Walk into most UK camping shops five years ago and you’d find portable power tucked between gas canisters and head torches. It was a niche product for the occasional festival-goer with a phone that died too quickly. That isn’t the picture anymore.
Portable power stations are turning up in DIY sheds, electrical retailers, garden centres and online marketplaces. The shoppers buying them aren’t only campers. They’re homeowners who sat through a long power cut last winter, van owners heading off-grid for the weekend, and tradespeople who need to run tools where there’s no socket nearby. For retailers, that wider spread of buyers is the interesting part.
Power cuts have moved up people’s worry list
The UK doesn’t usually think of itself as a country with grid problems, but the last few winters have changed that. When Storm Goretti hit in January 2026, nearly 170,000 properties across Wales, the South-West of England and the Midlands lost power, and many were left without it for more than a day.
People remember being in a cold house with no Wi-Fi and a fridge slowly warming up. That memory sticks, and it shows in the numbers. The government’s own Public Attitudes Tracker found that 78% of adults were worried about power cuts over the next 10 to 20 years.
When that many people share a concern, it becomes a buying reason. Most shoppers won’t fit a whole-home battery system. A portable unit that keeps the router, lights, phones and a small fridge running for a day or two is a much easier purchase to justify.
It’s not just one type of customer
What makes this category appealing for retailers is that it sells across seasons and across very different shoppers.
In winter, demand leans towards home backup. In spring and summer, it shifts to camping, caravanning and van life, where buyers want to run cool boxes, fans and laptops away from hook-ups. Tradespeople buy year-round to power drills, lights and chargers on jobsites. Some market stall traders and food vendors are swapping out noisy petrol generators for something quieter.
That gives retailers two natural sales peaks instead of one, which is rare for a single product line. It also means the same shelf space can be merchandised differently throughout the year. Put it near torches and blankets in November, then next to tents and camping chairs in May.
The big brands are already teaching customers
UK shoppers have been getting a steady education from the established names. Brands such as Anker, BLUETTI and Jackery are marketing heavily to UK buyers, with campaigns that cover campervan, motorhome and off-grid camping trips as well as home backup. That marketing spend raises awareness for the whole category, not only for the brands paying for it.
It does create one challenge, though: customers arrive with half-formed ideas about what they need. Staff who can explain the basics in plain English will win sales. A useful example is the difference between capacity in watt-hours and output in watts. A buyer might assume any unit can boil a kettle, but many full-size UK kettles are rated close to 3,000W, and a portable induction hob may draw around 2,000W. Those are things a small unit simply can’t run.
Clear shelf labels that show what each unit can actually power, such as “runs a fridge for X hours” or “charges a laptop Y times”, tend to sell better than a list of specifications.
Margin lives in the extras
The power station itself is only part of the basket. Folding solar panels, expansion batteries, car charging cables and carry cases all sell alongside it, and that’s often where retailers make better margins. A customer who buys a mid-sized unit for camping often comes back for a solar panel once they realise they want to stay out longer.
Bundles work well here. A “storm-ready kit” with a power station, LED lantern and charging cables is an easy sell in autumn. A “weekend off-grid” bundle with a solar panel does the same job in spring.
Sourcing is where retailers win or lose
This is also a category where getting supply wrong can hurt. Cheap units with poor battery cells, inflated capacity claims or missing safety marks lead to returns and complaints, and with lithium batteries, real safety risks.
When choosing stock, retailers should look for:
- LiFePO4 battery chemistry, which lasts longer and runs cooler than older lithium types
- Proper UK and EU certification, with test reports available on request
- Honest capacity ratings that match real-world use
- UK-ready plugs and sockets as standard
- Local stock to avoid long shipping waits during peak demand
Working with an established portable power station wholesale supplier can take a lot of that risk off the table. Manufacturers such as Souopen Energy offer small-batch orders, samples before bulk buying, and OEM options for retailers that want to sell under their own brand. Some keep stock in UK warehouses, which helps when a storm warning sends demand up overnight.
The window is open, but not forever
Portable power stations aren’t a passing gadget trend. They solve a real problem that more UK households are noticing, and they fit into several existing retail categories without much effort. The retailers who move early, train staff to explain the products simply, and source from reliable suppliers are the ones most likely to own the category as it grows.
Like most product booms, the early movers will set the pace. The rest will be catching up.
Terry Clark is the Publisher and Content Director of 365 Retail, with more than a decade of experience covering retail design, technology innovations, store openings and the wider retail industry. He also works closely with leading retailers, suppliers, agencies, events and industry awards across the UK.
