Episode 176: Liz Allan and Trevor Palmer - How EV Blocks Is Transforming EV Charging Infrastructure Globally.

Episode 176: Liz Allan and Trevor Palmer - How EV Blocks Is Transforming EV Charging Infrastructure Globally. 

Liz Allan speaks to Trevor Palmer, founder and inventor of EV Blocks. Trevor shares his journey from working alongside his dad pouring concrete bases, through an electrical apprenticeship, to inventing a modular foundation system that is now used across the UK, Europe, North America and Australia.

Liz and Trevor discuss how EV Blocks reduces installation time by around 30%, cuts repeat site visits, lowers carbon impact, and future-proofs EV charging infrastructure. Trevor also opens up about entrepreneurship, leadership lessons, scaling without external investment, and winning Global Entrepreneur of the Year.

Quote of the Episode:
“If we can make life easier for the installer, everything else falls into place.” Trevor Palmer

Trevor Palmer Bio:
Trevor Palmer is the founder and inventor of EV Blocks, a modular foundation system designed to simplify, speed up and future-proof EV charge point installations. A qualified electrician by trade, Trevor built EV Blocks from hands-on site experience, identifying inefficiencies in traditional concrete foundations and creating a smarter alternative. Today, EV Blocks is licensed and manufactured across multiple countries, supporting Charge Point Operators and installers worldwide. Trevor is also the winner of Global Entrepreneur of the Year, recognised for innovation, resilience and scalable impact.

Trevor Palmer Links:
Website: https://www.evblocks.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trevor-palmer-b7067aa7?

Transcript

Liz Allan  [00:00:02]:
Hi, everybody, and welcome back to this week's episode of Electric Evolution. This week, I actually have Trevor Palmer, the founder and inventor. I've not had many inventors before. So I love this idea of EV Blocks. Trevor, thank you ever so much for joining me. I'm really looking forward to speaking to you about this.

Trevor Palmer [00:00:24]:
Thanks for having us on. Liz. 

Liz Allan  [00:00:29]:
That's fine. You can call me whatever. We were introduced by Angela Mureson, who I have interviewed on this podcast previously, and she's doing a bit of work with you guys at the moment anyway, isn't she? So we can talk a little bit about, about that in a, in a while. But let's start off and just go. You know, we were just talking very briefly before, before we started recording about your, your got an Ev and you, you, you work, you've been a bit of a petrol head and things like that. But let's build a picture of you, too. What did, what, where did you start your kind of your career, and what got you to the point where you looked at building a business and, you know, developing a business like EV blocks and, and actually inventing the block itself. Let's, let's talk about that.

Trevor Palmer [00:01:25]:
Yeah. So I think like a lot of kind of small business owners or entrepreneurs, there's always like a hustle when they're at kind of school age, and I was, you know, doing pirate CDs and always, there was always a deal or something going on, even when I was a kid. And then I spent time working with my dad doing concrete bases for like big grain shed floors or basically big agricultural buildings where we're putting the concrete base or the floor in, ready for the rest of the build to take place. Whilst I was working with my dad, I was also applying for jobs with electrical contractors. So I wrote off around 20 letters to all the local electrical contractors, managed to land a couple of interviews and get an apprenticeship with Alfred McAlpine's for four years and studied at Lincoln College. And that was a great time because I couldn't, I hated school. I just could not wait to get out. I was just like, show me the money, I want to go out, I want to get to work, and I want to earn some money and get to it.

Trevor Palmer [00:02:36]:
So being able to get an apprenticeship and a. And then I was really engaged to college because, like, I want to be here rather than school. You're kind of just forced there. Yeah. So I did that and then qualified at 20 years old, worked for around six months as an electrician on a kind of maintenance contract and then left the UK to go travelling for a few years. So went to New Zealand, Australia, Thailand, Canada, the States, and Austria. And there was a mix of things in there, between chasing cattle through the desert on a dirt bike, to snowboarding, and just doing all sorts of weird and wonderful things in between. And that was a great time.

Trevor Palmer [00:03:20]:
And then came back to London and started work as an electrician.

Liz Allan  [00:03:26]:
And then was chasing cattle.

Trevor Palmer [00:03:29]:
Very, very different. Yeah. And extremely different working conditions, for sure. And then. Yes. So was working in London as a. As an electrician for a company. And then I decided to set up on my own.

Trevor Palmer [00:03:45]:
Just, you know, basically bought a secondhand van, put my toolbox in the back and. And started working. And then built that business up over a number of years, and had other electricians working for the company, who were installing electric car chargers. And that's where the kind of EV blocks were first bought. We were doing turnkey, you know, tarmac rip up, reinstatement, foundations for the pedestals to go onto, and all the electrical infrastructure behind it all under one roof. So it was a pretty big effort, each project. And we were doing sort of three projects a week or three car showrooms a week with a very small team. And that's where it.

Trevor Palmer [00:04:27]:
EV blocks allowed us to move quickly because it was the same consistent base, put it in the ground. Electricians knew what they were going to come to. So that was good. And we kind of gave birth to that brand in spring 2020. And then Covid hit two weeks later. My electrical contracting company basically went to the wall because we were aligned with shopping centres, office spaces and car showrooms. And they were the three places you could not go. And we just could not, you know, move our offering fast enough to another sector because those contractors already serving that sector would already be secured in that kind of work.

Trevor Palmer [00:05:08]:
So we closed that down, and it was all chips on. On EV blocks. And yeah, off we went and what, six years later, here we are.

Liz Allan  [00:05:19]:
That's. That's amazing. And you know what? I'm just. You brought back a memory from my childhood when you were talking about working with your dad, putting concrete bases down. I remember. Do you. I don't know whether you. I don't know how old you are.

Liz Allan  [00:05:35]:
And I'm getting. I'm getting on a bit. My dad, years ago, when I was only very young, bought this new garage. A garage, if you want to call it posh. It wasn't a garage, it was a garage. And he, he kind of, he did the base, he backfilled. He kind of built the base of the garage and the. Because he wanted to have a.

Liz Allan  [00:05:57]:
He called it a pit. It was his little place where he could go and tinker around with the under, you know, underneath the car. And so he built the pit. And then I remember him actually putting the concrete base down, and he and my brother or brothers at the time were kind of. They actually went along with this. I'll never forget it. And I don't think I particularly got involved in that side of stuff. But they went along, kind of flattening it all.

Trevor Palmer [00:06:22]:
Flattening all the tamping it down with a big piece of wood. Yeah, and that wood gets heavier and heavier all the way you move through that slab.

Liz Allan  [00:06:30]:
Do you know, I hadn't thought about that. You just brought it back to my. My mind then. So, yeah, work it. I'm saying I work with my dad. I think I used. I think I carried some of the blocks, you know, that he was building. He was building the base of the garage.

Liz Allan  [00:06:45]:
But yeah, flipping heck. That's if you did that quite a long time ago. Was that. Was that experience with your dad then, and was that the building of those bases and stuff like that? Like you've got in. You've done. You're kind of. You've gone into your electricals, and you've got electrical contracting. But you've made something this, you know, ev blocks.

Liz Allan  [00:07:06]:
Did that actually go right back to thinking about what you were doing with your dad?

Trevor Palmer [00:07:11]:
I just had a good understanding of concrete, you know, having laid plenty of aces with my dad and you know, working out what needs to happen when the cement truck arrives and the gap between the cement trucks, you know, when, when they're delayed and what, what to do and, and how long it would take for us to be able to get onto the floor with a power flow or how long it would be until the customer could walk across that base and strip shuttering off and things like that. So when we were asked to do the car showrooms, we kind of already understood the process of pouring a concrete base. It's going to need a few days to. For the. To cure before we can start removing shuttering, and also, you know, what's involved because concrete, you know, it's really kind of dense material. So that shuttering that you build needs to be fairly robust to make a decent foundation each time on site. So, you know, we got good at that or the civils team we had were good at the pouring bases, but we wanted something even faster again and, and Then with pouring the bases on site, you've got to remove that shutter in and you know, it's not always reusable so that you ended up with, you know, a bit of waste every other pour. So yeah, it was an interesting process.

Trevor Palmer [00:08:27]:
A bit. Yeah, that, that first bit we're working with dad kind of gives me a good understanding of what different tribes tried.

Liz Allan  [00:08:35]:
And you've got. Yeah, like you say, you. I suppose you've kind of involvement. And it's like going all the way through, isn't it? Kind of on a. Like an end-to-end because you're seeing it from, you know, you doing all the electrical bits, you've got your guys coming in, doing the. All the concrete or backfilling or whatever you've got to do, and then right through to those, those people, you know, like you say, who are walking on. Actually walking on it. So how different is it from those days to what you're doing now? Because you've got quite a.

Liz Allan  [00:09:13]:
For EV blocks, you've just had it patented, haven't you? In. In the US, what is the difference between a, A, you know, what you're providing? Because it's. If we think of it from a decarbonization point of view, there's something different about your product that's got a real usp, isn't there?

Trevor Palmer [00:09:35]:
Yeah, there's. There are a couple of items, really. So you know, compared with cor pouring a concrete slab that is completely kind of all of that area is. Is. Is concrete. Whereas what we've done with EV blocks is kind of hollowed out the centre of the block. So you've got a reduced amount of concrete going onto the site. In the first place, it's made in a manufacturing facility.

Trevor Palmer [00:10:04]:
So they. You've got this nice, consistent finish. And when we first started building the kind of building blocks, they were made to suit whichever pedestal we were fitting, which is fine but not very future-proof. So with the EV block, there's an adapter plate on the top so that it can be drilled to suit whichever fixing arrangement for whichever post is being fitted. And then if the customer wants to take the EV chargers off that site and kind of just do reinstatement work on it. On dilapidations to just have our adapter plate on top, no charger, they can. Or they can have a new adapter plate from us and fit new charging equipment on top and get a nice neat finish. Still, compared with your poured Concrete pad, which, after a couple of changes, is looking like a bit of Swiss cheese because all the fixing arrangements are in different places.

Trevor Palmer [00:11:06]:
So there are lots of holes and bolts in the wrong spot. And the same for a precast pad that was made for one charger installed on the day. Five years later, they come to install a different charger again, which is going to look like a bit of Swiss cheese. By the third charger that gets mounted on top of it, then you're ripping that up and starting again. So the whole deal is that EV blocks are future proof and always had kind of the, the disability part in my mind, where we wanted to have a non-slip surface on the top of the EV block. So when we first did, you know, version one of EV blocks, they were made with aluminium plates, now aluminium and wet, really slippery. So we use a coating that they use in the supermarkets to add some traction back in there.

Liz Allan  [00:12:01]:
Like a non-slip type thing.

Trevor Palmer [00:12:03]:
Like a non-slip self-adhesive laminated at kind of, I think it was about 45 degrees. Every single plate went through this laminate machine, which is great, but it wasn't quite as scalable as what we wanted. And now we've moved on to a composite adapter plate with I think it's ADA slip rating pattern. So we've kind of got there in the end.

Liz Allan  [00:12:32]:
What does, what does it say?

Trevor Palmer [00:12:33]:
It's basically a standard for slip resistance.

Liz Allan  [00:12:40]:
So, so typically, what if we're looking at. There are so many different chargers out there. Typically, what does an EV block? What does it? Hold on to the topic. What kind of chargers are we looking at? Are we kind of looking at bollards? Are we looking at DC? Are we looking? Is it mostly AC? What, what kind of. What style are we looking at here?

Trevor Palmer [00:13:03]:
So we started with the universal product, which is designed for AC chargers.

Liz Allan  [00:13:09]:
Yeah.

Trevor Palmer [00:13:09]:
So anything from sort of 3 kilowatts right the way through to 22 kilowatts. And I don't know whether there's any 3-kilowatt charges kicking about anymore. But most of them start at 7 now. But any kind of level 2 EV charger would fit on an EV block. And then off the back of that, we work with a company called EV Tower based in Wales. They asked us to lay a foundation for their pedestal because they've got a very similar ethos. So they make a universal pedestal. When we make universal foundations, it's like a kind of what these guys are doing.

Trevor Palmer [00:13:49]:
And Nick, the director there, who's kind of pestering me. He's kind of like rang me once, would you do a foundation for us? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rang me twice like, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's fine. The third time was like, this guy is serious, so let's get it together. And we did that for him. And it has been a fantastic partnership over the last sort of three or four years. Worked very closely with EB Tower on the EV block Mini, and then more recently, we've been getting involved with the charge point operators for their DC, you know, rapid charging hubs. So we've made a foundation to suit their requirements.

Trevor Palmer [00:14:29]:
Again, universal so it fits the majority of DC chargers that are on the market, and we're seeing a lot of Alpatronics being fitted to our foundations as long as the. As well as power electronics or chem power units as well. So it's, I think we've got around 40 different DC chargers that fit our DC foundation offering.

Liz Allan  [00:14:53]:
Wow. So are you, so you've just said about the, the chat, the charge point operators, are you, are you typically now working with them or are you kind of working with the installers? How, at what point, I suppose, do the people get you involved and kind of go, right, okay, this is what we want, and it's going to be an EV block that we're going to use as the base or the foundation.

Trevor Palmer [00:15:20]:
So we're coming in at a few different levels now. We're seeing EV blocks specified on drawings by architects, specifiers, and technical designers, which is really nice because we've been working on this for a number of years. For it to actually come in black and white when you see it on a set of drawings is brilliant. Then we work with the smaller installers who are installing, say, one or two pedestals a month on an EV block Mini or maybe for a small business unit, and then with the larger contractors on big rollouts for AC charging, and the same again for the contractors working with those CPOs. We're working directly with those contractors in some instances, and then in the others, we're working directly with the CPO, and then they're free to issue the products to their contractors, so they're remaining in control of what's happening on their site and asking the installers to put these particular items in.

Liz Allan  [00:16:25]:
Okay. I mean this, like you said, you've been going for what, about kind of six, nearly six years now, haven't you?

Trevor Palmer [00:16:33]:
Yeah.

Liz Allan  [00:16:33]:
What, at what point did you realise, God, I'm onto a winner here, you know, like you said, you went through the whole thing with lockdown and the electrical contractors and, you know, your other businesses. And it takes time, it takes time to build a business anyway, doesn't it? But what, what was that? When was that turning point? When did you kind of go flipping it? Look at this.

Trevor Palmer [00:16:56]:
I think that only really came last year. So we're kind of like four or five years in, and we're going, "Okay, this is now working." You know, sales are coming through the door consistently, we're getting better quality conversations, and we've built a great team here, which is really important. You know, business is only as good as the team that's there. A product can be great, but if you don't market it right or don't have the right people working in that business, it will not work. So, yeah, it's been fantastic. The last, I'd say the last 18 months, it's really kind of turned a corner where it's actually working.

Liz Allan  [00:17:39]:
And that makes it feel very, very different then, doesn't it? And I'm gonna just say congratulations because you won the Global Entrepreneur of the Year award. And that must have been mind-blowing for you.

Trevor Palmer [00:17:55]:
Yeah, it's like, it's a nice bit of recognition. I mean, that event is sponsored by Alica Bank. They're one of the fastest-growing banks in Europe, I think. And it was, it was a great, great evening. And I say just to be recognised as knowing you're doing something valuable within, you know, UK small businesses that are often overlooked, it's pretty smart.

Liz Allan  [00:18:21]:
So what? What was it? Do you reckon that, do you, do you kind of, do you see the judge's notes or anything like that? I don't know whether you, whether you get totally.

Trevor Palmer [00:18:32]:
Yeah, you don't, you don't get to see anything that they've, they've written down. I mean, it was quite a decent application. You know, sort of six pages of talking about your business and how it started and where it's been, where it's going.

Liz Allan  [00:18:46]:
But I mean, the judges saw something in you and the business and you know, your explanation of, of what, what you were trying to do, that, that must have, that must have been brilliant for all of the, for you and all of the team.

Trevor Palmer [00:19:02]:
Oh, 100%. Yeah. Especially great to be recognised for what we're doing. You know, we've got EV Block manufacturing in America, Canada, Australia, and France now. And that was it. You know, going back to what I was talking about when I was at school, I was, you know, always kind of Wheeling and dealing and looking to do something different. And this was the contracting business was good. And you know, I've been an electrician for a long time, but I always been very creative and wanted to build a business that could be truly scaled.

Trevor Palmer [00:19:43]:
And the fact that we've been able to, to scale this across the globe is that the, that's the interesting bit, you know, that's the exciting bit, if you like.

Liz Allan  [00:19:53]:
So when, when did you start expanding then? When you know, because it's not easy to set up other businesses in other, in different countries, is it? You know what, what was kind of, was it when you started to get inquiries from other countries, you know, on a regular basis and then thought, blimey, we need to actually do something about, about manufacturing here?

Trevor Palmer [00:20:17]:
Yes, we got kind of really leaned into the marketing side and got a better understanding of what cuts through and something obviously cut through that we were doing back 20, 21 I think. And we got a couple of two or three people direct messaging me across LinkedIn, saying we like your idea, can we have a chat? And then off the back of that, we entered into a partnership with a company called Recon Wall Systems in the US, and they have helped us to license the product across the globe.

Liz Allan  [00:21:01]:
Blimey, that's amazing. So hang on, so how many countries did you say?

Trevor Palmer [00:21:07]:
So we're in the U.S., Canada, Australia and France, and we are looking at two more dots on the world map by the end of next year.

Liz Allan  [00:21:19]:
My God. But, but if we kind of look at the, you know, like I say, that kind of scaling. What, what if you learn, if you don't mind me asking, what have you learned so far from that level? I'm going from here in the UK to the, all these ideas and you know, and, and built. Starting to build a team to write. Okay, my God, we've got, we're going to have representation in all of these countries. What, what were the main challenges that you came across? Or whether there are too many to mention.

Trevor Palmer [00:21:52]:
Well, they're still present. I mean, in the US, there are 20 different concrete manufacturers that create or make EV blocks under license. So there are 20 stakeholders that need looking after straight away, just in the US, a couple in Canada, the guys in Oz and France. And that is a lot of internal touchpoints. And then you need to be able to market that message and get it out to the respective contractors in those countries so that they know Ev Blocks exists, and the marketing around that is very, very different. I'm here because over the last six years I've been to a lot of trade shows, been on stage on panels, you know, met a lot of people in person. So people have got that kind of personal connection with either me or Jordan or the ladies in the office, and they speak to them on the phone. That's really hard to replicate in a, in a different country when, when you're not on the ground as the person.

Trevor Palmer [00:23:09]:
So we're still working on that and on how we can engage the audience a bit better across the globe. But you know, having those businesses take on the product and work with us is just incredible.

Liz Allan  [00:23:28]:
It's a bit of plate spinning that's going on. I can imagine. You know, kind of it's. Are you. Because I find work, you know, we're running our own business. You end up working weekends because you've not got a choice in the matter, trying to fit everything in. Are you still doing that, or is it a little easier now that your team's bigger?

Trevor Palmer [00:23:51]:
Yeah, it's definitely got lotties or easier. Less demanding of me since we've put the right systems and processes in place and got the right people in the business. That said, there are a couple of kinds of burning projects that I like to work on in the evenings or when I can get a spare hour that will come to fruition at the right time. But the day-to-day running is no longer being in the office till 9, 10 o'clock at night. I mean I remember laminating those aluminum plates so God knows what time at night to then pack and wrap them and all the rest of every single one. And you look back and you guys, a thousand of those that were every single one I touched. And I think this was quite tough.

Trevor Palmer [00:24:51]:
It got to a point where this is just not sustainable. We can't, can't do it anymore. And that's where we moved technology there. Yeah. Going back to what you were saying is a lot easier. Just the thinking and the doing are very different to what they were before.

Liz Allan  [00:25:11]:
I mean, just think about that, though. What you kind of said about you touched every single one. And yes, it meant that you were in, in you know, work until God knows what time. But the legacy and that you're leaving behind, you know, that you went. Will end up leaving behind, you know, and the fact that you can say you've been involved in it all the time must kind of give you a bit of a nice warm feeling inside to see what it's turning into now.

Trevor Palmer [00:25:40]:
Yeah. That's incredible. And, you know, there's been some great people in my life who have made it in terms of business, and they've been very complimentary in what we've achieved. And I'm still 100% owner shareholder of Evblocks. We've not sold out to PE or any external investment, and we've built this from the ground up.

Liz Allan  [00:26:07]:
Wow. Which is going?

Trevor Palmer [00:26:09]:
It's kind of unheard of in our industry.

Liz Allan  [00:26:11]:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Flipping it. It's normally getting investment at fairly early ages, early, early stage, isn't it? So that's brilliant. And, if you kind of look at the simplicity and you talk about the different blocks themselves, the simplicity of the blocks so that they can. All that, that you are helping to future proof how, how easy was it for you to kind of be able to do that, to keep it, keep those, you know, keep what you're doing quite simple with, you know, so people knew what they were getting, but you could change. And you know, like you said about moving to D.C. and staying at AC to start off with, how easy is it, how easy has it been to keep it simple?

Trevor Palmer [00:27:01]:
It's had its challenges, but my kind of ethos is can we streamline it? Can, can we make it easier? And all of the initial work was about how to make the installer's life easier? Because I was the installer standing in the rain, trying to do concrete and all the rest of it, and it's just like this, socks. So how do we make this easier for an installer and for ourselves? Then we've got to the point where if it's easy for us, it's going to be easy for others. Built EV blocks to what it is no,w and kind of keeping that, that ethos of keep it easy for the installer. And in terms of scaling, then it's, it's been very repeatable because we've, we've worked out what works right now we can multiply that. That's been, that's been good. And also the engagement from CPOs when we're developing the DC products that really helps kind of steer what they are, what they require, what they, they do want, what they don't want and getting, getting something that's, that's fit for purpose for going out into the field. And I think we're pretty much there with that. It's been good.

Liz Allan  [00:28:25]:
So I was going to ask you about, about the pet, the patent, but What I'll ask you first. I suppose it's kind of a real burning question of mine. When you're, when you're talk when, when you've got an installer or a CPO that is organized or you know, however they work it, they must, you must be saving a hell of a lot of time because if you're putting a, putting a block in rather than, you know, like I said, going, excuse me, going back to what I said about my, my dad's garage, you know, and you doing the stuff with your dad and all that lot, that is time consuming, isn't it? So on average, tell only the top of your head, you know how much time of this, you know, because you'd know, because you did this, but originally didn't you? How much time is this? Are the blocks saving somebody's install?

Trevor Palmer [00:29:17]:
We are looking around. 30% time saved.

Liz Allan  [00:29:22]:
Blow me.

Trevor Palmer [00:29:23]:
But it's kind of, it's more impactful with the bigger the site, because then you get less shuttering to be made. You know, guys can drop in 10 foundations in a morning rather than just building the shuttering up in, in the morning. So. And we're having a couple of time studies done to look at the difference. But it's not only what's happening on site that's the saving for the contractor, who do not have staff in hotels overnight, but they've also not got return visits to the site a week later to take the shuttering off and mount the charger, because all that can be done the same day with our product. So then you've got reduced hotels, reduced diesel backwards and forwards to the site, because let's face it, the guys and girls are still in diesel vans at the moment. So that kind of goes into that story of working towards net zero and reducing the number of trips to the site, reducing your project time. So it has a big knock-on effect when the contract is really getting into the product.

Trevor Palmer [00:30:33]:
We've seen that a few times where contractors have been on the fence, and they're like, well, we'll try it on this small site. Once they try it once, that's it. They just keep coming back because it's like they can see it on site and see the guys working with the product, and then the light bulb goes off and they go oh, this is a no-brainer. Why didn't we do this before? And you're like, we did try to tell you guys, but.

Liz Allan  [00:31:02]:
But it's winning them over, isn't it? It's, it's like you say, it's a bit like driving an Ev really, isn't it? You know, you have to drive one to actually work out that they're actually pretty decent for what you're talking about. You've got to actually try them out and get the teams to do the work. And for somebody to, you know, everybody be stood, stood there and going, blimey, we've just, as you said, you saved 30 minutes. But again, it's not just the time to win, you know, kind of to put the, the fixings in and all the, you know, kind of all, all the backfilling or whatever and the concrete in and the weight in, in the hotels, as you said. So I suppose all in all, it's not just 30, is it? There's so much more because there are so many more people. Yeah. So all you need to do is. I mean, this is from my improvement background is totally kicking in now, you know, from like, like you said, a time, a time savings.

Liz Allan  [00:31:55]:
In fact, my dad going back to my dad again, bless him, when he was working, he used to do what they called time and motion studies, which were the precursor to what I do, which is kind of bizarre because we didn't even, I didn't even know for many years what my dad did because, you know, it was just my dad, you know, and then it was when I was realized, when I realized like he was doing time of motion, which was just stop watching, you know, start it, stop it, see what the time is. How long is it? How long is it taking somebody? Are there better ways of doing things? And it sounds like you have found better ways and are saving that time, you know, saving that time. God, I bet your case studies are going to be amazing for this.

Trevor Palmer [00:32:38]:
Yeah. I mean, some of the, like the images that get shared from contractors back to us and the feedback back from the contractors we get, it's fantastic. It, it is. It's really difficult to kind of put all that information together. You know, the hotel room saved, the diesel trips backwards and forward saved, and the time physically doing the job on site saved. It's really hard to quantify, but we do know that, you know, it's definitely faster than building shuttering, pouring wet concrete, and waiting a week.

Liz Allan  [00:33:16]:
Definitely, what you need is somebody who can do really good process mapping. I'm just pointing at myself here.

Trevor Palmer [00:33:24]:
Oh, I hit you up, Liz.

Liz Allan  [00:33:25]:
I will definitely do some process mapping for you there. I'm sorry, I'm going. I'm geeking out, people. I'm geeking out. I bet another person who's geeking out. Well, I reckon Angela Mureson is probably having a wonderful time while she's handling some of the social media marketing for you guys. Because like you said, you know, all of the things that you're getting back and sharing. I bet it, I bet it's, you know, I bet she's rubbing her hands together, going, oh, look at all of this coming in. Because it must be.

Liz Allan  [00:33:55]:
It's a marketer's dream, really, isn't it?

Trevor Palmer [00:33:58]:
Yeah. To be able to get content back from the outside world on a regular basis. Is that helpful? We want to kind of lift up the contractors who are working with us as well, because we appreciate the business they're doing with us. Can we help them with an introduction to somewhere else, or, you know, kind of what goes around comes around? Right?

Liz Allan  [00:34:22]:
You're not wrong. Absolutely. Yeah. Because there are a lot of people in this, in this sector that don't always get kind of recognition. So the fact that you can share that will, will make it. Do you know what? I was talking to somebody else on another podcast about this. It's about showing your care, isn't it? You know, showing that you, that what, that what they're doing, it proves what you're doing is a good thing, but it also proves what they're doing is a good thing too. Which is, which is just.

Liz Allan  [00:34:53]:
Yeah, it makes a massive, A massive difference. So if we kind of look at the sort of the, the net zero angle on this, you've talked about it, haven't you? You said that you've got. There are people still driving around in diesel vans because, probably in some cases, it's a cost thing. It's also potentially, you know, depends on the distance that they've got a, They've got to drive from wherever they're coming from. Coming to where? How, where do you think we're going with, with the, trying to get the installers, etc to move over to evs. Are they, are they? If you're seeing these guys and girls, should I say, are you seeing them recognise that EVS are a good thing from a personal point of view, really? I suppose.

Trevor Palmer [00:35:47]:
Yeah, definitely. I've seen more installers pick up a electric vehicle for their own personal use, you know, and certainly when they go out to site and they're already driving electric vehicle and they're selling electric vehicle charge points kind of goes hand in hand when they're pitching their business to, you know, somebody wants these EV charger points installed at a site secondhand car market for electric car. Cars still seemed pretty, pretty strong. And even talking to the neighbours a couple of nights ago, like, yeah, I think we'll go electric next. No one's got a gun to the head saying, you must go electric. Everyone's kind of clocking on, going, well, this is not bad. And especially, especially noticeable when, you know, I do the school run, and there are all those tailpipe fumes outside the front of school when you're thinking, that's not fantastic.

Liz Allan  [00:36:47]:
It's not good for your kids, for you, is it?

Trevor Palmer [00:36:49]:
Yeah, yeah. So. But this kind of transition to electric is. It's not overnight, it's work in progress. And it will come.

Liz Allan  [00:37:01]:
So let's, let's talk about kind of you and sort of like, what. I know I kind of said some of the lessons learned, but what about, what about being a leader? How is that? Because you're now, you're now looking at extended teams, aren't you? How's that kind of. You could. I'll just go back a second. Being an entrepreneur is one thing, and being an inventor is something else. But, but being a leader and in charge of teams is, you know, and I know you've got other people who are helping run the teams as well, but how's that been as a bit of a journey over, like, these past five, six years? Was it like one chocolate, you're all right with it?

Trevor Palmer [00:37:48]:
No, definitely not. It's like all the other elements of business. It is a learned skill. You know, no one's a natural born leader or no one's an, know, a natural born accountant. You know, it's like, come on. So that's definitely one of the skills that I'm, I'm working on and working towards being, being better in that field. You know, I'm pretty good at the creative side, and some of the other entrepreneurial bits that you need to be strong in, and there's room for improvement in other areas. So.

Trevor Palmer [00:38:30]:
Yeah, no one's perfect, right?

Liz Allan  [00:38:34]:
No. And you know what, it's funny because it takes time, doesn't it, as an entrepreneur or business owner to actually recognise that you can't be everything. You know, you can beat yourself up about not being that accountant, you know, as in, I can do, I can do the creative stuff. I can do the business development, the marketing and whatever, but I can't, you know, the accountancy is like, oh, my God, it's not my zone of genius, as I call it, but actually recognising that you, you know, you, you don't have to do all these things. You can get other people to come and help you. And it's, I think it's that sometimes when you recognize, well, actually I do need this, I need a team around me just to support me and, and working off one another as well in a really positive way, you know, because you've got people to talk to about stuff and they get you and then you start feeding ideas, don't you?

Trevor Palmer [00:39:35]:
Yeah. And there's also having the capacity to lead still very hands on within the business and, and we're making some kind of strategic moves to kind of move me out of day to day so that I can help that wider picture that, you know, those licensees, those other stakeholders that are involved with EV blocks, I want to be able to have the time and the capacity to, to work with those guys. So we're changing things here in the UK so we can flex a little bit more outside the UK, then. So. And again, nothing happens overnight with these things, either, as much as I'd like them to.

Liz Allan  [00:40:26]:
But you know, like I say, yeah, the one thing you are, is agile when you're a smaller business, aren't you? You know, you can be like with the blocks, the, the stuff that you've been doing, you're quite, you've been quite agile. But there are certain things that do take that little bit longer, you know, longer, and sometimes it's, it's kind of hard to let go, but it's, it's kind of, it's, it's worth it, isn't it? Just even if it does take that little bit when, when it gets there, it's kind of like, oh my God, thank God for that, you know, but it's just, it's just part, it's all part of the journey that you're on as a business, really, isn't it?

Trevor Palmer [00:41:07]:
Yeah, yeah, for sure. And it's a great, you know, touch wood today. Great journey. Some tough lessons in there, but yeah, it's been really good.

Liz Allan  [00:41:18]:
So you said earlier, didn't you, that you're looking to expand into another couple of countries? What are you looking for besides that? Where do you want to go after these next couple? Do you want to, you know, is there, have you got, have you got a grand plan?

Trevor Palmer [00:41:39]:
We're always planning something. I mean, there are a couple of other products that we're looking at. Yes, we want to continue to grow the license network across the globe and just. Yeah, it's part of the reason I was, you know, trying to free up my time for the stuff that's outside of the UK, is to really, you know, learn a little bit more about running a global business or having multiple shop fronts, if you like. And I think that's, that's going to be where the focus is. If you like to just build our little EV blocks brand, you know, ultimately we're still, you know, a small business effectively. We've grown a good business from pretty much nothing. But we're not like a Goliath of the industry as of yet.

Liz Allan  [00:42:43]:
Not yet. But hey, you know, you never. Well, you never know. But what?

Trevor Palmer [00:42:48]:
Keep going.

Liz Allan  [00:42:49]:
Yeah, well, exactly. What, what do you want to learn next, then? What's next? As in, you know, if you kind of had the opportunity to kind of go, right, I can do these things, what do you want to learn nex,t and who would you like to learn it from? I said I wasn't going to throw you a curveball in there. It isn't. It. It's a nice curveball. What, what do you, you know, where have you got, say, like, I don't know why Stephen Bartlett just popped into my head then, you know, is, is it, is it kind of like you kind of, you know, somebody that you hold in high esteem that you kind of go, do you know what? I'd really love to know that. What that, you know, what that person knows? Do you know what I mean?

Trevor Palmer [00:43:38]:
You. Yeah, yeah, I'd definitely like to get involved with other businesses or in fact, we were discussing this around the dinner table last night of, of giving back and helping other business owners or budding entrepreneurs not make those same mistakes that I've made or that peers or mentors that I've had have showed me that, you know, they made these mistakes when they were up and coming and it saves you a lot of time, saves a lot of money, and it saves you a lot of heartache. You know, no one goes into business because they don't believe in it, and no one goes into business to fail. But I can tell you when you do fail or when it doesn't go right, it hurts. I mean, it's a right kicking. So if you can save someone from that, or not even, or not even save them, but steer someone away from making the same mistake you did, that's good news in my book.

Liz Allan  [00:44:52]:
So you're going to be adding mentoring to your, to your CV next than are you? Because that sounds like that. I can imagine that that'd be a really good thing for you, to be honest.

Trevor Palmer [00:45:03]:
Yeah, I'm open to it, that's for sure. Because it's, it's a decent thing to do.

Liz Allan  [00:45:12]:
Oh, I like that. I like that. So, just as one final thing. And I think, do you know what? I could have just ended on that because that's just a lovely point, really. If there was, if there was somebody, if there's somebody now who's just starting out in business and they just want some guidance, what would be, and it doesn't matter whether it's to do with what you're doing or not. Just, just a business, you know, somebody setting up in business, what would your advice be to them? What would be the most important thing that you'd want them to know?

Trevor Palmer [00:45:56]:
All the information you need is out there. And the biggest place I've found him is in the books. No one reads anymore, but a lot of the business and psychology books are still rel. You know, as relevant today as what they were when they were first published. And it's incredible. Some of the books that I've read or listed, I can't, I can read, but I can't read, and it goes in. So I'll listen to it on an audiobook, and it goes in. So I'm like, perfect.

Trevor Palmer [00:46:30]:
So having audiobooks has really helped me. Whether that's a three-hour car drive or doing something in the garden. Having audiobooks and learning new skills through them has been fantastic. And I would highly recommend that to anyone starting out.

Liz Allan  [00:46:53]:
That's a really, really good point. Really, it's because I said to you and other people know, watching, listening, I'm neurodivergent. My brain doesn't always work in the same way as, you know, my brain as somebody else. And, and everybody learns in different ways anyway, you know, and, and I am totally like you in the fact that I listen to audiobooks now because I get a lot from them and sometimes, especially when they're written by the author of the book, you can get that intonation from their voice, of their passion and, and it just makes a difference or I feel a bit emotional just saying that now. But seriously, it is really about, you know, kind of just listening to what they're saying and how they're saying it because they're wording it and their intonation is, you know, is exactly what they're trying to say. So I'm not, I'm really not saying that reading books, as in physical books is a bad thing, but for me, yeah, I just, you know what I've really, really, really appreciated your honesty, Trevor. It's. It's so refreshing.

Liz Allan  [00:48:03]:
It really, really is. And just to, you know, and that point about giving back, that is just. Yeah, there's, there's a lot of, a lot of people who don't always see that, but I really, really, I just, you know, you should be really proud of yourself just saying that. And I'm, I know I'm not just trying to be a, you know, a weirdo or anything like that. I'm just, I am serious. I am serious. I think that's just recognising that that's kind of one of the next steps and being able to support other people. I, I totally get you.

Liz Allan  [00:48:35]:
I really do. But look, on that note, I'm going to say thank you. It's been, it's been really, really good. It's been absolutely lovely talking to you and just getting to know you a little bit because we kind of, like I say we were introduced through Angela. You probably didn't know the heck I was beforehand. And we did have a chat, didn't we, originally. But it's been, it's been lovely to, to hear you and talk about the journey and just good luck. Onwards and upwards.

Trevor Palmer [00:49:00]:
I say thank you very much, Liz. I appreciate that.

Liz Allan  [00:49:04]:
So just everybody, I will be sharing. Please check out the links for evblocks.com in the show notes. I've just told you the link. Anyway, I will provide all of your other links. Anything else. But yeah, congratulations on the, you know, the Global Entrepreneur of the Year award. That is just fantastic. And yeah, just keep, keep doing, keep saving money, and if you want somebody to do process mapping, then give me a shout.

Trevor Palmer [00:49:33]:
Brilliant.

Liz Allan  [00:49:36]:
So to everybody, I'm just gonna say, look, I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I did. Please just check out his links. Check out our podcast page on LinkedIn. So. Electric Evolution podcast on LinkedIn. And thanks, Trevor. And thank you to everybody for joining me. I'll see you later.

Liz Allan  [00:50:00]:
Bye.