was trying to get dissed and verified and I did it kind

of in the wrong way where I sort of verified it as an individual rather

than a business. So it ended up changing to Daniel Moore and

having my face on it, which I didn't want, even though I've kind of become the face of diss, which

I didn't intend to be. So

we were trying to figure out kind of like, sort

of doing that kind of thing. Why have I got into this topic? What were we talking about

just then, Derek? You'd mentioned

the video, you didn't, oh, so yeah, sorry, the

spelling mistake thing. When I came out of

that, I was like, I managed to get unverified

so I can change it back to Disson and take my face off the bloody profile. So

I had to change the name back to Disson, I spelled it

wrong. And then I was

like, and Ayesha, our marketing manager, said you

spelled this wrong, you need to change it. So I tried to change it

and it's like, you can't change it in the next two weeks. I'm like, bloody hell,

I can't do anything right with this, with this profile. So I just had to take

the name off. It was like, you've got two options, you can either leave it,

or you could just have no name on Instagram. So I've got no, we've

got no name for two weeks. And But in so were

there certain things that you learned that you've learned through that post

which sounds like it was like a one-off fluke everything was kind of right there was all

the right elements are there but there was I imagine there wasn't an intention to be

In your sort of experience since then before then

and after Are there certain things that

That work better than others? Yeah, so there's, you

definitely see, looking through my page, you'll see the

ones that hit like close to a million or are

always like secret doors, hidden doors, smart

things like pull out things that you wouldn't expect to pull

out from certain places and that. And that's why customers sometimes come

to me and stuff is like we had one where we

did a job in Harrogate and they had an under stairs and

they had a dead space that would happen under the stairs because

we had drawers coming out underneath the angle. And then I was like, well, let's do

a pullout rather than put a wire basket. And so that was kind

of the theory. Like you could put like a kitchen pullout thing. I was like, why don't

I make it? So just put ball bearings, have that drawer came out,

went over and these came over. Then you had two drawers come out and

that did really well. And then we do a lot where the back of

alcove units, not alcove, loft wardrobes, so

the ceiling goes down quite a bit, there's no point going in

too far with the wardrobe because you'd have no height. So

you bring the wardrobe forward but then the back of the wardrobe just slides and

a simple little thing like a sliding wardrobe runner, that's

all it is, but it sits flat against. So one security And

then you get the negative post going, oh, you take all the clothes out to get it. I'm

like, yeah, but how often do you take your Christmas decorations down? How

often do you go on holidays? Fair do to you if you go every week. But the

suitcases you're not using, put them in there. And then you just

know it's a matter of take a few clothes out, get your fluff out. And that's

easier than going into the loft. Because a lot of houses nowadays, you are noticing

they're getting less and less loft space because they're going into

the roof with the plaster and all that. So they're actually losing a lot of

storage. So Um, I enjoy, I

enjoy stuff like that. Enjoy, um, challenging and coming

up with ideas of, um, especially like space saving thing.

We did a really cool one with a, a bed, um, that

turned completely round. That was a shelving unit on the other side and

that did really well as well. But yeah, things that are like house,

uh, secret storages and stuff like that, they always do well. A

shaker wardrobe's a shaker. That's what I always say to people. a shaker wardrobe

is a shaker wardrobe. It doesn't matter if it's a five piece door, if it's plant

on, if it's foil wrapped, it's going to look the same in a photograph. But when

we got married, I said to my wife, I said, look, why are we buying

loads of real flowers for them to dye? And I was like, well, I'm just going to buy a

load of silk flowers and have them on the thing and we can sell them. And

you don't smell a flower in a photograph, like flowers and stuff. So

it's just like, just if it looks the part and does the

part and it's not going to fall apart kind of thing, why not try

But the, so the, the, what you're, what, what you're

sort of saying here is the, the, the viral

nature of the stuff that you've done that's been really successful. It

isn't about a particular technique in terms of, how you've created

the post and, or a, or a trend is very much the

Yeah, you're showing, at the end of the day, you're showing other

people to, to, to mirror the same thing. Like, well, if

you're the way I look at it going, if you're one of the first or

got the, like, there's nothing I worked in a

company, there was a trolley at this company and we ended up making,

I had a template of it and I carried it on and I met 12 of

them in my workshop and they went literally everywhere. I

can guarantee you, you go to any furniture workshop, I can pretty

much 80% guarantee they'll have that design, that trolley. But

it's become known as the Derek Barrett trolley. It's not my design,

but it's where they're seeing it. just people making it

and then going inspired by Derek Barrett or we've got a

Derek Barrett trolley. Then I, and I say, that's the one thing I say to a

lot of people is tag and tag

everything, at everything and tag everything in every post. You can pull them tags

off if you don't want to fill it up with tags. You can slide them off and they

still stay on it. So if you got a DeWalt or Makita, tag DeWalt,

tag Makita, whatever, slide it off if you want. Then if Makita go

and repost it, they've got more, you've got 500 followers,

they've got 30,000 followers. There's 30,000 people that may see

your workshop and go, that's an actual nice workshop, I'm going to follow him. And

before you know it, where I see all these posts and there's no tags on

them and I just think it's a waste. But going

back to Yeah. And

then one other point I wanted to make was people say

I don't have time to do pop stories and take pictures

and stories. But what I always say is take pictures through the day. But

don't you don't need to be this person that's posting at 10 o'clock posting at

12 o'clock. Also, it's better if you're on a site and

you turn up and you're there at eight o'clock. You take a picture at

eight o'clock in the room and then you take a picture of it

being built, take a picture of you putting some LEDs in, take a picture of the

end and then do a real But post all

those pictures at 6, 7 o'clock, 8 o'clock in the evening. And

put the time. You can click the time. It'll always remember the time it was taken. So

you're not lying. So you're showing that we did do this in the day. But

then that'll run from 7 o'clock till 7 o'clock the next day.

So you pretty much get two days of views where if

someone posted staggered pictures through the day, by

1 o'clock the next day, two pictures are gone. to make sense. And

no one's going to follow a story. So they want to see, oh, oh,

Really nice. Genius. Yeah. Just simple. You create almost like your own, like,

Yeah. Post everything at one, one five minute slot or whatever. And

then there's loads of little, skip, skip, skip, skip. But it's

just, and that doesn't take, 15 minutes.

I say like I go home, I park outside the house and I'll do 20 minutes in the

van before I go up to the house, the kids and stuff. And or

before I leave the workshop, I'll just sit there and I'll do all

my posts and then it's done for the day. But try not to let one

lapse and then have nothing there. Yeah, that's the key thing. Trying

That's really cool. It's interesting. It's very similar to how there'll be

certain times where we want to post something. on the

fly because we've got the time but a lot of time if especially if we're on like a skeleton

crew on a particular production and a

lot of the time we're shooting our behind the scenes content on

our cameras like on our pro gear so we're not kind of

like pulling that off the off the camera to go to a phone

to post like the same day it's gonna it's gonna happen at some stage over

the next month but that's not a big deal but the stories uh

it's very much like if we're on a production that's on

location. Um, if it's, uh, if it's for

instance, if it's me and Molly on this particular production, um, I'm

just like WhatsApp all of the stuff that I've shot. She's got all

the stuff that she shot. I've watched a WhatsApp to her. She's

going to edit them and put them on the stories on the, on the drive home. You don't want to

So if you post it, you're driving to Redden with Molly to do

a video at eight, seven in the morning. And

then you post another one at 11. People are

going, well, I'm waiting now till 11. I'm going to forget about it and never going to

go back. But if you post it all together, then it's a story. Oh, that was

when they were, oh, they write. Oh, they did. Oh, they're already on their way back at

six o'clock. They've done really well. They've edited it and they've done all the photographing. That's

That's a really good tactic. I like that. And again, time saving, isn't

it? You know what I mean? No one can be on the ball all the time. So if you could

just put in these kind of systems where it just becomes

automatic, you know, just to kind of do that kind of thing. So let's

take it back. So you've gone, you've done incredibly well off this, first

of all, to get to the point where you can make a post viral. I

guarantee you if you hadn't have already built up that great following it

wouldn't have been anywhere near as successful. You've got to put that work in

initially to get the right people to share it at the right

times and that kind of thing. So you've done incredibly well at this and

you're progressing, you've practically doubled your your

followers in that period of time. Did that make a big difference to

Yeah. So I feel that I became more

known for understairs wine storage and stuff, which

to be honest is So we had a lot of people asking

us, because that glass is not cheap. So like you're looking

at nearly, I think five, five and a half grand for a triangle bit of

glass. And a lot of that scared a lot of people off. So I

say, look, I'm happy to do this part for

this amount, but you can get the guys to come in and do the

glass and it's entirely up to you. Or we can offer you one

without glass. Sorry again. You

can do one without the glass or we'll do

one with just normal glass and we'll make the frame. So we've done a lot of them. So I

like doing the understairs, one with the LEDs, two

with the oak. It's really easy. It's Rubio.

It's handy to do. It looks, it's attractive on your Instagram

because it was for years I was doing very white.

It was white units with white internals. And

it wasn't until I started to work with Finza and the

MDF board company with the melamines and stuff that I

started to introduce walnuts and oaks and stuff. And then I

was paying a guy to do my LEDs and then I wanted more controls. So

I started to do them myself. And LEDs, starting

now, I feel like a lot of trades out there is like, It's one of those things

they shy away from, one for cost and the extra labor, but it

sells. And something with an LED on

someone's Instagram is going to attract someone's eyes and click

on it rather than, like I said, a white basic shaker wardrobe. Like

I said, it could be anyone. It could be sharps or whatever. It's a hook, isn't it? Yeah. You

just, I always say you're better off, your first picture on

Instagram in the furniture industry is better to have the doors open

then they are closed. I'm fortunate that I get quite a lot of walk-in

wardrobes with outdoors, so it's already a wow factor. But

all these people posting pictures of these doors closed on a shaker

wardrobe, and it's like, I'm not clicking on that. Where

if the doors are open and the customer sees, where they've done the

shelves or they've done the hanging for long hanging smaller. And

it's not just a double hanging rail. It's actually they put a divider in. They thought

about how many long clothes to have. They got a place for the ironing board. They've

they've done awesome shoe drawers. And this guy's thought about

this. It's not just a rep coming around going, this is what you

can have. Only this, only this, only this. We are bespoke. The

reason people come to us is we're not Ikea and things like that. We come

up. It's our ideas. And that was the big thing in 2020 with COVID. I

was, I just think back the first three years, how many times

I was going around to houses, quoting jobs and stuff, wasting time and

doing drawings and then never hearing again from that customer and stuff. And

so my youngest that was born the year I started in

September, she had a heart condition. So I was like, I'm not chancing

it. I'm not going out to these houses, catching COVID and then finding

out that the job's never gone through and my little one's got sick or whatever. So

I just started saying, because a lot of the time it's in our own heads, we

were like, sorry, no, email over what you're looking for. I'll

do a quote. If you're happy, it's 10%. So

I do a 10% quote. Until that money hits my bank account, we're

not ever going to meet or I'm not coming out to you to discuss because

my ideas are worth, like, that's why people come to me. Or

I say, look, if it's a big job, 100 grand, 150 grand, I say, look,

come to the workshop, meet me in person. I'm happy to show you around, show

you what we're and I'll sacrifice my time for that. But at least I

know they're willing to sacrifice their time. And it's

never one time I think someone said, I'm not coming out. I expect you to come around

for free kind of attitude. But a lot of the time it was like, yeah, that's fine. That makes sense.

10 grand job, thousand pound. And that's one thing I would say to a lot of

makers out there is is 10 percent is a good round number.

for a deposit, these people that have 250, 350 pound fixed rate prices,

it doesn't work on a 20 grand job. That's fine on a three grand

job, but there's a lot more work in a 20 grand job than there is in a three grand

job. So 10% is reasonable for the client and

you to go has enough money in that if it doesn't go ahead to

cover my drawings and my time. And that was the

biggest learning curve of 2020 for me. And I've never looked

back. Now we get so many deposits ahead with

10% deposits and then we get the 50 and the usual depending on

It's interesting, we do the 50% model, but, but

the not necessarily the quoting stage. So

we're typically figuring out a solution, but we

always ask for money first, in terms of like, what's your budget? Like,

I think that's a crucial part of the kind of things that

we do, because people, people like our clients, not our

clients, but Some potential clients are a little bit scared to

say what their budget is. A lot of the time they don't know, so they've not given it enough thought. That

means they're not that serious. They're coming

out for ideas and suggestions and they're

not doing anything wrong. But I'm like I can't, I

can't, I can't think on

a particular project, I can't start working stuff out until you tell me how

much resource I can put into it. Because a lot of clients… Well

because I can make a film for two grand, maybe not two grand, that's

probably… I could do for some, for the right client I could make a

film for two grand, it wouldn't be… very extensive. I

could make a film for 20 grand and I can make a film for 200 grand. They'll

all kind of do the same thing but just at very different levels.

So, but our kind of like rates to

some extent are fixed, like we work everything out of a standard rate

of production time, resource, editing time,

um pre-production planning all that stuff's kind of like worked out

um with a with a standard rate so i think a lot a lot of people are kind of

concerned that um if i could have done a film at 20 grand

um and and then they say well we've got a 200 grand

budget i'll go yeah it's 200 grand but i'm doing the same amount that's not the case

and finding that you're putting all the numbers down, working it all out, and then find that

you just wasted all that time when they had a two grand budget in their

Exactly, which happens all the time. The worst thing I've had, and

every now and again, I fall for it, because I think, oh, it's probably worth it. They're

pretty cool. Let's say we haven't got an idea of budget, but

we're looking for this. I'm like, cool. Here's some, and I won't put a

lot of effort into it, but this is kind of roughly what I'm thinking. I'm not going to

do any planning for you. I'm not going to do any creativity. But this is kind of what we've

it's probably going to be about 40 grand for this, for this, what you need to

go, that's our budget. I'm like, you told me, you told me you didn't have a budget. You

can't just tell me your budget. I was like, what's your budget? Like 20 grand,

like tell me that in the start. And then we'll be able to, I can make something

It's so frustrating. We're never going to stitch anyone up on price because

it's, it's just, it's not in our nature. We don't, we don't do stuff like that.

But it just means that if you need a film that's, you know, let's say it promotes

a particular product, well, I can do some really cool stuff

in the studio and get out on location and do some influencer marketing if

you've got the right budget. But if you've only got this budget, we're going to have to prioritize one

of those three. And it's going to have to be on a skeleton crew

as opposed to a crew with a full lighting package, makeup,

you know, all that kind of thing. We never use makeup. I don't know why

I said that. I'd like to. It'd be cool. No, we have Molly. Molly

gets her powder out every now and again if you're looking a bit shiny. It's

an interesting kind of, it's an interesting thing, the budget thing.

So like I said, I got a lot more inquiries for understair storage

and stuff. Like you said, people didn't have that budget. They

just saw it and wanted it, but then they realized what the kind of cost would be. But

I know if I want more walk-in wardrobes

or understairs, which are my two favorite things I do, I

just do a reel and post it, and I get inquiries. And it works really

well. Because the understair standard storage is

There's a lot of people doing it and they can do it very reasonable and priced and

it's a functional piece. It's not something I ever really want to

get into. I do get asked sometimes, but it's actually more time

consuming. And it, because things like stairs are like 900 deep,

the customers don't realize that's not a standard sheet size. And then you

end up using a sheet per side where a 600 wardrobe is

designed to be two halves. And, um, And there's people

out there, but I couldn't do that. I couldn't go and put a 550, 600 unit

under stairs when I know there's dead space behind it. That would kill me.

And it's that kind of thing. So, but

no, yeah, it did really well for me and I just was

delighted I didn't drop off. And I kept, kept

at it. I used to set myself goals every like six months, like Easter

or Christmas going, I want to be at this. And then what I

find is if you set yourself a goal, you'd be looking at the algorithm, not

the algorithm, but the gate to see what was working or wasn't working and

pushing it a bit more. Like I said, this year I've taken

a little bit off the accelerator and concentrated more on

just getting the workshop. We've, we've grown in size, not,

not people, but in the unit. So we've got a better flow.

We've got space. We've got everything. We've got a storeroom now. We've

got goods like stock. Everything's like. managed really

well. So if we did want to take on more staff for that,

we've got a good flow and it's easier to train people and

To put that infrastructure in ahead of time before you before you grow even further. If

you could put If

you could look back, I'm really intrigued from

the perspective of like if I was in the space

of somebody who's like sitting around 50,000 and they

want to get to 100,000, you've practically done that in

one post, which I know that it's

easy for me to say that because actually it's all the time you've taken to get to the

50,000 that's allowed that post to be successful. Financially

though, if you could put a number, like percentage wise, like did

it make a big difference to you in terms of like, we got more work out

Yes, I would say we got slightly

higher clientele. Okay. On the basis of anyone

that can afford to have an under stairs wine storage in the

front hallway is a different kind of clientele to, I

want storage for my kids shoes and stuff like that. Nothing wrong with that. And

it, The

job, like I said, in Utah, sir, that was a crazy

amount of money. Yes. It was the first time ever my wife

was like on the laptop. She works in the office and she was like, they

want to know where to park the helicopter. Oh, wow. It was never

like that. It was just like, OK, I've just done the they've

got a 20 car garage and Ferraris

And she found me on Instagram just flicking through and like that, the

understairs. And I want to work with this guy and,

um, lovely couple, really good. They own a big company

in, um, Utoxer and, um, uh, I respect

them and they respect me. And that was the big thing. I had a big job this

year in Beaconsfield and the, we

just ran into loggerheads with the customer after deposit and everything was paid. And

he said a few things and I was just like, do you know what? I'm

giving you a deposit back. We're just not right for each other because I can

see that this is going to be stress and the final payment is going to be stressful

Exactly. And I've learned, I've, I've turned down way more

work this year than I've ever done. Like one

job in Chelsea, which like literally they got recommended

and they were begging me, like begging me, the, the, the furniture package. was

3.2 million. Not that I was going to do the 3.2 million, but they wanted to

spread the furniture between a few companies because if one company,

but one company of course was, they were happy to do the whole thing.

But the building firm who were paying it were, didn't

want to put all their eggs in one basket. But it

was, it was treated too much as a commercial business,

a commercial thing where it's like the You have had targets to hit and you

get charges and I was like, no, no, no, this is right. I want to deal with the one

on one like me. I'm making something for you. I don't be talking to an interior designer or

an architect kind of thing because it's just too many cooks in the kitchen and things

get missed out. And that's why I work better with the

client directly. I understand what they want. They trust me

And this, this sort of ability to be able to pick and choose your clients

allows you to make those decisions and not be in a situation where,

you know, it's easy for people to say, you know, I can turn down work when

you've got enough work. And you have to get to that point

And like, I'm seven years now in business, like, I

think like when I was three, four years, I was more, I was so

impressed with the, the whole, um, where I

had got to. Like, bar the CNC, I haven't grown

a little bit in the width of the workshop. There's not a

massive difference, but what I got done in such a short

paced time has made it easier for hiring and taking on. And

the best staff that I have now, have found me through

Instagram, where I've tried all the other avenues, the

ads, the LinkedIn, not LinkedIn, but whatever it

is, the search engines and stuff. Indeed, and all that kind of thing. Yeah. And

it just never works. No. Because they don't. I want you to know what

I'm about and what I do and what my principles are. And I

want you to come and learn. So

we've started an apprentice. That's the new thing since September. He's 16. And

he's from Wrightcottwood, the college in Oxford. And he's,

yeah, so he's just trying

to get used to that side of things. So we, we had to up

our scale with the, you know, the usual like the fire extinguishers, first

aid, signing books and stuff, a little bit of red tape, but to

within reason that it still doesn't feel too red taped. because

Yeah, we don't even like doing work experience anymore, do we Kay,

because they're just a nightmare. There'll be like work

experience with adults, no problem at all. Like if they want to come and

do a little bit bits and bobs, but Yeah, from

schools and colleges and stuff. I'm like, nah, thanks. Like, it's just not worth the

Yeah. Well, it's crazy, like, because you're like, he's blocked.

So he's one weekend, he's in now one week next month, and he's

got to have four hours a week doing his own thing. And

he's on his phone doing, like, is he on his phone?

Is he uploading the college stuff? You don't know. It's like,

actually, for £6.50, it's actually, you'll do really good

Oh mate, it's, it's, it's tough because yeah, you're expecting, you're expected

Which is, this is a topic for a difference now. I think, I think you're

great if, I think apprentices should be paid decent wages.

But if that's the case, then it needs to be some sort of subsidization from

Oh, I was saying to my wife's like, have you looked into it? I think it's like, you

get £500. I was like, what's that guy who barely covers their

There's PPE. I swear there

was a time when they would like, you know, practically get their wages like

half funded. And now it's like, you can't even get their education

fully funded. Like, you've got to pay a bit of that. And, you

know, it's probably showing my age now. But I remember my, you know, my brother in

law, you know, I remember when he was in, He

was an apprentice. I think he got paid £2.50 an hour, you know, or £2 an hour.

I left university with a BA honours degree in furniture. I was on

£6, £6.50 and that was 2000 and I don't feel like it was

that long ago. But But

yeah, what you had to do, what you were expected to do, you're given a

little sketch and you had to do the cut list. You had to do the drawing. Now I'm doing

all this for them. And yeah, it's crazy.

Different world. I love, I like the idea of apprenticeships doesn't work for,

it currently doesn't work for our business model because. There's

no sweeping the floors you can do here. Technically, technically, you

could, I suppose, but it's not really a big part of the of

the job when it comes to social media going really well.

And to summarize, not only is it is it benefited you financially,

but it's also allowed you to have a little bit more freedom in the business and

have and freedom to make specific decisions. Are there

any other marketing channels that you use other than, we're talking

mainly about Instagram at this point and social media and stuff like that. If

we take social media sort of almost like out of the equation at this point, are

there other marketing channels that you actually don't

get enough mention in terms of the way that you bring in

Sorry, not really to be honest. Like

I said, I was on Checker Tread at the early years. I probably gave up

that in 2018. And And

then in 2019, 2020, I think

I set up a, well, I had a website and

then I paid someone in Newcastle, I think it was, to do up on

WebAhead to sort me out a website. And

it's really good, but the thing is I had to link it

with my Instagram because I didn't have time to be going on and uploading pictures. So

like the pictures now I think are linked to my Instagram. It's a

good write up, it looks professional, it looks good, but everyone

that pretty much 90% of the people that call me say, one,

we found you on Instagram, two, we've been recommended, we've

been on your Instagram. And that's the first thing I say to them, look, have you been on my

Uh, I was like, I don't want to have to sell myself. Like I've already, like, I've

done all the, what I need to do. That's your portfolio. That's my portfolio. That's me. And

there's videos of me making the furniture. It's not just a bought

in from China or whatever. Like I put a lot of that. And I always say

to people like, you need to make it personal.

Uh, like. you are your brand at the end of the day.

Like you're, you're, I always say to every, like I still, my favorite

part, one is the design and then two is the fitting. Like I still, there's a

lot of makers out there, a lot of furniture makers that do not like the fitting side of

things. They love the making, they love the workshop. They hate going on site and

Um, so I'm happy now to give the making side to my guys. Um, pretty

much become a workshop manager again, uh, unknown to myself. And

that was one thing that I find has made

it a little harder for my content because now I

find myself, I'm in the office more, I'm doing the SketchUp drones, I'm

doing the, I'm going out to customer meeting that where, where I

was always doing a bit of the, the making and stuff. I could always set up a tripod,

set up a camera, do a time lapse and stuff. So now I rely

sometimes on the guys to send me pictures or a time lapse

or something. And, um, it's one of the stuff I pick up

on and go, you're wearing trainers and that. That bit

is literally over fun. It's

trying to train them to be, to understand what to look out for

and stuff. But yeah, that's the hardest thing is

to, is to, I, I literally seem

to be doing my content now at five, six o'clock in the evening when everyone goes.

Like if I get something sent out by a brand and I want to

do an unboxing or something, I'll do that rather than do it when there's people

around me. Yes. And that, um, but yeah, no,

um, mainly Instagram, mainly socials for bringing in clients. Like

I said, we got the TikTok, we got the, we got the treads and

I have, uh, I think I've got, 1300 on

YouTube, but I'm not consistent with the minutes yet. So

the workshop video seems to have done really well. And if I could probably do another

one of them at Christmas and then try and make it once every

week, if not every two weeks or something. You choose its own beast. I

don't know how Mark does it with two days a week, like Wednesday. And

I heard him when he said it on the podcast, I was like, Once a week is tough going,

but twice a week is literally. And he keeps up with his other

social profiles. And he's literally on the tools. It's

As well as all the other networking stuff he does. It's not like he's like, Um,

you know, it's, it's mad, you know, he comes and does stuff like this mid, you

Um, it goes and, I was delighted when he was one

of the interviewers, when I did the trade legends thing. And, uh,

it was just made us so much more at ease and stuff. And he's a great,

yeah. Cause we, he was the captain, we'll say the captain for the, the

tool theft thing we did in London. And then I think you had, uh,

Pape. Screed Pappy. That's where I

first met him. He was on our side.

Really good guy. Yeah. We speak relatively

often. Who knew? Who knew that I would be the guy that's

speaking to all these, you know, like part of the, I'm

like a fraud because I'm not the least practical man ever

in my life. I'm such a fancy creative. But

But it's a bit like James the stone dresser, like I'm watching the guy chip

on stones and are like electricians and stuff. And they're like, it's amazing what

you find you want. You're watching and you find interest in

that where it's lovely to hear customers and other

tradespeople saying, we always check in to see what you did that day

or see how it turned out. Like it's like a TV. Like

the best one is when the wives are actually following me. And they turn around and

they go, oh, have you seen this? Like, that's Derek Barrett, I know him, kind of thing.

We, I can't remember, there was, yeah, it's amazing. It

is a community, isn't it? This kind of like, trade social media

and you get, we, you know, we get people sending us

accounts all the time, not just in the, in

the particular community, but people outside, like my, My

wife's cousin's fella, basically my

mate, he'll send me the people that he's like, this looks like

a really cool guy for the podcast. I'm like, he's already in. He's already coming in. Or

we work with him with one of our brands or something. People outside of

the sphere find them. I remember when, I think

someone sent me the, he was like, I think it

was the same guy. He's like, I watch the Ball Builders content all the time.

And I'm like, why? You've got nothing. Your work

isn't even close to being a trade. It's just

funny and entertaining. And yeah,

it is absolutely mad. Is there anything that you've done that's completely

flopped? I'm trying to think of like, because we're

getting to this picture now where it's like, OK, you can build your following.

We've started to build up some tactics. We've actually talked about some

of the stuff that you do that's actually been really successful for

you. What I'd like to know is learn from some of your mistakes, if

you've made any that are just like, you know what, this doesn't work for me.

Well, there are like sight mistakes where you've

completely messed up the measurement or something like that. I think one of the

worst ones was during COVID. There was a

lot of scenarios that came into it, but I

went off a learning curve, went off a customer's size.

And when I went round to to measure

the room when it was fully built, because it was COVID and it was hard to get up.

She was pregnant. We had to climb up a ladder outside in the rain during

March, into March or whatever, to go up and measure the room. And I noticed the angle was

completely wrong. And I concentrated all my time on

the angle that I never took a basic measurement of the height. And

they had told me that it was 2.3 and it was actually

2.030. So when I went to install, I went to lift up the unit, but it

ended up being I had, like, I

was like, right, something's not, I need to reset here. Read,

looked at my draw and how can I get around this? Problem solving, as

you would call it. And, um, I managed to still turn around in the

two days and do all the alterations on site. And then

it was one of those things where it was the biggest F up. But yeah, but

still was able to fix it. But going back to other things, investments

What about specifically about marketing? Like if you could, if because

we talked about perhaps your that, you know, the posts that

do incredibly well for you and and what's working for you on

social media. Are there particular tactics on social media that

you've sort of given a go or you sort of think, I want to try this

I've I've I have tried like the jokey

ones and stuff sometimes. And they have done within reason, like

still good numbers and stuff. But it's kind of like sometimes you

look back and cringe and you go, why did I do that kind of thing or jumped on

the bandwagon kind of thing. I I

like to now, I've kind of got into a rhythm on a, if I can, on a

Sunday is to do like, if you can get a good, like motivational

kind of thing. And then all I do is just do a dump of workshop videos

and people seem to find those quite interesting. And one just went out

Sunday and that's done really well. Um, but

yeah, I, it's not that anything's flopped.

Uh, I'm all for like, just do it, just have

a go. You'll always get a certain amount of views, but

it's if you start overthinking it and think, oh, should I, shouldn't I do it,

just do it kind of thing. I do find

when I go on holidays and

I do like, I'll put up a couple of pictures of my wife and kids

and stuff. You do feel it drops because they,

but it may drop. because of

the people that are not interested in that. But at the end of the day, there's never

a client out there that's never going to like seeing that

you have a personal life and that. So don't let you don't take that

too much to heart. It's because that could be like tradies gone. I

just want to see the furniture. I just want to see the tools. I don't want to see. So

You can, you can pay sometimes too much attention to the numbers, can't you?

And especially from a marketing perspective, so influencers,

let's call them, I don't really, it's what you're kind of like one of those weird,

I classify it as more of a creator, like, yeah, short sharing my,

but I get, I kind of get the thing that your

content isn't necessarily to get the attention of brands, necessarily.

It just happens to have accidentally done that. Really, your focus was

on getting clients, which makes you not necessarily an

influence, just a really good marketer. I

would say, if you've got a marketing agency or

a marketer that's looking to do a

lot of work and happens to go viral on social media doing

They're not necessarily an influencer. But it's a bit like, I would like, I'm known on

Instagram for, it's usually when I go for fits, I try to just do it when

I go for fits, it's like go for a Greggs. He's gone

for Greggs, you're sponsored by Greggs, I'm trying. That would be great.

But what you don't realise is then come Christmas or a customer, they'll

give you like a 20 quid Greggs voucher. But it's because it's embedded

in their head that Derek Barrett likes Greggs. And I saw

Danny Madden doing it where he was rating his

customers for tea and biscuits. And it was,

oh, you shouldn't be doing that. But they all stepped up their game. They're coming

in with Victoria sponges and stuff. And he's like, well, why not? It's a

bit of fun. Because we do say it quite a bit when we're

on site. I go home and I go, that house is worth three million. And

we're there three days and they didn't offer us one cup of tea. And

it's, it's amazing how the little thing like that can have such an impact of

like, you're just the worker kind of thing. And,

or you can't use the toilet. That's the worst one. Go to a customer's house

and they won't let you use the toilet. And it's like, I had one time I

went to Cambridge and I was like, why didn't you tell us this prior

to getting here? And they said, no, sorry, the toilet is out of action for

trades. And I'm like, it's like, you don't want to be finding that out.

But there was one thing on- It wasn't a personal thing, it was just to trades in general. There

Just us coming in and we're all very clean, dusty boys down,

the usual, like we're really, we pride ourselves and all that. But

yeah, she must have had bad experiences. Yeah, but there was one thing

I heard on fix one time and it's something I had to put, I just put in my terms and

conditions, you know, when the energy peaked up and it was the energy crisis and stuff

like that. And there was customers now charging, like

saying to tradespeople to take off whatever their

smart meter was reading because they had used so much

of the electric. in a day. And there's stuff that you don't even think about

to put in your terms and conditions that I have now that we will be using your

electricity when we're on site to charge our batteries and that.

Because they were arguing going, charge your batteries in your own workshop kind of thing. And

if you're there for two days and they're used to spending 10, 20 pound and

then it's gone up to 50, they were like, well, you owe us 40 pounds. So can you take that off

the bill for our electric? And it's amazing, you don't even think of these things.

So it's just other things to think about. That's so petty. I've

never even considered stuff like that. Although I do feel, yeah,

I want to buy that Festool, the power stack. And

plug it in in places like that and charge it up and then I can charge all my batteries in

But yeah, festival. Festival are the ones aren't they?

I just bought their air purifier and it's

amazing. I like, I have no regrets getting it. Like it's, it's,

it just sucks all the fine dust out of the room when you're working. And

because I am one of these people that will, if I'm in this room, I'm working in

this room. I am not doing that and going up and down those stairs outside

to cut. I don't care. We'll sweep up at the end, but it's just that fine

dust that floats around. So with this new thing now, it

just takes all that dust away. And it's, it's definitely going

Key, this is the first time I'll ask you, have you, have you

got any questions for Derek? Is there anything specific that we've talked about? And

or anything that you think I've not covered in this episode? Specifically,

centered around like, Derek's kind

of relationship to social media marketing, specifically to

I think you've asked some good questions, to be fair. I just wanted to get you more

involved. Yeah. Yeah. How did you go

from, like, how did the transition from getting

more clients from just word of mouth and stuff to,

Yeah. So like I said, with Check A Trade, I was relying

on that for the first year or so. And then then eventually I

was getting more inquiries coming through the social media network

that I had. I was And I made the decision

that I don't necessarily, because what was happening was people were still inquiring through

check a trade. But like I said, they wanted everything done in a week or two weeks,

three weeks kind of thing. And they just think you're doing nothing and just waiting around. It's

more like a Facebook marketplace kind of DIY to come around because

it was like fitting Howden's kitchens benchmark. Nothing wrong with that. But it wasn't

a route I wanted to go down. But

one thing I was going to say was what I used to do on

bank holidays, like Christmas, Easter, things like that, I'd always

do a boost on social media like Instagram. So

if I knew one, if I knew a picture or something

I had just done, like a walk-in wardrobe looked amazing, I

would put 30, 40 pound and just boost it for six days, seven

days. And you would see a good reward come back on that. But

now, have you heard about Apple? What they're doing now

is they're charging, they're charging Instagram. So

we're paying. So where you were paying 40, 50 pound on

Instagram to do a boost, Apple are charging you 50 pound. So it's

cost double the amount what it was. And it's not, I

just can't justify it. Because Apple are basically saying. You're

going to use Apple pay or whatever to do it. They have their, their

charge of about, I think it's like, I don't know, 40, 45. It literally is

double. Because I had someone mentioned to me and I was like, not when I did it.

And then I went to do a 50 pound one and they wanted 90 something pound

for a six day just to run an ad. And

so I just declined it. But what Instagram said there is on

Facebook, you can now put credit in Facebook and then

you pay through Facebook. But it's. it's kind of like that

Oh, I see. Because I'm like, we run ads all the

time. I've never heard of this kind of like doubling up. But what you mean is if you're on

your phone trying to boost a post on your Apple phone, you're going

to have to charge. If you're on Android it'd be... I don't know. Maybe. I've

I nearly only did it a few weeks ago because one guy in our group said that

he wanted to run a hundred and fifty pound. He does kitchens and

stuff like big cost kitchens and stuff. And he was going to run a hundred and fifty

pound to run it for a certain amount of time. And they wanted three hundred pound. in

charge, like the £300 altogether for the £150, where it

was always like, if I want to put £30 down, I'll put £30 down. But

now it's getting to where it's the taxes

Yeah, but something to keep an eye on. Yeah. I think we're about

running to the end of this, Derek. It's been fascinating. It's

been really, really cool to hear about your story and also how

it relates. Not necessarily to, can I get this brand deal? Can I get

this? Although those things I think are happening anyway. But it's

really about, I just want to do more work. I just want to get more customers,

more clients, and better work. And it seems like that's working incredibly well

That's it. brand person

or person that's doing it, like people don't realise the

amount of brands you turn down as you take on and that. So

we pretty much all like want to work with the, I

always find the ones with the lower followings, they'll end

up like taking whatever's coming kind of thing that where

I don't rely. Sometimes like I'm getting stuff and I'm like just

sitting there and it's like, what will I do with that? I've

just ended up giving it to the guys sometimes and that, but If it's

something we can use, we're now working with some other brands

and stuff. So no, it's good. And that's why Emma,

I started speaking to Emma from Limitless this

year or beginning of this year and stuff. But after the installer show and

And hopefully we can continue on and stuff. But it's just that like

her, her whole thing about let the creators

do what they do and then I'll deal with it. Because it is, we've done stuff

with HIPAA and Troy and things and the amount of emails back

and forth. And it's just like, I don't know what they want. You tell me

what they want and I'll do it. And then I'll know. And translate all of this information.

She's doing a great job. Last thing you guys need is more admin. Yeah,

that's exactly it. And that's where she comes in. It's great. What's next

What's like next couple of years? Like, have you got any like

plans? Like you mentioned a little bit about YouTube and stuff like

Yeah, well, I said it this year, but again, I'm saying it

for next year kind of thing. But I'm all or nothing. If

I don't feel like I can do, put it in,

like if I'm, I've just joined a PT in a gym. I've

been like 11, 10 years where I haven't gone back to the gym. because

I knew I just couldn't give it. So this year I've gone back and

I've been religiously doing it and stuff. So I

just I need to know that I will give it 100% and then

I'll go for it. But carrying on doing what

I'm doing. I'm a big fan of like trying to own

what I have and not have like massive finances and stuff. I'd

love to know like if I had to close up tomorrow I don't owe

loads of people and stuff like that. But I don't know, maybe

five years and might be back in Ireland. I don't know. It depends. The kids are always

like wanting to go back, even though they're born here. But,

um, you fancy Canada then? Oh, I'd love it. But,

um, but yeah, it's, it's, it's hard to know. We've, we fixed

the mortgage for a couple, a good few years now. Thank God. Uh, And

we'll let that, and then the whole mag, like I said, is four years left on

that. And then we'll make decisions. But it was never, I've

never done this business to be something I could sell or

I'm not an entrepreneur kind of thing. I just want to, as

long as I can have a holiday and I can pay people's wages. And you love

what you do. And I love what you do kind of thing. Like I said, I always said when I'm

in my fifties, I can always go back to it. I know I can

go to a job tomorrow if I had to kind of thing. So it's

not a long term goal necessarily, but as long as I can do it

Never say never, but I, you know, I

couldn't even fathom selling dissident. First

of all, I don't know if anyone would want this ragtag group of miscreants. But

I just think, what would I do? I get

stressed going on holiday because I just want to speak to

my team and see what's going on. So

I don't know what I would do. I'd have to consult or something like that. Is

there anything that I've missed, Eric? Anything that you feel like I

should have asked you that I haven't, that you think, I've got this little nugget

No, not necessarily. No, all good. just,

I'm like at the moment, like if you, if you interviewed me a year or two years ago,

I would have been like, oh yeah, it's flying it. But

at the moment, like anyone, I'm still trying to figure out what Instagram wants,

what the algorithms are. It's all changed. It has dramatically changed. Like

I said, I've been up and down a good few hundred. And

it's different for me because I was so used to always being on the

plus side and stuff. There's no right or wrong answer.

Does it stress you out when it's not

going well? Does it bother you? It bothers me

within reason a little bit when you usually you know why

or that didn't do well or something like that. But then

you hear things about shadow banning and stuff like that or you've used a

song maybe that was maybe. I have noticed that I use CapCut quite

a lot and I think CapCut has a lot to do with TikTok. And

because I may be uploading CapCut videos to Instagram that

could have an impact on the rather than just

using the Instagram is own. Instagram's

own software and stuff like that. So that's something I'm

looking into now. It's just hearsay and rumour though,

isn't it? That's the thing. It's like people say, don't use hashtags and all

this stuff, but just use them. They're there, just

use them. Yeah, don't get mad. One guy told me, I saw at the Materials

and Finishings show, I was on a Q&A about social media. And

one of the tips that everyone took away from was one old guy said to

me in Beaconsfield, he said, look, when you build a shelving unit, it goes hashtag

shelfie. And I was like, huh? And I couldn't believe it.

It's like back when he told me about it, it was 2.5 million

hashtags. Now it's 3.5 million. But if you do hashtag fitted

furniture, hashtag cabinet maker, it's not even close. But

you don't even think. So if there's shelves there, then you just hashtag shelfy. And

it's massive. And it's just things that you don't... And sometimes the wrong spelling

in a hashtag can actually do you better. Because you pop up in places that

someone's done the exact same thing. I misspell, as

And I still, to this day, I don't know what our URL

is. on dissidentagency.com, isn't

it? Is that right? Yeah. I was on a podcast and they were like, where can

we find you? I was like, I don't know. I honestly don't

Mine's sometimes D Barrett design and it's Derek

It just, it turns out what I've done is I've just, I've bought all of the

possible dissident URLs now and just they all, they all point towards

Derek, thank you so much for coming. It's been an absolute pleasure. Really, really insightful conversation

about social media and using it to get clients