June 26, 2025 • 25 mins
We explore spot heating technology with Joe Bristow from BN Thermic, diving into how this instant, energy-efficient solution can transform village halls by heating people directly rather than warming the air.
• Spot heating provides immediate warmth without needing to pre-heat spaces, making it perfect for sporadic hall usage
• Spot heating targets people and objects rather than air temperature, working even with doors open
• Installation can often utilise existing wiring, making it cost-effective for halls with limited budgets
• Advanced control systems include motion sensors that activate heaters only when spaces are occupied
• The technology creates a noticeable "curtain of warmth" that transforms user comfort in otherwise difficult-to-heat spaces
• Integration with battery storage and renewable energy sources supports net-zero carbon goals
• A hybrid approach combining spot heating with minimal background heating protects building fabric from damp
Entries for the Village Halls Inspiration Awards 2025 are now open until September 30th. Visit our website at villagehallspodcast.com to find out more and submit your hall for consideration.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Marc Smith (00:01):
Hi, I'm Marc Smith and welcome to the Village Halls
podcast, sponsored by AlliedWestminster, the UK's largest
specialist provider of VillageHall insurance, and the home of
Village Guard.
Before we begin, a quickreminder that entries are now
open for the Village HallsInspiration Awards 2025,
celebrating the incredible workhappening in village, community
(00:24):
and church halls across thecountry.
You can apply between the 1stof May and the 30th of September
, so do consider putting yourhall forward.
Welcome to the Village Hallspodcast, the show that explores
the big ideas behind our smallcommunity spaces.
In this episode, we're focusingon a very specific kind of
warmth heating the people, notthe room.
(00:45):
It's called spot heating and itcan be a game changer for older
or drafty halls that are costlyto keep warm.
My guest today is Joe Bristowfrom BN Thermic, experts in
electric heating systemsdesigned especially for spaces
like yours.
Welcome to the podcast, Joe.
Thanks very much for having meon, Marc.
Oh, you're very welcome.
So could you tell us a littlebit about BN Thermic and your
(01:07):
role within the company?
Joe Bristow (01:09):
Yeah well, BNThermic.
We're a UK-based family-runmanufacturer of electric heaters
.
We've been based in Crawley,west Sussex, sort of near
Gatwick, for 20 years, thoughthe building's been in use for
about 60 years developingheaters, and we were born out of
a company called bush nelson in2005, so we're actually
(01:30):
celebrating our 20th anniversarya week Saturday.
We've got a nice big partycongratulations um, thank you
very much.
So we sell through uk electricalwholesalers.
So we sell through aswholesalers all over the country
.
So we're not installers, we'rejust purely manufacturers.
And then myself, I've been thetechnical sales manager here for
(01:51):
11 years and my basic role isto lead the sales and customer
service side of the business, soensuring the customers get the
right heater for the project,not just what looks good on
paper, making sure that weactually get down to the
nitty-gritty of what is neededto make sure they get the right
solution for them.
Marc Smith (02:11):
Excellent.
So what type of buildings doyou primarily supply to so?
Joe Bristow (02:17):
Basically all commercial and industrial
buildings, a few domestic hereand there.
So we're talking things likesports halls, warehouses,
village halls, obviously, and wehave a real strong focus on
churches as well.
We work quite closely with theChurch of England because
they're trying to get to netzero across the whole of their
range by 2030.
(02:38):
So, yeah, that they'reprimarily we do, but there's not
many applications that wehaven't got the ability to offer
a solution for.
Marc Smith (02:48):
Excellent.
Well, I'm glad you mentionedvillage halls there.
It would have been a bitawkward if I was like no, it
would be.
Yeah.
So we spoke earlier in the weekand we discussed something
called spot heating.
So and I wrongly said infrared,so this spot heating, which we
(03:08):
can get into, how it works later.
But so when I call it infraredbecause I spoke to someone else
about this as well, that wasdoing the podcast, and they also
mentioned infrared, but it'swrong.
So what is infrared and why isit not?
Joe Bristow (03:20):
what you do there Infrared is a sort of generic
term for the wavelength ofinfrared heating.
So in infrared we hadeverything from shortwave
heating all the way through tolong wake.
The problem with the terminfrared is you could be talking
about very different styles ofheater along that spectrum and
(03:42):
you can end up getting yourselfin quite a pickle because with
you're talking about one end ofthe spectrum, I'm talking about
the other end of the spectrumand therefore we're talking at
two completely different stylesof heating that are going to
provide different forms.
All infrared heaters radiateout heat, but the way that
translate into how we feel itand what it's really used for
(04:03):
differs quite quite largely allright, right, so spot heating,
then this is still I have.
Marc Smith (04:09):
I mean, it's obviously you'll know inside out
, but in my head it's still new.
I had never heard of it untilmaybe.
Well, you mentioned, I did hearabout it once, but I didn't
think anything of it.
So what is spot heating?
Joe Bristow (04:23):
So spot heating is heating people and objects
directly, rather than trying toincrease the overall air
temperature.
The simplest way to put it it'sa little bit like sunlight
You're outside in the shade, youfeel cold.
You walk into the sunlight, youfeel warm.
The air temperature hasn'tchanged, but you're now getting
the.
You're being spot heated by thesun.
That's the simplest way to putit, I think.
Marc Smith (04:51):
Right, right, getting the.
You're being spot heated by thesun, that's, that's the
simplest way to put it, I thinkright.
Joe Bristow (04:52):
Right, why?
Why do you think they work wellwithin village halls, in
particular old village halls?
So the big problem you get withvillage halls is they.
They tend to be poorlyinsulated, relatively drafty and
often in sporadic use.
So the problem you have withgoing down the other option,
which is space heating, sobuilding up a body of warm air,
yeah, if you're using itsporadically and only for a few
hours at a time, by the timeyou've turned the spacing system
(05:13):
on and got it up to temperature, you're ready to leave.
So it's a really ineffectivesystem.
You've effectively just wastedsome energy that you didn't get
the benefit from.
Yeah, so when you go down thespot heating route, it's
absolutely instantaneous.
So you turn it on only whenthat space is occupied and you
feel the benefit absolutelyinstantly.
So that's the, that's the truebenefit of it all.
Marc Smith (05:34):
Right now this might sound like a crazy question, uh
, so, when you have this spotheating on we did this is just a
thought would it matter if thedoor was open to the outside?
Joe Bristow (05:44):
No, that's the interesting part, because you're
not heating the air at all.
In fact, the idea is to bypassthe moisture in the air, which
is how you feel warmth, andyou're just heating anything
with mass.
So people objects.
So because of that, you don'tneed to worry about doors,
roller shutter doors, windows,things like that.
You're still heating the person.
Marc Smith (06:05):
Right, so insulation doesn't really matter then, no,
not at all.
Joe Bristow (06:09):
The only benefit of having higher levels of
insulation are if you're usingit for long periods.
Let's say you had a day whereyou're using it from nine till
five.
What will eventually happen is,as the shortwave energy hits
you, hits you directly and hitsthe floor, you start to convect
out the heat.
So eventually you actually willbring the overall temperature
(06:30):
up, but that's, that's the sortof secondary benefit of it
rather than the primary benefitof it all right, so you're
saying they're nine to five.
Marc Smith (06:37):
Is it a crossover between when spot heaters are
perfect and a point where theyare no longer.
You know you're better to usethe convection heating.
Yes, there definitely is.
Joe Bristow (06:48):
Um, it would be very much on building use and um
things like heat loss and andair loss.
So if you had a building thatwas in consistent use monday to
friday 90 or 5, as an examplethen actually you're probably
going to get the benefits ofspace heating because when it
hits its temperature it turnsoff, whereas with the spot
(07:11):
heaters they'll be on for themajority of that day.
Maybe when the area getsslightly warmer you might turn
them off, but realistically,throughout that whole day they
would be on.
But with a space heating systemthey're going to come in and
off from that thermostat, soyou're going to end up saving
energy.
So it's a real.
This is why it's important thatwe understand exactly what
(07:32):
we're doing in terms of howoften it's in use and the the
insulation levels of thebuilding, because there's no one
size fits all approach.
Yeah, I have to reallyunderstand what you're doing and
particularly how the buildingis in use.
Marc Smith (07:46):
You just said something there about a
thermostat.
So with spot heating, obviouslya thermostat in my house knows
the temperature of the room,which I assume is the air as
well.
How does a spot heater know thetemperature that it's putting
out, like say, oh I want to feel21 degrees?
How does it know?
Does it just put out a weaker?
(08:07):
I'm going to call it a signal,but it's obviously not.
But how does that regulate atemperature?
Joe Bristow (08:12):
So it doesn't regulate the temperature as such
.
Usually they're controlled bythings like on-off buttons, push
button timers or movementsensors.
So somebody walks into the roomand it goes on.
Now what you can do is, beforethat, before those controls, you
can put in a thermostat so theydon't have the option of
turning on because it's 25degrees or whatever it's going
to be, and only when it dropsbelow a certain temperature is
(08:35):
it allowed to turn on.
Once the on-off button or thepush-button time on the movement
sensor is engaged, so you canadd that into it to stop any
unreasonable heat build-up.
Marc Smith (08:47):
For no, when the when the air temperature has
increased oh, that's good, yeah,yeah, I always assume that it's
cold in the uk, but is that youdo get warm periods, like today
, I suppose?
Yeah, you wouldn't need it.
On the, the cost between thetwo like, not the cost of the
actual product but the cost ofthe energy.
Is it comparable with the?
Obviously you don't have topreheat with the spot heating,
(09:08):
but is once it's on.
Is it comparable with the, theold, old-fashioned heating like?
Joe Bristow (09:14):
the panel heaters or you probably need more
overall energy to spot heat,because you need a a larger
amount of heat to heat youdirectly.
But the benefit comes in thereduced time scale.
So, for example, if you weretrying to I don't you had a yoga
class between 9 and 11 and youwere trying to space heat that
area.
Depending on the building'sheat loss, you might well be
(09:37):
turning that on a couple ofhours prior to give it time to
build up to it.
So you're getting a lot ofenergy in use when the
building's not occupied.
With the spot heaters, you turnit on the moment you need it
and then the moment you don'tneed it you're turning it
straight off.
So it's more to do with thereduced timescale rather than
the overall energy being used atthat time.
Marc Smith (09:58):
All right, that's interesting actually.
Yeah, so if a village hall waslooking to install these and
they've got existing heating inthere which heats the air, and
it's a sporadically used halland it fits all the criteria, do
they need to rewire?
Or can you take off a panelheater and put on a spot heater?
(10:18):
Or do they need to be high up,is it?
Joe Bristow (10:22):
interchangeable.
They tend to be higher up thanpanel heaters would be.
So warm-mounted panel heatersbecause they need to be high up
so they get a nice spread, sothey can spread the heat out
quite wide and quite far.
It depends on the size of thepanel heater.
So from experience in villagehalls you tend to be having
three kilowatt heaters on thewall.
That tends as a rough guideline.
(10:43):
Now panel heaters tend to besomewhere between two and three
kilowatts.
So, assuming you've got thecorrect supply there, yeah, at
that point it's just a case ofraising the wire up to the point
where you need to mount theheater itself, um, and obviously
making the heat safe that's.
Marc Smith (10:59):
That's really good that yeah, because I think a lot
of village halls, well, they'llhave heating already,
especially the older halls.
Joe Bristow (11:04):
It'll be the old style heater and the fact you
can just change it straight over, as is uh is yes, it's pretty
good yeah, well, that's the ideato try and keep it to minimal
windstool costs where possiblewhen we so I do a lot of site
visits where I get out tovillage halls and go and see it
firsthand, and we always try tokeep that in mind because that's
(11:25):
going to reduce yourinstallation costs quite a lot
and there's not a lot of moneyfor village hogs, so we try and
keep that in mind.
Marc Smith (11:31):
Yeah yeah, I suppose these this type of village hog
we're talking about, they're, Isuppose they're older and they
have issues with damp.
What's?
What are the?
Is there any complications whenit comes to spot heating?
If?
If there is an issue with damp,or or do you battle that with a
dehumidifier?
Or can you maybe add aconvection heater alongside spot
(11:55):
heaters, just to tackle some ofthe challenges that the halls
have?
Joe Bristow (11:59):
Yeah, you're putting the nail on the head,
really.
So, because spot heating isjust heating when it's needed.
They're often turned off forvast periods of time, sometimes
even days.
So in terms of things like dampin the building or even low
temperatures, especially whereyou are, you're going to get
incredibly low temperatures.
Sometimes it makes absolutesense to keep a convector heater
(12:20):
in the background, justmaintaining a very low
temperature.
So only maintaining it, let'ssay, eight, nine degrees, which
isn't that much warmer than thefront of a fridge, but that way
it stopped one.
It protects your pipe work fromfreezing, so you haven't got to
worry about any water pipes andit just maintains the fabric of
the building slightly warmer,um to hopefully, hopefully, stop
(12:41):
damp.
So that's often what is doneall right, interesting.
Marc Smith (12:44):
Yeah, so you mentioned um with the spot here.
You mentioned that littlebuttons at the side that can
they, they can they, can controlthem, and then a motion sensor.
So that's really quite clever.
So if you're walking, you neveractually really need to turn
them on.
So I assume you would say or donot come on.
Uh, below 21 degrees, if youdetect movement, check if it's
(13:08):
21 degrees.
If it's below, turn on.
If not, stay off.
Is that what that's allsupplied?
Is that all supplied with theactual heaters you, you make?
Joe Bristow (13:18):
or yeah.
So they're all different parts,but we said all three.
So what you would in thisscenario you would have power
going to a thermostat and then,through the thermostat, goes to
the movement sensor and then tothe heaters.
So what you're effectivelydoing are the first sort of yes
or no is the thermostat.
So if it's below your set point, well, that's a yes.
Lets the power pass, yeah.
(13:39):
And then when you come in andyou walk in front of the
movement sensor, that's the nextyes, and that allows the power
to get through the heater, whichthen which then energizes it.
So, yeah, that's exactly how itwould work.
Marc Smith (13:49):
Oh, excellent, that's fantastic.
So I assume it does.
But do you integrate withbattery storage and renewable
energy?
I take it it's just a case ofjust literally swap it out and
it'll work with whateverexisting system they have in
place in the village hall.
Joe Bristow (14:05):
Yeah, all the battery storage is just a power
source, so it's just getting itthrough to there, so absolutely
all right, and it's fastbecoming a much more used thing.
Even churches now are doingthat, um.
So yeah, it's.
It's very much becoming amodern thing to do, which is a
great idea yeah, definitely soin your experience.
Marc Smith (14:24):
What uh questions should a hall committee member
ask when they're sourcingheating quotes?
So this could be for spotheating or any type of heating.
Joe Bristow (14:35):
The first one seems unusual for me to say but
what's the downside to thissystem?
Because there's alwaysdownsides to it and it's better
to be aware of the reality ofthe system rather than the sort
of the the ideal system thatcould it could be.
You will know what's.
What's the reality.
So, for example, with spotheaters, what the reality is,
(14:56):
it's not going to be um helpfulfor the fabric if the building's
left unheated for days at atime.
So in that point you might needto look at a convection system
if that's something you'reworried about.
Yeah, if you're using a spaceheating system, or how long,
what's going to be the runningcost?
If I need to run that for 90 or5, what's the realistic running
cost going to be?
Which is very difficult to workout because it comes down to
(15:20):
heat loss, air changes, outsidetemperature.
So it's trying to work out fromreality and a lot of the times
you can do that by looking atyour current system and you can
look at the running cost.
It's been for that.
If you have a space heatingsystem currently, you can sort
of try and look at that and thentry and use a comparison to see
how much it's going to cost torun.
So I think that's that would bethe important bit.
(15:42):
The other thing would be thecontrol, because the control is
really key to reducing yourenergy costs.
That has the largest impact, inmy opinion, of how you're going
to keep those running costs toa minimum but still making sure
that you get the benefit thatyou're looking for.
So I think the control becomesreally important and I always
(16:04):
joke that we're a heatingcompany but we're also a
controls company, because overthe years we've had so many
ideas from site visits andseeing the real world reality
and we've created controls basedon just these.
So I think the controls are areally big asset.
They're the two things I wouldsuggest that we ask.
Marc Smith (16:21):
Yeah, I did notice that on your website.
So you actually manufacture thecontrols themselves, the little
wall panels.
Joe Bristow (16:26):
Yeah, that's it.
So a good example is movementsensors.
There aren't a lot on themarket at all and very few that
can deal with the heaters thatwe use for spot heating.
So we have one of our engineerscan you please make one?
And then six months later wehave got two movement sensors
because we saw a need for it,and I'm on site enough that I
(16:49):
see that there's a real, a realbenefit to having them, and
within six months they're therealready that's amazing, that's
yeah, that's quite, uh, that'squite a feat.
Marc Smith (17:00):
It's great to see that that you're.
You see an issue and you can.
You can actually solve it yeah,it's not like you're, yeah, you
don't have to go looking forthe, the solution you, you can
create one yourself yeah, we'revery lucky.
Joe Bristow (17:10):
We've got quite a few engineers that are.
They're very quick to react, um, and it's a challenge and they
like a challenge.
It's sort of fixing with their,with their mindset really, um,
so there's been a, there's beena few controllers that I've been
directly involved with, whichis quite nice because there's
not many jobs where you can go.
I think we need a product andthen eventually the product
turns up.
I mean it's slightly scarybecause then you need to sell it
(17:33):
, because if you don't sell it,it's quite a nice way to work
excellent.
Marc Smith (17:37):
Yeah, so when you've your experience, when you've
been putting these systems intohalls, what's the feedback been?
Joe Bristow (17:47):
We always get the feedback that, especially with
spot heating systems, of howbeneficial it is having it work
absolutely instantaneously.
Because the reality is a lot ofvillage halls have old spacing
systems and over the years theuse of the village hall has
changed, but the problem is theheating system hasn't gone along
(18:08):
with it, so they've beenturning the systems on and
they're never really getting thebenefit of it, whereas when we
go in and we suggest spottingsystems, once they're installed,
the response is brilliantbecause they just have this
active, instant heat and it'scompletely noticeable.
And that's that's the.
That's the best bit about it isthey can notice that and people
walk in and go oh wow, that'sthat, that's suddenly a great, a
(18:30):
great amount of heat that theycan feel.
So I think that's that's the.
The biggest feedback we get ishow brilliant the instantaneous
um heat is all right.
Marc Smith (18:39):
All right.
Here's stupid question numbertwo for you.
Does it feel any different?
And I really want to have ashot of one of these things, but
does it feel any?
Can you feel a difference inthe type of heat that's coming
from these spot heaters orwhat's you?
Joe Bristow (18:52):
you can, yes is the honest answer.
So, especially when they'refirst turned on, because there's
a relatively defined beampattern.
So if you imagine a, a lightunit, it has a beam.
If you imagine a beam like that, but with heat, so you, you
notice a very defined beampattern.
So I feel warm here and if Itake a step backwards I won't
feel warm.
(19:13):
So there's a certain that.
But having said that, assumingwe've got the layout correct,
which is obviously my job, wehave.
You give it 15, 20 minutes andwhere the floor starts to warm
up, the walls start to warm upand they start to slowly convect
out the heat.
It feels relatively similar toto a normal heating system.
(19:33):
Um, the we use them in ourwarehouse, because massive
warehouse don't want to heat thewhole thing, and there's a
particular run of a sort of likemanufacturing run when we,
where we build the heaters, andyou, when you walk into where
the heaters cover, it's almostlike a curtain of warmth and
anywhere within that that area,all right, right, it's warm.
(19:53):
And it's really unusual becauseoutside of it, where we don't
have the heaters, it's cool asthe as the rest of the area is.
Yeah, you sort of take thatstep through that barrier and
it's it's really nice that'samazing.
Marc Smith (20:05):
Yeah, I I'm.
Yeah, I need to have a shot.
I need to find someone with oneof these.
Yeah, it's gonna have a shot.
It does sound quite cool.
Yeah.
So one thing you said there.
So it does.
It heats any, any surface thespot heater.
So one of the issues that wehad this is years ago when I
played badminton down the hall,see, when it was cold and the
floor would be slippery becauseof the condensation.
(20:26):
So that would also tackle thatas well, because it would heat
the floor.
Joe Bristow (20:30):
It would certainly heat the floor.
If it's directed towards thefloor, it would absolutely do
that.
I mean, we actually use them insquash courts quite a lot.
So especially with sporadicallyused squash courts, yeah, that
trying to build up a body warmin there is nigh on impossible,
and a lot of the time they'reopen to a gallery.
So you're not just heating thesquash court, you've got to heat
the gallery as well, yeah, um,so we we've we do a lot of
(20:53):
squash court heating with them,um, and they're sort of mounted
high up and and they've beendown over it and it works an
absolute treat.
So, yeah, they're certainlygoing to heat the floor there,
absolutely.
Marc Smith (21:06):
So how long have I been oblivious to this
technology?
How long have they been out for?
Joe Bristow (21:10):
Oh, I mean years and years, is it really?
Oh, 100%.
So they I don't know if youremember the old pool cord
bathroom heaters oh, yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I grew up with one of thosethat's a style of it and they
sort of moved on from there and,as far as I'm aware, sort of
early 2000s is when they reallysort of came onto the mass
(21:32):
market and they used to havethese like a red filter over the
top and you'd get this brightred light.
Well, it was warm, which islovely, yeah, but it would just
discolor everything.
Everything in that area wouldchange color, right, um.
And then we introduced a goldlamp I don't know when we
(21:52):
introduced it, um, which had amuch lesser light output, but
still a light output nonetheless, yeah.
And then I'm gonna say aboutfive years ago but I'm sure I've
been saying about five yearsago for two years we came up
with a new lamp and it's calledthe magic lamp, right?
Basically, it's primarily usedin churches, where they don't
want a bright red light, yeah,and you get the same heat
(22:16):
intensity, but you don't get thediscoloration.
You can certainly see thediscoloration, um, you can
certainly see that the lamp ison.
So you can certainly see thatthe filament is energized, um,
but you have a heavily reducedlight output.
So they've been around a longtime and they're just slowly
getting better with everygeneration that comes through
right.
Marc Smith (22:34):
well, it's a good time to have this because a lot
of halls, everyone's looking fornet zero.
Everyone, everyone's trying tobecome as energy efficient as
possible, so they do make a lotof sense if you don't have.
As I was saying earlier on, Iwas looking at a village hall
that got I think it was about2.1 million to convert the hall
into a warm hub, which isfantastic, but there's so many
halls that don't have it, sothis is actually another good
(22:56):
way to do it without if you'venot got 2.1 million spare you
can, you can still um save costs.
You know, save a lot of energycosts by putting uh or
converting what you've gotalready to uh to spot heating
yeah, it really is and and andreally focus in on the, the use
of the building.
Joe Bristow (23:15):
That's where it is.
And then if you go with anelectrical supplier that has, um
, has like a net zero, um sortof agreement you've got you're
getting a very green electricitythrough to the building, adding
the fact you're not usingfossil fuels, you're using
electric heaters, yeah, andyou're well on your way to net
zero or decarbonizationexcellent.
Marc Smith (23:38):
Well, that's been a.
I don't have any more sillyquestions to ask you.
They seem silly in my head, butnow, probably, listening back,
I think I shouldn't have askedthat, but I think it's.
I can't believe I've missedthis.
I I don't know why I've missedthis, but yeah, it's so
fascinating and I think it's a.
It totally makes sense for, youknow, for churches we like any
big space that's, um, that'sused sporadically.
(24:00):
Certainly Village Hall us waschurches every Sunday.
But yeah, I think it's amazing.
Thank you very much for comingon, no problem at all.
Thanks very much for having me.
You're very welcome.
Many thanks to our headlinesponsor and specialist Village
Hall insurance provider, alliedWestminster, the home of Village
Guard, for making this podcastpossible, and to online booking
(24:22):
system provider, Hallmaster, whoalso sponsor our podcast and
can be found at Hallmaster.
co.
uk.
You've been listening to theVillage Halls podcast, a unique
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(24:43):
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com, where you'll also findlinks to our social media pages.
Thanks again for listening inand until next time.
Goodbye for now.
Hi, I'm Marc Smith and welcome to the Village Halls
podcast, sponsored by AlliedWestminster, the UK's largest
specialist provider of VillageHall insurance, and the home of
Village Guard.
Before we begin, a quickreminder that entries are now
open for the Village HallsInspiration Awards 2025,
celebrating the incredible workhappening in village, community
(00:24):
and church halls across thecountry.
You can apply between the 1stof May and the 30th of September
, so do consider putting yourhall forward.
Welcome to the Village Hallspodcast, the show that explores
the big ideas behind our smallcommunity spaces.
In this episode, we're focusingon a very specific kind of
warmth heating the people, notthe room.
(00:45):
It's called spot heating and itcan be a game changer for older
or drafty halls that are costlyto keep warm.
My guest today is Joe Bristowfrom BN Thermic, experts in
electric heating systemsdesigned especially for spaces
like yours.
Welcome to the podcast, Joe.
Thanks very much for having meon, Marc.
Oh, you're very welcome.
So could you tell us a littlebit about BN Thermic and your
(01:07):
role within the company?
Joe Bristow (01:09):
Yeah well, BNThermic.
We're a UK-based family-runmanufacturer of electric heaters
.
We've been based in Crawley,west Sussex, sort of near
Gatwick, for 20 years, thoughthe building's been in use for
about 60 years developingheaters, and we were born out of
a company called bush nelson in2005, so we're actually
(01:30):
celebrating our 20th anniversarya week Saturday.
We've got a nice big partycongratulations um, thank you
very much.
So we sell through uk electricalwholesalers.
So we sell through aswholesalers all over the country
.
So we're not installers, we'rejust purely manufacturers.
And then myself, I've been thetechnical sales manager here for
(01:51):
11 years and my basic role isto lead the sales and customer
service side of the business, soensuring the customers get the
right heater for the project,not just what looks good on
paper, making sure that weactually get down to the
nitty-gritty of what is neededto make sure they get the right
solution for them.
Marc Smith (02:11):
Excellent.
So what type of buildings doyou primarily supply to so?
Joe Bristow (02:17):
Basically all commercial and industrial
buildings, a few domestic hereand there.
So we're talking things likesports halls, warehouses,
village halls, obviously, and wehave a real strong focus on
churches as well.
We work quite closely with theChurch of England because
they're trying to get to netzero across the whole of their
range by 2030.
(02:38):
So, yeah, that they'reprimarily we do, but there's not
many applications that wehaven't got the ability to offer
a solution for.
Marc Smith (02:48):
Excellent.
Well, I'm glad you mentionedvillage halls there.
It would have been a bitawkward if I was like no, it
would be.
Yeah.
So we spoke earlier in the weekand we discussed something
called spot heating.
So and I wrongly said infrared,so this spot heating, which we
(03:08):
can get into, how it works later.
But so when I call it infraredbecause I spoke to someone else
about this as well, that wasdoing the podcast, and they also
mentioned infrared, but it'swrong.
So what is infrared and why isit not?
Joe Bristow (03:20):
what you do there Infrared is a sort of generic
term for the wavelength ofinfrared heating.
So in infrared we hadeverything from shortwave
heating all the way through tolong wake.
The problem with the terminfrared is you could be talking
about very different styles ofheater along that spectrum and
(03:42):
you can end up getting yourselfin quite a pickle because with
you're talking about one end ofthe spectrum, I'm talking about
the other end of the spectrumand therefore we're talking at
two completely different stylesof heating that are going to
provide different forms.
All infrared heaters radiateout heat, but the way that
translate into how we feel itand what it's really used for
(04:03):
differs quite quite largely allright, right, so spot heating,
then this is still I have.
Marc Smith (04:09):
I mean, it's obviously you'll know inside out
, but in my head it's still new.
I had never heard of it untilmaybe.
Well, you mentioned, I did hearabout it once, but I didn't
think anything of it.
So what is spot heating?
Joe Bristow (04:23):
So spot heating is heating people and objects
directly, rather than trying toincrease the overall air
temperature.
The simplest way to put it it'sa little bit like sunlight
You're outside in the shade, youfeel cold.
You walk into the sunlight, youfeel warm.
The air temperature hasn'tchanged, but you're now getting
the.
You're being spot heated by thesun.
That's the simplest way to putit, I think.
Marc Smith (04:51):
Right, right, getting the.
You're being spot heated by thesun, that's, that's the
simplest way to put it, I thinkright.
Joe Bristow (04:52):
Right, why?
Why do you think they work wellwithin village halls, in
particular old village halls?
So the big problem you get withvillage halls is they.
They tend to be poorlyinsulated, relatively drafty and
often in sporadic use.
So the problem you have withgoing down the other option,
which is space heating, sobuilding up a body of warm air,
yeah, if you're using itsporadically and only for a few
hours at a time, by the timeyou've turned the spacing system
(05:13):
on and got it up to temperature, you're ready to leave.
So it's a really ineffectivesystem.
You've effectively just wastedsome energy that you didn't get
the benefit from.
Yeah, so when you go down thespot heating route, it's
absolutely instantaneous.
So you turn it on only whenthat space is occupied and you
feel the benefit absolutelyinstantly.
So that's the, that's the truebenefit of it all.
Marc Smith (05:34):
Right now this might sound like a crazy question, uh
, so, when you have this spotheating on we did this is just a
thought would it matter if thedoor was open to the outside?
Joe Bristow (05:44):
No, that's the interesting part, because you're
not heating the air at all.
In fact, the idea is to bypassthe moisture in the air, which
is how you feel warmth, andyou're just heating anything
with mass.
So people objects.
So because of that, you don'tneed to worry about doors,
roller shutter doors, windows,things like that.
You're still heating the person.
Marc Smith (06:05):
Right, so insulation doesn't really matter then, no,
not at all.
Joe Bristow (06:09):
The only benefit of having higher levels of
insulation are if you're usingit for long periods.
Let's say you had a day whereyou're using it from nine till
five.
What will eventually happen is,as the shortwave energy hits
you, hits you directly and hitsthe floor, you start to convect
out the heat.
So eventually you actually willbring the overall temperature
(06:30):
up, but that's, that's the sortof secondary benefit of it
rather than the primary benefitof it all right, so you're
saying they're nine to five.
Marc Smith (06:37):
Is it a crossover between when spot heaters are
perfect and a point where theyare no longer.
You know you're better to usethe convection heating.
Yes, there definitely is.
Joe Bristow (06:48):
Um, it would be very much on building use and um
things like heat loss and andair loss.
So if you had a building thatwas in consistent use monday to
friday 90 or 5, as an examplethen actually you're probably
going to get the benefits ofspace heating because when it
hits its temperature it turnsoff, whereas with the spot
(07:11):
heaters they'll be on for themajority of that day.
Maybe when the area getsslightly warmer you might turn
them off, but realistically,throughout that whole day they
would be on.
But with a space heating systemthey're going to come in and
off from that thermostat, soyou're going to end up saving
energy.
So it's a real.
This is why it's important thatwe understand exactly what
(07:32):
we're doing in terms of howoften it's in use and the the
insulation levels of thebuilding, because there's no one
size fits all approach.
Yeah, I have to reallyunderstand what you're doing and
particularly how the buildingis in use.
Marc Smith (07:46):
You just said something there about a
thermostat.
So with spot heating, obviouslya thermostat in my house knows
the temperature of the room,which I assume is the air as
well.
How does a spot heater know thetemperature that it's putting
out, like say, oh I want to feel21 degrees?
How does it know?
Does it just put out a weaker?
(08:07):
I'm going to call it a signal,but it's obviously not.
But how does that regulate atemperature?
Joe Bristow (08:12):
So it doesn't regulate the temperature as such
.
Usually they're controlled bythings like on-off buttons, push
button timers or movementsensors.
So somebody walks into the roomand it goes on.
Now what you can do is, beforethat, before those controls, you
can put in a thermostat so theydon't have the option of
turning on because it's 25degrees or whatever it's going
to be, and only when it dropsbelow a certain temperature is
(08:35):
it allowed to turn on.
Once the on-off button or thepush-button time on the movement
sensor is engaged, so you canadd that into it to stop any
unreasonable heat build-up.
Marc Smith (08:47):
For no, when the when the air temperature has
increased oh, that's good, yeah,yeah, I always assume that it's
cold in the uk, but is that youdo get warm periods, like today
, I suppose?
Yeah, you wouldn't need it.
On the, the cost between thetwo like, not the cost of the
actual product but the cost ofthe energy.
Is it comparable with the?
Obviously you don't have topreheat with the spot heating,
(09:08):
but is once it's on.
Is it comparable with the, theold, old-fashioned heating like?
Joe Bristow (09:14):
the panel heaters or you probably need more
overall energy to spot heat,because you need a a larger
amount of heat to heat youdirectly.
But the benefit comes in thereduced time scale.
So, for example, if you weretrying to I don't you had a yoga
class between 9 and 11 and youwere trying to space heat that
area.
Depending on the building'sheat loss, you might well be
(09:37):
turning that on a couple ofhours prior to give it time to
build up to it.
So you're getting a lot ofenergy in use when the
building's not occupied.
With the spot heaters, you turnit on the moment you need it
and then the moment you don'tneed it you're turning it
straight off.
So it's more to do with thereduced timescale rather than
the overall energy being used atthat time.
Marc Smith (09:58):
All right, that's interesting actually.
Yeah, so if a village hall waslooking to install these and
they've got existing heating inthere which heats the air, and
it's a sporadically used halland it fits all the criteria, do
they need to rewire?
Or can you take off a panelheater and put on a spot heater?
(10:18):
Or do they need to be high up,is it?
Joe Bristow (10:22):
interchangeable.
They tend to be higher up thanpanel heaters would be.
So warm-mounted panel heatersbecause they need to be high up
so they get a nice spread, sothey can spread the heat out
quite wide and quite far.
It depends on the size of thepanel heater.
So from experience in villagehalls you tend to be having
three kilowatt heaters on thewall.
That tends as a rough guideline.
(10:43):
Now panel heaters tend to besomewhere between two and three
kilowatts.
So, assuming you've got thecorrect supply there, yeah, at
that point it's just a case ofraising the wire up to the point
where you need to mount theheater itself, um, and obviously
making the heat safe that's.
Marc Smith (10:59):
That's really good that yeah, because I think a lot
of village halls, well, they'llhave heating already,
especially the older halls.
Joe Bristow (11:04):
It'll be the old style heater and the fact you
can just change it straight over, as is uh is yes, it's pretty
good yeah, well, that's the ideato try and keep it to minimal
windstool costs where possiblewhen we so I do a lot of site
visits where I get out tovillage halls and go and see it
firsthand, and we always try tokeep that in mind because that's
(11:25):
going to reduce yourinstallation costs quite a lot
and there's not a lot of moneyfor village hogs, so we try and
keep that in mind.
Marc Smith (11:31):
Yeah yeah, I suppose these this type of village hog
we're talking about, they're, Isuppose they're older and they
have issues with damp.
What's?
What are the?
Is there any complications whenit comes to spot heating?
If?
If there is an issue with damp,or or do you battle that with a
dehumidifier?
Or can you maybe add aconvection heater alongside spot
(11:55):
heaters, just to tackle some ofthe challenges that the halls
have?
Joe Bristow (11:59):
Yeah, you're putting the nail on the head,
really.
So, because spot heating isjust heating when it's needed.
They're often turned off forvast periods of time, sometimes
even days.
So in terms of things like dampin the building or even low
temperatures, especially whereyou are, you're going to get
incredibly low temperatures.
Sometimes it makes absolutesense to keep a convector heater
(12:20):
in the background, justmaintaining a very low
temperature.
So only maintaining it, let'ssay, eight, nine degrees, which
isn't that much warmer than thefront of a fridge, but that way
it stopped one.
It protects your pipe work fromfreezing, so you haven't got to
worry about any water pipes andit just maintains the fabric of
the building slightly warmer,um to hopefully, hopefully, stop
(12:41):
damp.
So that's often what is doneall right, interesting.
Marc Smith (12:44):
Yeah, so you mentioned um with the spot here.
You mentioned that littlebuttons at the side that can
they, they can they, can controlthem, and then a motion sensor.
So that's really quite clever.
So if you're walking, you neveractually really need to turn
them on.
So I assume you would say or donot come on.
Uh, below 21 degrees, if youdetect movement, check if it's
(13:08):
21 degrees.
If it's below, turn on.
If not, stay off.
Is that what that's allsupplied?
Is that all supplied with theactual heaters you, you make?
Joe Bristow (13:18):
or yeah.
So they're all different parts,but we said all three.
So what you would in thisscenario you would have power
going to a thermostat and then,through the thermostat, goes to
the movement sensor and then tothe heaters.
So what you're effectivelydoing are the first sort of yes
or no is the thermostat.
So if it's below your set point, well, that's a yes.
Lets the power pass, yeah.
(13:39):
And then when you come in andyou walk in front of the
movement sensor, that's the nextyes, and that allows the power
to get through the heater, whichthen which then energizes it.
So, yeah, that's exactly how itwould work.
Marc Smith (13:49):
Oh, excellent, that's fantastic.
So I assume it does.
But do you integrate withbattery storage and renewable
energy?
I take it it's just a case ofjust literally swap it out and
it'll work with whateverexisting system they have in
place in the village hall.
Joe Bristow (14:05):
Yeah, all the battery storage is just a power
source, so it's just getting itthrough to there, so absolutely
all right, and it's fastbecoming a much more used thing.
Even churches now are doingthat, um.
So yeah, it's.
It's very much becoming amodern thing to do, which is a
great idea yeah, definitely soin your experience.
Marc Smith (14:24):
What uh questions should a hall committee member
ask when they're sourcingheating quotes?
So this could be for spotheating or any type of heating.
Joe Bristow (14:35):
The first one seems unusual for me to say but
what's the downside to thissystem?
Because there's alwaysdownsides to it and it's better
to be aware of the reality ofthe system rather than the sort
of the the ideal system thatcould it could be.
You will know what's.
What's the reality.
So, for example, with spotheaters, what the reality is,
(14:56):
it's not going to be um helpfulfor the fabric if the building's
left unheated for days at atime.
So in that point you might needto look at a convection system
if that's something you'reworried about.
Yeah, if you're using a spaceheating system, or how long,
what's going to be the runningcost?
If I need to run that for 90 or5, what's the realistic running
cost going to be?
Which is very difficult to workout because it comes down to
(15:20):
heat loss, air changes, outsidetemperature.
So it's trying to work out fromreality and a lot of the times
you can do that by looking atyour current system and you can
look at the running cost.
It's been for that.
If you have a space heatingsystem currently, you can sort
of try and look at that and thentry and use a comparison to see
how much it's going to cost torun.
So I think that's that would bethe important bit.
(15:42):
The other thing would be thecontrol, because the control is
really key to reducing yourenergy costs.
That has the largest impact, inmy opinion, of how you're going
to keep those running costs toa minimum but still making sure
that you get the benefit thatyou're looking for.
So I think the control becomesreally important and I always
(16:04):
joke that we're a heatingcompany but we're also a
controls company, because overthe years we've had so many
ideas from site visits andseeing the real world reality
and we've created controls basedon just these.
So I think the controls are areally big asset.
They're the two things I wouldsuggest that we ask.
Marc Smith (16:21):
Yeah, I did notice that on your website.
So you actually manufacture thecontrols themselves, the little
wall panels.
Joe Bristow (16:26):
Yeah, that's it.
So a good example is movementsensors.
There aren't a lot on themarket at all and very few that
can deal with the heaters thatwe use for spot heating.
So we have one of our engineerscan you please make one?
And then six months later wehave got two movement sensors
because we saw a need for it,and I'm on site enough that I
(16:49):
see that there's a real, a realbenefit to having them, and
within six months they're therealready that's amazing, that's
yeah, that's quite, uh, that'squite a feat.
Marc Smith (17:00):
It's great to see that that you're.
You see an issue and you can.
You can actually solve it yeah,it's not like you're, yeah, you
don't have to go looking forthe, the solution you, you can
create one yourself yeah, we'revery lucky.
Joe Bristow (17:10):
We've got quite a few engineers that are.
They're very quick to react, um, and it's a challenge and they
like a challenge.
It's sort of fixing with their,with their mindset really, um,
so there's been a, there's beena few controllers that I've been
directly involved with, whichis quite nice because there's
not many jobs where you can go.
I think we need a product andthen eventually the product
turns up.
I mean it's slightly scarybecause then you need to sell it
(17:33):
, because if you don't sell it,it's quite a nice way to work
excellent.
Marc Smith (17:37):
Yeah, so when you've your experience, when you've
been putting these systems intohalls, what's the feedback been?
Joe Bristow (17:47):
We always get the feedback that, especially with
spot heating systems, of howbeneficial it is having it work
absolutely instantaneously.
Because the reality is a lot ofvillage halls have old spacing
systems and over the years theuse of the village hall has
changed, but the problem is theheating system hasn't gone along
(18:08):
with it, so they've beenturning the systems on and
they're never really getting thebenefit of it, whereas when we
go in and we suggest spottingsystems, once they're installed,
the response is brilliantbecause they just have this
active, instant heat and it'scompletely noticeable.
And that's that's the.
That's the best bit about it isthey can notice that and people
walk in and go oh wow, that'sthat, that's suddenly a great, a
(18:30):
great amount of heat that theycan feel.
So I think that's that's the.
The biggest feedback we get ishow brilliant the instantaneous
um heat is all right.
Marc Smith (18:39):
All right.
Here's stupid question numbertwo for you.
Does it feel any different?
And I really want to have ashot of one of these things, but
does it feel any?
Can you feel a difference inthe type of heat that's coming
from these spot heaters orwhat's you?
Joe Bristow (18:52):
you can, yes is the honest answer.
So, especially when they'refirst turned on, because there's
a relatively defined beampattern.
So if you imagine a, a lightunit, it has a beam.
If you imagine a beam like that, but with heat, so you, you
notice a very defined beampattern.
So I feel warm here and if Itake a step backwards I won't
feel warm.
(19:13):
So there's a certain that.
But having said that, assumingwe've got the layout correct,
which is obviously my job, wehave.
You give it 15, 20 minutes andwhere the floor starts to warm
up, the walls start to warm upand they start to slowly convect
out the heat.
It feels relatively similar toto a normal heating system.
(19:33):
Um, the we use them in ourwarehouse, because massive
warehouse don't want to heat thewhole thing, and there's a
particular run of a sort of likemanufacturing run when we,
where we build the heaters, andyou, when you walk into where
the heaters cover, it's almostlike a curtain of warmth and
anywhere within that that area,all right, right, it's warm.
(19:53):
And it's really unusual becauseoutside of it, where we don't
have the heaters, it's cool asthe as the rest of the area is.
Yeah, you sort of take thatstep through that barrier and
it's it's really nice that'samazing.
Marc Smith (20:05):
Yeah, I I'm.
Yeah, I need to have a shot.
I need to find someone with oneof these.
Yeah, it's gonna have a shot.
It does sound quite cool.
Yeah.
So one thing you said there.
So it does.
It heats any, any surface thespot heater.
So one of the issues that wehad this is years ago when I
played badminton down the hall,see, when it was cold and the
floor would be slippery becauseof the condensation.
(20:26):
So that would also tackle thatas well, because it would heat
the floor.
Joe Bristow (20:30):
It would certainly heat the floor.
If it's directed towards thefloor, it would absolutely do
that.
I mean, we actually use them insquash courts quite a lot.
So especially with sporadicallyused squash courts, yeah, that
trying to build up a body warmin there is nigh on impossible,
and a lot of the time they'reopen to a gallery.
So you're not just heating thesquash court, you've got to heat
the gallery as well, yeah, um,so we we've we do a lot of
(20:53):
squash court heating with them,um, and they're sort of mounted
high up and and they've beendown over it and it works an
absolute treat.
So, yeah, they're certainlygoing to heat the floor there,
absolutely.
Marc Smith (21:06):
So how long have I been oblivious to this
technology?
How long have they been out for?
Joe Bristow (21:10):
Oh, I mean years and years, is it really?
Oh, 100%.
So they I don't know if youremember the old pool cord
bathroom heaters oh, yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I grew up with one of thosethat's a style of it and they
sort of moved on from there and,as far as I'm aware, sort of
early 2000s is when they reallysort of came onto the mass
(21:32):
market and they used to havethese like a red filter over the
top and you'd get this brightred light.
Well, it was warm, which islovely, yeah, but it would just
discolor everything.
Everything in that area wouldchange color, right, um.
And then we introduced a goldlamp I don't know when we
(21:52):
introduced it, um, which had amuch lesser light output, but
still a light output nonetheless, yeah.
And then I'm gonna say aboutfive years ago but I'm sure I've
been saying about five yearsago for two years we came up
with a new lamp and it's calledthe magic lamp, right?
Basically, it's primarily usedin churches, where they don't
want a bright red light, yeah,and you get the same heat
(22:16):
intensity, but you don't get thediscoloration.
You can certainly see thediscoloration, um, you can
certainly see that the lamp ison.
So you can certainly see thatthe filament is energized, um,
but you have a heavily reducedlight output.
So they've been around a longtime and they're just slowly
getting better with everygeneration that comes through
right.
Marc Smith (22:34):
well, it's a good time to have this because a lot
of halls, everyone's looking fornet zero.
Everyone, everyone's trying tobecome as energy efficient as
possible, so they do make a lotof sense if you don't have.
As I was saying earlier on, Iwas looking at a village hall
that got I think it was about2.1 million to convert the hall
into a warm hub, which isfantastic, but there's so many
halls that don't have it, sothis is actually another good
(22:56):
way to do it without if you'venot got 2.1 million spare you
can, you can still um save costs.
You know, save a lot of energycosts by putting uh or
converting what you've gotalready to uh to spot heating
yeah, it really is and and andreally focus in on the, the use
of the building.
Joe Bristow (23:15):
That's where it is.
And then if you go with anelectrical supplier that has, um
, has like a net zero, um sortof agreement you've got you're
getting a very green electricitythrough to the building, adding
the fact you're not usingfossil fuels, you're using
electric heaters, yeah, andyou're well on your way to net
zero or decarbonizationexcellent.
Marc Smith (23:38):
Well, that's been a.
I don't have any more sillyquestions to ask you.
They seem silly in my head, butnow, probably, listening back,
I think I shouldn't have askedthat, but I think it's.
I can't believe I've missedthis.
I I don't know why I've missedthis, but yeah, it's so
fascinating and I think it's a.
It totally makes sense for, youknow, for churches we like any
big space that's, um, that'sused sporadically.
(24:00):
Certainly Village Hall us waschurches every Sunday.
But yeah, I think it's amazing.
Thank you very much for comingon, no problem at all.
Thanks very much for having me.
You're very welcome.
Many thanks to our headlinesponsor and specialist Village
Hall insurance provider, alliedWestminster, the home of Village
Guard, for making this podcastpossible, and to online booking
(24:22):
system provider, Hallmaster, whoalso sponsor our podcast and
can be found at Hallmaster.
co.
uk.
You've been listening to theVillage Halls podcast, a unique
listening community forBritain's village community and
church halls and anyoneinterested in the vital services
they provide.
Don't forget entries for theVillage Halls Inspiration Awards
(24:43):
2025 are open now until the30th of September, so visit our
website to find out more and getinvolved.
We will be back again soon withanother episode.
For more information, visitthevillagehallspodcast.
com, where you'll also findlinks to our social media pages.
Thanks again for listening inand until next time.
Goodbye for now.
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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