I’m often asked why I started Genesis Homes (some days I wonder myself!) Joking aside, most of my working life has been spent contracting for large house builders and I became increasingly frustrated that the process was by no means perfect, often disorganised, and produced an uninspiring product. Genesis Homes was formed with a simple objective ‘to create quality, vibrant and welcoming housing developments’; it was borne out of a desire to offer a much better product, and in turn a well-managed process in the house building industry. After 18 months of trading, I’m proud to say we’ve upheld that mantra, and as the saying goes, ‘we’re going from strength to strength’.
It’s not been easy, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how quickly we’ve been accepted despite being the ‘new kid on the block’. Our flagship Wigton development has quite literally flown off the shelves and Brigham has got off to a good start too. So, what sets us apart from other house builders? We all basically say the same i.e. ‘we build quality, high specification properties’…well let me just say that that’s not enough for Genesis Homes.
Our Brand department has been working on our Brand Guidelines for a few months now and the starting point of that work was defining what we did that was better than our competitors, or even just different. We’ve introduced a tagline which says ‘A Genesis Home; it just works’ as at the end of the day that’s what I want our business to stand for; there’s no point in a house that doesn’t fit around you and the way you live. So, in a nutshell:
- We only build 16 house types – a mix of 2, 3, 4 and 5 beds that are practical homes (some builders have over 40 house types, and although that’s a lot of choice, they probably don’t know which ‘work’ as homes);
- We build our properties on good sized plots (Wigton has an average of 33% green open space and Brigham has 37%). I’m not sure about our competitors but I hear a lot of comments like ‘have you seen such and such, they’re crammed in like sardines’. I don’t want that to be what people say about us;
- You can fit wardrobes into our bedrooms – it may sound silly, but some house builders use smaller furniture in show homes to give the illusion that their rooms are a good size;
- We build bungalows. Not many housebuilders build bungalows as they basically take up too much space; we know that our buyers like, and want bungalows, so we build them (it’s called ‘supply and demand’!);
- The location of our developments is a strategic choice, ticking lot of boxes in terms of demographics, local employment centres, transport connections, good schools and local amenities, and they are often close to the great outdoors of Cumbria.
We’ve still got a way to go, and we’ll add to and refine ‘why we’re different’ as we go but I’m comfortable with what we’ve achieved and I’m looking forward to defining our business strategies as we implement our short term growth plans over the next three years.
Nicky Gordon, Managing Director