UK-based Snaffle Solutions has created an online marketplace, Snaffle, aimed at making it easier for SME builders to buy tools and materials, while creating extra online sales for traditional suppliers in the industry.
Incorporated in 2016, the company was founded by Luke Robertson, formerly a contracts manager in an office fit-out business, and Daniel Reiner, managing director of the Coulsdon, Surrey-based building products supplier, Bryson. With a combined 25 years’ worth of experience in supplying construction companies big and small, they believe there is a growing appetite for builders to purchase building products online, particularly if the seller guarantees fast delivery, meaning no downtime collecting materials. A Snaffle study showed that, on average, a builder or tradesperson can spend 2.8 hours a day driving to and from merchants.
Snaffle it
First-time buyers will be able to search the Snaffle website (no mobile apps, but the site renders will in a smartphone browser – important for the tradespeople market) for everything they require for their project and compare costs from multiple suppliers. Depending on what is more important to buyers, the site will find the best price or closest supplier, anywhere in the UK.
Suppliers of building materials can upload their entire product range onto the e-commerce platform (at no cost) allowing customers to compare prices, browse an unlimited range and place orders to be fulfilled directly through suppliers’ own warehousing and logistics.
Robertson said:
“It’s brilliant to see how this is benefiting everyone in the industry – both customers and sellers. On one hand we are giving many well-established more traditional businesses in the market extra sales with an online presence, and on the other we are making the builders lives easier by getting goods to site more efficiently.”
The dual targetting of both tradespeople and sellers is also a strategy pursued by London-based Buildiro, which launched its mobile solution in March 2019 (post).
