Healthy Growth Expected in the Plumbing and Hard FM Contractors Market
The market for plumbing contracting and hard FM services is made up of the need for the installation and maintenance of a variety of plumbing and heating systems. This is within both residential and non-residential buildings. The end-use sectors and subsequent customers of these services are varying, they include housebuilding firms, domestic homeowners as well as operators of non-residential buildings such as commercial ad public sector offices, company sites, retail outlets and more.
The market for plumbing contracting and hard FM services as with many other sectors fell in 2020 due to the effects of the pandemic on the industry and the workers themselves. The market value dropped by 5% that year, however, it recovered in 2021, increasing in value by 9%. It is worth noting that plumbing and heating engineers were classed as ‘key workers’ during the lockdown periods in 2020, meaning that maintenance activities could still be carried out.
Looking not at the different sectors covered in the market, RMI and maintenance activity account for a significant percentage of revenue for many plumbing contractors and hard FM providers. Total expenditure on building maintenance in the UK is estimated at over £60bn per annum, which equates to around 3% of GDP.
A key difference within the market is the overall size of jobs/contracts available. For Hard FM services, the value tends to be much higher for providers. Installation and maintenance of plumbing and heating systems is often part of the larger contracts. Although the plumbing contracting sector accounted for 80% of total market value in 2021, the hard FM sector should increase its share in the years leading up to 2026.
There were an estimated 44,325 enterprises competing within the market in 2021, which has only increased over the last 5 years. Most of these companies are extremely small in terms of employment size and turnover, however, are also growing in numbers of people employed since 2019.
Whilst construction output is one of the main drivers in the growth of this market another to keep an eye on will be the many regulatory changes currently being introduced, many of which are to assist with the UK becoming carbon neutral by 2050. There are now many schemes and initiatives promoting the use of alternative heating systems for both domestic and non-residential properties, heat pumps are the most recent example of this. With all of this information collated AMA Research is expecting the market value forecast to increase by around 4% per annum during the period between 2022 and 2026.
