They are working demos: each is a fully hand-coded site you can click through, scroll and open on your phone, not a flat image. The placeholder name, colours and example images are just there to show the layout working; the build underneath is the real thing, ready to be made yours.

Not at all. These are starting points, not straitjackets. Spot something you like in one demo and something else in another? No problem; we can pull elements from multiple demos and merge them into your design. We can also design a completely bespoke WordPress website from scratch if you have a specific brief in mind. Either way, the finished site is built by hand, tailored throughout, and yours to own outright.

Yes. The demos here are a convenience, not a requirement. If you have a clear brief, existing brand guidelines, or just a firm idea of what you want, we can go straight into bespoke WordPress theme development from scratch. Hand-coded, no page builders, built around your spec. The demos just give most clients a faster way to communicate what they are after.

Almost certainly. The layouts are built around what any local business needs: services, trust signals, contact and booking, so a structure shown for one trade adapts easily to another. Whether you need a WordPress website for local business in the trades, hospitality, retail or anything else, you can pick features from more than one demo and we will merge them. And if none of them suit you at all, custom WordPress theme development from a blank canvas is exactly what we do, so just get in touch and tell us your brief.

Yes. Your colours, fonts, logo, content and imagery are applied throughout before launch, so the finished site looks like you, not a recognisable template.

Completely. You own every line of code outright. There is no platform lock-in, no premium plan standing between you and your own website. If you ever want to move it to a different host or developer, nothing stops you.

No subscription keeps your site alive; once it is built and paid for, it is yours. The only ongoing costs are the usual domain renewal and hosting fees, which are inexpensive and entirely separate. We are happy to advise or set those up, but you are never tied to us.

Every project is a fixed price WordPress website, quoted up front before any work starts, with no surprises and no hourly meter running. Whether you are starting from one of the demos or coming with a completely bespoke brief, every fixed price WordPress website quote depends on the size of the site and how much custom work you need. Tell us what you are after and we will give you a clear number.

A starter site is typically turned around in two to four weeks. The biggest factor is usually how quickly you can get us your content: text, images and details like prices or opening hours. We will agree a realistic timeline with you at the quote stage.

Yes. The whole process (from the demo you pick to the finished site) is custom WordPress theme development done by hand. Your chosen design is built into a full WordPress theme, so you can log in and update text, images and pages yourself whenever you like, with no developer required for day-to-day changes.

If you are selling, we build a WooCommerce website for small business owners (hand-coded, not bolted onto a marketplace theme) so you can manage products, stock and orders yourself. A hand-coded WooCommerce build performs far better than a bloated marketplace theme full of features you will never use. One demo is built specifically with a shop in mind, but WooCommerce can be added to most of them.

Every template is fully responsive and tested on real devices (phone, tablet and desktop), not just a resized browser window. Most of your visitors will be on a phone, so that is treated as a priority, not an afterthought.

Yes. Because everything is hand-coded with no heavy frameworks or page-builder bloat, these sites load quickly by default, which is good for visitors and for search rankings.

We do not host your live site ourselves. While we build, it lives on our own in-house staging servers so you can follow progress. For going live, we will set you up with a reliable host (a one-off setup fee), and the hosting itself is paid directly to that host, in your name. You keep full ownership and control of your domain and hosting account, so you are never locked to us. If you already have hosting and a domain, we will happily work with those instead.

You are welcome to provide your own, and we will guide you on what is needed. If you would rather not, we can help with wording and source suitable imagery as part of the project. Just let us know.

We handle the technical SEO basics as standard (clean, fast code, sensible page structure, headings and metadata), along with the fundamentals of conversion rate optimisation, so the layout is built to turn visitors into enquiries. Beyond that, how you rank and convert over time comes down to you and your market: your content, your reviews, how competitive your area is and how you keep things fresh. We set those foundations right; we do not run ongoing SEO or marketing campaigns.

Of course, it is your site, so day-to-day content edits you can make yourself in WordPress. For bigger changes, you are covered during the after-sales period that follows launch. After that, work is quoted ad-hoc as you need it, or you can take an optional support plan and we will handle updates for you. Either way, there is no contract you are forced into.

A quick chat about your business and which template caught your eye, then your branding and content. From there we do the heavy lifting and keep you updated as it comes together.

Dearthwood Software is based in Claypole, near Newark in Nottinghamshire. We build every kind of WordPress website for local business across the Newark area and beyond, from a single-trade service site to a full WooCommerce shop. Whether you are looking for a WordPress website for local business nearby or further afield, we work locally and remotely.