Liam Hollett is our ‘Sparky of The Month’.
Liam Hollett of LH Electrical in Liverpool speaks to Zano about his pathway into the electrical industry, experience with LED dimming and current lighting trends.
Name: Liam Hollett
Company: LH Electrical
Location: Liverpool, England
Why did you become an electrician?
I always wanted a trade but was unsure exactly what trade I’d like to do. I tried joinery and brick laying as a placement in school as an option but didn’t really like either. When I left school, my uncle had his own electrical wholesalers and a customer of his was looking for an apprentice. He employed me and I completed my NVQ Level 3, winning ‘Apprentice of the Year’ for the Northwest in my final year of college. It was always the end goal to have my own company and earn money for myself rather than for someone else.
What do you enjoy most about your job?
Job satisfaction most definitely. From initially meeting a client and talking through ideas they have and ideas we put forward, to seeing the finished job and how happy the customer is with the finished article – that’s got to be the best feeling.
What's the most interesting job you've completed to date?
We work very closely with a landscape garden company (Brockstone Landscape Construction) delivering power and lighting to their projects. We add lighting that gives the landscape a completely different dimension and ambience at night. We love doing this work because there are so many different ways you can add lighting design to a garden to bring it to life of a night. Each and every project is also different, from basic lighting to complex, hot tubs to audio and visual aspects like outdoor TVs and speakers. Each job is very interesting, I just don’t like the cold in the winter being outside.
What are the biggest challenges you face day-to-day?
One of the biggest challenges I face is workload, from quoting jobs, carrying out the jobs we win, filling out certificates to invoices, it’s trying to balance workload with social life. I find getting that balance right the hardest because I don’t like letting people down.
What services have been most in demand this year?
We offer all customers a bespoke LED lighting service. This is becoming more and more popular, because there are so many ways to use lighting to light up a room or having a stand-out feature light in a room. These include plaster in profiles with seamless LED tapes, to tile in profiles, to adding features to bathroom renovations… the list is becoming endless of what you can do with this aspect of lighting.
Fun fact about you?
I also play semi-professional football, so this is my get away from work life. It’s always been my go-to hobby since I started playing around age 7.
How did you find out about Zano Controls?
We found out about Zano Controls from the wholesaler we use in Liverpool (Parr Electrical). We have used this wholesaler since we started around 10 years ago. A project we did, using comparison dimmers, were not giving the effect we wanted. The dimming range was not very good and noise from the actual dimming modules themselves was so loud. They suggested we try Zano dimmers, and this eradicated the noise aspect and the dimming range was exceptional. We wouldn’t install anything else now.
What is your go-to product?
When we deliver an LED lighting project our go-to dimmers are now always Zano, as explained above. Using Zano to dim LED tapes you get no flickering or humming from the actual modules and the dimming range is better than anything we have ever seen before.
What's the biggest LED dimming problem you've faced?
The usual again. Because there are that many different variants of LED on the market these days, cheap products don’t give you the effect you want without the problems explained above, but you don’t get these issues using Zano products.
If you could rewire anyone's house, who would it be?
I’d like to rewire someone’s house where money was no object, because the effects and aspects you could incorporate would be second to none, but bespoke lighting can become really expensive, really quickly.
Think you have what it takes to be our next Sparky of The Month? Be sure to share your installations and projects with us, and it may just be your face appearing in our next Sparky’s Corner! For any project or product enquiries, please call the team on 0345 519 5858 and we will be happy to help.
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