Imprinted Concrete Driveways
A coloured, patterned slab with no blocks to sink and no joints for weeds. £75–£130 per m² installed as a 2026 guide; reseal every 3–5 years.
Imprinted concrete driveways →Concrete Laid & Installed in Birmingham
Driveways, garage and shed bases, footings, patios and repairs — priced the same working day from published 2026 rates and carried out by vetted local installation partners. We take the call, write the spec down properly and tell you who is attending before anything is booked.
Installed work
What Our Installation Partners Lay in Birmingham
Six jobs, six pages, each with the build-up the quote should show, the 2026 guide price and the local rules that apply. Supply-only concrete for your own contractor is on the supply pages.
Concrete Driveways
Brushed, tamped or exposed-aggregate finishes on an air-entrained slab. £85–£125 per m² installed; a two-car drive is typically £2,500–£4,000.
Concrete driveways →
Garage, Shed & Garden Room Bases
100mm shed pads up to 150mm mesh-reinforced garage and garden-room slabs, built level, square and bigger than the building. £45–£85 per m² installed.
Garage, shed & garden room bases →
Foundations & Footings
Strip and trench-fill footings for extensions, garden rooms and garages, dug to the depth Building Control wants on Birmingham clay. £105–£250 per linear metre.
Foundations & footings →
Patios & Paths
Brushed, poured or imprinted concrete patios and paths laid with a fall away from the house and below the damp-proof course. £65–£120 per m² for a concrete patio.
Patios & paths →
Driveway Repair & Resealing
Crack repair, resurfacing and resealing of tired imprinted or plain concrete. Resealing runs £4–£8 per m²; small crack repairs £100–£300.
Driveway repair & resealing →
How it works
One Number, a Vetted Partner, a Written Spec
We are not the contractor. We are the people who know which local contractor should do your job, what it should cost in 2026 and what the quote has to say.
1
Tell us the job
Call or send the size, the postcode and what you want laid; photos help. We ask what a surveyor would: what is there now, the levels, truck access, where the rainwater goes and whether a dropped kerb is involved.
2
Priced the same working day
We price it from the published 2026 rates on these pages — per square metre for slabs, per linear metre for footings — and tell you what would move the number: breaking out an old surface, drainage, access, a thicker slab.
3
Matched to a vetted partner
The job goes to the local installation partner whose insurance and recent work we have checked and who does this kind of job every week. You are told who is attending before anything is booked.
4
Survey, written quote, the work
The partner surveys, quotes in writing with the spec itemised, and does the work on the agreed dates. Where the partner wants it, the concrete is batched on your street by one of our delivery partners' volumetric trucks and metered as it pours.
The word we keep using
What "Vetted" Means Here
Birmingham City Council's dropped-kerb pages record dozens of complaints a year about doorstep contractors who resurface a drive, drop the kerb illegally and demand cash. That is the low bar. Ours is the list below.
- Insured for the work — current public liability cover, seen as a document rather than claimed on the phone.
- Quotes in writing, itemised — dig depth, sub-base, membrane, concrete grade and depth, mesh, joints, drainage and disposal, each on its own line.
- Specifies the right mix — air-entrained PAV1-equivalent concrete on drives and patios, GEN3 on an unreinforced base and a reinforced grade where mesh goes in, GEN1 or a sulfate-resisting FND mix in footings where the ground report says so. The grades are on our concrete grades page.
- Designs the drainage — a fall, a channel and a soakaway or roof-drain connection on every front-garden drive, so the job is lawful and the council will build the kerb.
- Recent local work and a written guarantee — addresses in the West Midlands you can drive past, and the guarantee period and cover on the quote in the partner's name, because it is their guarantee.
- Never drops a kerb without the council — vehicle crossings in Birmingham are built only by the council's authorised contractors, and the council can remove an illegal one and bill the owner.
What vetted does not mean: that we employ the crew or hold the contract. The agreement is between you and the installing partner and the guarantee is theirs. Our job is to make sure the right firm turns up with the right spec, and to be the number you ring if it does not.
Two ways to buy
Supply Only or Supply and Lay?
Most callers want concrete delivered for a job their builder is doing; that is the supply side of the business. The installed pages exist for the other call: "I don't have a contractor, I just want the drive done."
| Supply only | Supply and lay | |
|---|---|---|
| What you get | Concrete batched on your street by a volumetric truck and metered as it pours, from 0.5m³ | The whole job: excavation, sub-base, membrane, concrete, finish, joints, drainage and disposal |
| Who does the work | Your own contractor, or you | A vetted local installation partner |
| How it is priced | Per cubic metre plus VAT: £99–£128 depending on the grade, per our prices guide | Per square metre for slabs, per linear metre for footings, on an itemised written quote |
| Worked example: 30m² drive at 150mm | 4.5m³ of air-entrained driveway mix, roughly £520–£580 plus VAT | £2,500–£4,000 installed as plain concrete; £3,000–£4,500 imprinted |
| Best for | Builders, landscapers and confident DIYers with the base ready | Homeowners who want one price and one firm responsible for the result |
The gap between the columns is not profit on the concrete. On a plain drive the concrete is roughly a fifth of the installed price; the rest is the dig, the skip, the sub-base and the labour, which is why a quote far below the guide ranges usually means something has been left out. Check volumes with the concrete calculator and the mix pages for driveways, bases and foundations.
Installed work is carried out by a vetted local partner; you'll be told who is attending before the job is booked.
2026 prices
Guide Prices for Installed Concrete in Birmingham
Every figure below is a 2026 guide price from the national trade cost guides; a real quote moves with access, ground and what has to come out first. The detail behind each row is on the service page.
| Service | 2026 guide price | Typical job | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Imprinted concrete driveway | £75–£130 per m² | 30m² two-car drive £3,000–£4,500 | Reseal every 3–5 years at £4–£8 per m² |
| Plain concrete driveway | £85–£125 per m² | 30m² £2,500–£4,000; 60m² £5,000–£7,500 | Exposed aggregate and colour are extra lines |
| Garage & garden room base | £45–£85 per m² | Single 3×6m garage £1,150–£1,550; double 5×6m £1,900–£2,600 | A 150mm slab with mesh and thickened edges sits at the top of the range |
| Shed base | £60–£75 per m² | 2×3m £500–£600; 3×4m £850–£1,000 | Small slabs cost more per metre: the set-up is the same |
| Foundations & footings | £105–£250 per linear metre | Single-storey rear extension £4,000–£7,000 | Machine-dug strip £95–£115 per m; trench fill £130–£160 per m |
| Concrete patio | £65–£120 per m² plus VAT | 25m² brushed patio £1,500–£2,125 | Imprinted patio £100–£145 per m²; a 20m² patio takes 3–4 days |
| Driveway repair & resealing | Reseal £4–£8 per m² | 60m² reseal £240–£480; small crack repairs £100–£300 | Resurfacing worn concrete £40–£70 per m² |
Sources: the 2026 Checkatrade, MyJobQuote and Concretecalculate cost guides. The patio figure is Checkatrade's and excludes VAT; the others are as the guides publish them. Add £500–£2,000 to remove an existing drive, and the council's £125 application fee and £375 administration fee plus construction for a new dropped kerb. The installing partner's written quote after a survey is the price.
Where our partners work
Birmingham, the Black Country and the Rest of the West Midlands
Our installation partners cover the Birmingham postcodes and the towns around them, including Sutton Coldfield, Solihull, West Bromwich, Walsall, Wolverhampton and Coventry. The full list is on the areas page.
The ground is why local matters. Around 30% of Birmingham's homes are interwar — 106,000 of them — and the 1930s semi with a front garden is the house whose lawn is becoming a drive and whose garden is getting a garden room. Under most of those plots is clayey till to the south-west, sandier drift to the east, and Mercia Mudstone whose top metre or two behaves as shrinkable clay. So a drive needs 100–150mm of compacted sub-base rather than a skim of stone, footings go to at least 750mm–1m and deeper near trees, and a ground report can call for a sulfate-resisting FND mix instead of GEN1; west of the Great Barr fault and across the Black Country there are old coal workings to check too. A partner who has dug in Kingstanding, Harborne and Halesowen knows which applies to your street.
Quick answers
Installed Concrete FAQs
Are you a concrete contractor?
No. Birmingham Ready Mix Concrete is a concrete enquiry service. We price the job, arrange it through a vetted local installation partner and tell you who is attending before anything is booked; the contract and the guarantee for the work are with that partner. The concrete comes from our delivery partners' volumetric trucks, batched on site and metered as it pours.
How can you price a driveway or base without seeing it?
From the published 2026 guide rates on these pages and a few questions: the size, what is there now, truck access, levels and where the rainwater goes. That gives a realistic range the same working day. The installing partner's written quote after a survey is the price, with the depth, sub-base, mix and joints itemised so you can check it against the spec on these pages.
Who guarantees the work?
The installing partner, in writing on their quote. Ask for the period and what it covers — workmanship, settlement, sealer — before you accept, and keep the quote with the spec on it. What we check beforehand is that the partner is insured, quotes with the spec itemised and has recent local work to show you.
Do I need planning permission for a new concrete driveway?
Not if the rainwater stays on your property. Since October 2008 a front-garden drive of more than 5m² in an impermeable surface — plain or imprinted concrete — needs planning permission unless the water is directed to a lawn, border or soakaway inside your boundary. A drainage channel at the low edge is the usual answer, and Birmingham City Council will not build a dropped kerb until that drainage is in place.
Can I just buy the concrete?
Yes. Supply is what most of our callers want: £99–£128 per cubic metre plus VAT depending on the grade, from 0.5m³, batched on your street by a volumetric truck and metered so you pay for what goes in the ground. Run the numbers through the concrete calculator and see the driveway, base and foundation mix pages for the right grade.
How long does installed work take?
A 30m² drive is typically 2–4 days on site and then 7–10 days before you park on it. A garage or shed base is 2–3 days, plus a week or more of curing before a sectional building goes on (some makers ask for the full 28 days). Extension footings depend on Building Control's inspection and the depth the clay demands. A new dropped kerb adds the council's lead time of at least 16 weeks from payment.
Want a Price on the Job Today?
Tell us what you want laid, where and roughly how big — we'll price it the same working day from the 2026 rates above and arrange a vetted local partner to survey it.