Summary

  • You can use the planner and read every guide without an account or an email address.
  • Planner inputs stay in your browser unless you choose to save a project.
  • Saved projects are reached through a secure link. We store only a hash of the link’s token, not the token itself.
  • If you ask for professional help, you choose separately whether we may contact you, whether we may refer your project to a third party, and whether you want occasional updates.
  • Our own analytics record allow-listed events and coarse bands, never your name, email, phone number, address, or free text.
  • We do not sell personal information, and we do not share your details with a third party for a referral unless you have consented.

Using the planner

The planner runs in your browser. The choices you enter, such as room dimensions, bottle counts, racking, glass, cooling, and finishes, are stored locally in your browser so that you can continue where you left off. They are not sent to us until you choose to save a project or request help. You can clear them at any time by clearing this site’s data in your browser.

We ask only for information that changes the estimate. A ZIP code, if you provide one, is used for broad regional assumptions. We do not ask for the monetary value of your collection.

Saved projects

When you save a project, we store the project configuration and the results calculated from it (capacity range, cooling-complexity category, planning range, and the pricing and source versions used), together with an optional project name, an optional ZIP code, the page you saved from, and timestamps. Saved versions of the same project are kept so you can compare them.

Each saved project is reached through a secure link containing a long random token. We store only a one-way hash of that token, so the link cannot be reconstructed from our database. Anyone who has the link can open the project, so treat it like a private document. Projects are identified internally by non-sequential identifiers.

An email address is optional for saving. If you provide one, we use it to send you the secure project link and messages about that project. Saving a project never signs you up for marketing; any updates require a separate, unticked checkbox.

Professional-help requests

If you ask for help with next steps, we collect what the form asks for: your name, email address, ZIP code, project timing, the kind of help you want, and, if you choose to provide them, a phone number, project description, property ownership, approximate budget, preferred contact method, and whether a designer or builder is already involved. We also record campaign parameters from the link you arrived through, if any, and the page you submitted from.

The form asks for three separate consents, recorded with the version of the consent wording you saw:

  1. Direct contact (required to submit): permission for us to contact you about your request.
  2. Third-party referral (optional): permission to share your request with an independent manufacturer, designer, cooling specialist, glazier, contractor, or installer who may be able to help. Without this consent, your details are not shared for a referral.
  3. Marketing (optional): permission to send occasional updates. You can withdraw it at any time.

Project details or files are not sent to a third party without your referral consent. We do not promise that a suitable local professional is available, and we do not describe any provider as vetted.

Email

Transactional messages, such as your project link or a reply to your request, are kept separate from marketing. Every marketing message includes an unsubscribe link, and you can also unsubscribe at our unsubscribe page. Unsubscribing from marketing does not delete a saved project.

Analytics

Cloudflare Web Analytics. We use Cloudflare Web Analytics to count page views and measure performance. It does not use cookies for tracking and does not build profiles across sites.

First-party events. We record a small set of allow-listed events, such as “planner opened”, “result displayed”, or “project saved”, through our own endpoint. Each event stores only the event name, the page path, an optional short label (an option name or a coarse band, such as an estimate band rather than an exact figure), and a timestamp. Names, email addresses, phone numbers, addresses, free text, project tokens, and exact estimates are never included.

Google Analytics. We also use Google Analytics to see which pages and planner steps people use, so we can improve the site. It sets first-party cookies and receives your IP address, browser details, and the pages you view. Google signals and ad personalization are off, and we never send names, emails, phone numbers, addresses, project descriptions, or project links. You can opt out with Google’sopt-out browser add-on or by blocking cookies.

Security and spam protection

Forms are protected by Cloudflare Turnstile, which checks that a request comes from a person rather than an automated script, and by a hidden field that catches simple bots. Turnstile is provided by Cloudflare and processes limited technical information about your browser for that purpose.

To prevent abuse, we limit how often forms can be submitted. Rate limiting uses a one-way hash of your IP address rather than the address itself. All input is validated and sanitized on our server, responses are worded so they do not reveal whether an email address is already on file, and data is transmitted over encrypted connections. No method of storage or transmission is perfectly secure, but we work to keep what we hold to a minimum.

Sharing and service providers

We do not sell personal information. We share it only:

  • with service providers that host the site, store data, deliver email, and provide analytics and spam protection, under terms that limit their use of it;
  • with a third-party professional, only when you have given referral consent for that request;
  • where required by law or to protect the site and its users from fraud or abuse.

Retention and deletion

We keep personal information only as long as it is needed for the purpose it was collected for. The site owner sets and periodically reviews the retention period for saved projects, help requests, email preferences, analytics events, and rate-limiting records, and deletes or anonymizes records that are no longer needed. Rate-limiting records and analytics events hold no direct identifiers.

You can remove your information in any of these ways:

  • Delete a saved project from its secure link. This removes the project and its saved versions.
  • Unsubscribe from marketing at the unsubscribe page or through the link in any marketing email.
  • Email [email protected] to ask for a copy of your information, a correction, or deletion of a help request or anything else we hold. We may need to confirm that the request comes from the owner of the email address.

Your choices

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or receive a copy of your personal information, and to object to or restrict certain uses. You can exercise them by writing to [email protected]. We will not treat you differently for exercising them.

Children

The site is intended for adults planning home projects and is not directed to children. We do not knowingly collect information from children.

Changes and contact

If this policy changes, we will update the date at the top of this page, and we will ask for fresh consent where the law requires it. Questions about privacy can be sent to [email protected]; general questions to[email protected]. See also the terms of use.