Marquees in the winter
September is usually the last busy marquee month of the season. If you’re still very busy through October and the Christmas market then you’re doing very well. There is a change to the way people use marquees during the winter though:
- Often customers are after gaining a room from the house for a party rather than hosting the whole function outside.
- Obviously you need to provide plenty of marquee heating
- Butt the marquee hard up against the house or use a walkway with sides
- Allow more time to put the marquee up. It could be cold, wet and/or windy and the daylight hours are shorter
- Allow more maintenance time between jobs, marquees need cleaning and drying unless they’re going straight back out
- It’s tempting to raise the hire charge of the marquee due to the greater running costs but unfortunately the opposite is usually true, because winter is drastically quieter than summer for parties you often have to offer discounts or incentives to be competitive and get the work.
- Buy some good waterproofs. We’re quite fortunate in that once the marquee is up we’re generally working in the dry doing all of the interior work but if you’re having to do that in wet clothes life is not fun. Get the marquee up quickly, get all the kit inside then it becomes a normal day whatever the weather outside (assuming you’ve got good quality marquees of course!)
- We recommend testing any gutter before you leave site anyway but especially do so during the winter
- If snow is forecast leave heating on very low to prevent it building up on the roof. UK marquees are not designed for snow loading.
- edit: As the excellent County Marquees pointed out after posting wooden floors are a very popular option during the winter. Not only do they give a good surface but you are raising the height of the floor – a popular (but expensive) solution on soft ground prone to waterlogging or hard surfaces where water can come back under the sides.
In the main erecting winter marquees is a far more relaxed business than summer ones, the company is generally not as busy so you can take your time to get it right and ensure you’ve tried absolutely everything on the nearest sandwich shops menu.
Thanks for reading
Spencer
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