Nick Pott, Arbjobs.com
We all know that the economy has changed a lot over the past few years. In light of the big changes to the cost of living and general well-being of the domestic economy, how have arborist and tree surgeon salaries been impacted?
We are uniquely positioned to monitor the salaries and benefits employers have offered over the past six years, and we have collated this data to monitor changes in pay at both national and regional levels.
In this exclusive preview of our Comprehensive Arborist Salaries Report, we break down annual changes to arborist climber salaries. The comprehensive report will include a deep-dive look at salary data across other job roles within the industry and different regions of the UK, so please keep an eye on the Arbjobs blog for its release.
About the data
- Our data here is based on the published salaries for arborist climber jobs advertised on the Arbjobs.com job board.
- Each job advert asks the posting employer to include a salary range for their offer. The salary levels used in our report are an average of the minimum and maximum ends of that range.
- In this article, we analyse 1,500 arborist climber salaries.
- The dataset averages salaries from across the UK.
So let’s jump into it. How much do arborist climbers earn, and how have arborist salaries changed over the past 6 years?
National trends 2018-23
Our data shows that the growth of arborist climber salaries between 2018 and 2023 mirrors wider trends for average salaries across the UK. The pandemic disrupted existing trends in year-on-year changes, creating some irregularity in the following years.
Arborist climbers’ salary growth 2018–23
Salaries for arborist climbers increased by around 10% between 2018 and 2019, but there was a notable slowdown in that growth between 2019 and 2020. During this period, arborist climbers’ salaries only increased by 2.6% on average year-on-year. This coincides with the fall in wage growth during the first half of 2020 registered across the UK (www.statista.com/statistics/933075/wage-growth-in-the-uk). 2022 and 2023, however, both saw much better year-on-year growth of approximately 4.7% and 4.8% respectively, as domestic tree work boomed and employers found themselves competing for staff.
Arborist climbers’ salaries by region
The figures in the table on the left are an average of arborist climber salaries data from across the whole of the UK. However, it is important to acknowledge there are big differences between regions.
Looking at the latest data, 2023 arborist climbers’ salaries across the UK averaged at £32,363. As expected, regions in the south had the biggest average salaries, with London topping the charts at an average of £34,200, which is 5.5% higher than the national average. 2023 arborist climber salaries in Scotland, on the other hand, averaged at just £27,975, which is 14.5% lower than the UK average.
There’ll be more on this data and the full regional breakdown in our upcoming Arborist Salaries Report.
Key takeaways
- The 2020 pandemic outbreak disrupted salary growth trends.
- Between 2018 and 2019 arborist climbers’ salaries grew by 10% year-on-year.
- Between 2019 and 2020 arborist climbers’ salaries grew by only 2.6%.
- 2022 and 2023 saw a slight recovery, with salaries growing by nearly 5% each year.
- The national average salary for arborist climbers in 2023 was £32,363.
Create competitive strategies for tree surgery recruitment In publishing this data, we hope to shed some light on the industry’s salary trends, enabling employers to create competitive recruitment strategies moving forward. For more insights, please look out for our in-depth data breakdown, which will cover salary data across a variety of roles and regions. To keep up to date with the latest Arbjobs news: www.arbjobs.com/company-signup
This article was taken from Issue 204 Spring 2024 of the ARB Magazine, which is available to view free to members by simply logging in to the website and viewing your profile area.