Home-Grown: Basing Your Business In The Garden

Finding a place to do business can be a challenge when you’re first starting out. A lot of people begin this process, only to find that they need a place to work from, and that their bedroom or lounge simply aren't good places for this sort of task. Buying or renting an office is expensive, and most people will want to maintain some of the benefits of working from home. A garden can solve this problem for you, giving you a space which is disconnected from the distractions found at home, while also providing you with easy access to everything you need. Let’s see how you can put something like this together.

The Building

Most cities and towns have strict local governments who will want to know what you’re doing to your property before you do it. Planning permission and permits are a thorn in any developer’s side, but there are ways to get around this. Companies like https://www.sjonescontainers.co.uk/container-sales/ sell shipping containers, and these large metal boxes are plenty large enough for at least one person to work from. You won’t need permission to place something like this in your garden, as it doesn’t count as a permanent structure.

A little bit of work will have to go into making a space like this into a workable office, and this is what the next stages will be showing you. Alongside this, though, you can also decorate your new office on the outside, using wooden or plastic panelling to make it look a lot more like a real building than a metal container. This is great when you want it to blend into your outdoor space.

The Power & Utilities

The next area to consider will be the power and utilities which are piped out into your garden. You probably won’t need water, as you’ll be so close to home, but you will need electricity to keep your computers running, and gas to warm the place up. It will be worth having a professional come to sort this out for you, installing electrical wiring from your home to the office outside. This sort of job can be very dangerous, and those without experience often hurt themselves trying to do it.

The Inside

Creating the inside of an office within a shipping container will be much easier than you might expect. It’s worth using insulation panels to keep the place warm, but you can use whatever you like to cover the walls once this is done. Wood can be used to make the floor look more authentic, and you could even consider putting a proper ceiling up. Once you have the basics ironed out, it will be time to think about furniture.

Saving space will be crucial when you’re doing this, and this makes it worth planning out the area before you start to build desks or add furniture. Having a desk mounted to the wall will save a little bit of room, but will restrict the flexibility of the office. Smart storage solutions will also help you to make better use of it. There are loads of guides around the web which can help you with this, providing you with the knowledge you need to create an office which perfectly meets your needs, while also sticking to the confines of a container. If you simply don’t have enough space, you could consider buying another container and joining them together.

The Elements

While a garden office will be an outdoor building, it makes sense to work hard to make sure that the elements won’t do it any harm. For example, if you have a lot of wind and rain, you will need to make sure that there aren’t any small holes which will let water in. Alongside this, you also need to think about temperature. Hot places will make a metal container painful to be inside, and you may need some reflective material on the roof to make sure that it doesn’t heat up too much. Cold weather is harder to deal with, and you may need to install a heater in your office to solve this.

Having an office in your garden can be a great idea. Many people like to work from home, but find that their normal spaces are too distracting to get real things done. Having your office outside can solve this problem without taking away the elements you love about your business. Of course, as the company expands, you will need to find more spaces, but you could always work to help you employees to create their own offices.