Guest slot from Ajaz Ahmed - we need more real retailers

Ajaz Ahmed founded the industry-changing Freeserve and is currently running Legal365. He also likes to tell it like it is as you will see over a short series of columns:  

Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked is a quote from Warren Buffet, and it is very relevant today for the retail industry.

My question is, why are so many retailers struggling and going out of business at the moment? It's because before the recession it was easy to take money, easy credit drove the market and a good time was to be had by all, but as the quote says when the tide goes out, only then do you find out who was swimming naked.

This industry is full of people who simply are not retailers, it’s as simple as that. It’s full of people that have never worked in a shop and could never work in a shop, they simply don’t understand customers and its customers not spreadsheets that drive a retail business.

What’s the difference between a businessperson and an entrepreneur? The two biggest skills that an entrepreneur possesses is the power of observation and empathy. The ability to put yourself in the customers shoes is priceless, that’s how great retailers are able to become such a success without any formal qualifications.

Freeserve was born out observation and empathy. I'd worked in retail (Dixons/PC World) for many years and one of my observations was that when senior management visited my store, they would very rarely talk to the staff. They would never take time to ask the people who spend all their time on the front line, on the shop floor, “what do you think? How can we improve things? What are our customers asking for?” The solutions to many problems often lie with the staff if only someone would ask them.

Comet had been struggling, so how much change was made to the retail part of the business since OpCapita took over? Not a lot. Here’s an interesting fact that the guys sitting behind their desks at head office and the private equity guys might not understand, it’s the retail part that customers see, not the cost cutting or the operations, they see the shops. Customers walk into the shops and spend money.

A number of my friends were working at Comet and I would often ask them “what would you change?” They came up with all sorts of common sense ideas that would make huge difference to Comet's business. But did anybody ever ask them? No. I asked my friend who is a store manger, when the chairman, John Clare came to visit your store, did he talk to any of the staff or any customers? No was the answer.

That’s partly why Comet has gone into administration, because none of the private equity guys or senior management of Comet were retailers with observation and empathy skills. They simply do not believe that someone on the shop floor might be able to make a suggestion that could make a valuable difference. Because people at head office never went into the stores and asked the staff what they they thought, they look down on the staff that work on the shop floor.

Retail greats like Sam Walton and Ingvar Kamprad walked the shop floor and talked to their staff and customers. You can’t run a shop from just spreadsheets sat behind a desk.

British retail needs more retailers.

What the founders of Dunnhumby did next...

Having created Clubcard for Tesco and revolutionised the way data is used within the retail sector the co-founders of customer insight firm Dunnhumby are embarking on a new mission.

Edwina Dunn

Following the sale of their last interests in Dunnhumby to Tesco, Edwina Dunn and Clive Humby have recently formed H&D Ventures that - among other things - is potentially seeking to do the same for the mobile phone networks as they did for the retail sector.

Speaking with Retailinsider.com Dunn suggests that having enjoyed her time in retail she wants to "learn some new skills" and the mobile networks are ripe for taking advantage of their rich data.

Such is the all pervasiveness of the mobile phone that this move certainly has the potential to be far-reaching in the way it impacts on consumers and their behaviours.

"You've got to follow the data and the telecoms companies have such rich data. But so far they've been fast growing companies so their data has just been used for billing and to tell you that you are on the wrong tariff! There is a lot to play for," she suggests.

In using this data Dunn intends to focus more on things that people “love” and are more loyal to than say supermarkets. As successful as Clubcard has been for Tesco she has long acknowledged that people are not typically passionate about the supermarket they shop in.

By tapping into what people "chat about” on the different social media platforms - increasingly via their mobile devices - Dunn says "we can find the things they are loyal to and what they care about".

She adds: "It's what defines the person, and this is what interests us [at D&H]. People are passionate about a few things and so if we can make life easier then they'll like it. It makes it more fun while they shop and live their lives. This is the [data] model that we believe is sustainable."

The view is that this will make it possible to identify promotions and offers that are related to what the individuals are really interested in rather than simply delivering broad brush offers. "Everybody is trying to offer the customer something they really want, but all the companies use the same tools and are trying to fit this into their existing [business] scenarios," she says.

Dunn cites the examples of Starbucks doing a sponsorship deal on a specific book and O2 offering tickets to see a band, but the problem is that every customer of these companies will then receive the same promotional email.

Despite the widespread success of Dunnhumby and Clubcard, Dunn says people still fail to understand data and “still do not believe it is strategic". When combined with the fact that many companies are "stuck with old technologies and legacy systems" then it does not make for a progressive cocktail.

She says one of the "breaths of fresh air" with starting a new business has been the ability to use the latest software, which today is either free or very cheap.

Big Data: big problem

Dunn also questions the many claims that are being made about the potential benefits of 'Big Data' because "most big data that is out there is in the format of photos and films" and it is still tough to make sense of this unstructured data.

She says this is posing a challenge to the likes of Google and Facebook who are collecting swathes of private information on people but these individuals are not necessarily getting a payback on this.

"People are letting it ride because at the moment they are getting the [social media and search engine] platforms for free. But once these organisations have more personal data than people imagine and they are not seeing the benefits of it then people will begin to cry that it is unfair."  

At Tesco, Dunn says the retailer was very aware of striking a balance between the data it collected on individuals and the loyalty rewards it then gave them back: "At Tesco it was always about not asking for anything that they would not then use."

At the moment both Facebook and Google are finding it hard to build the capability to generate the necessary returns for their stakeholders - and also provide the rewards to customers - from their increasingly high mountains of data.

Making life more difficult is the fact that the brand owners/advertisers tend to, not surprisingly, exert pressure. "They always want to do horrible things with data, like use it to steal customers. Tesco said to the brands that it was not about stealing customers and that they must give something back to the consumer. It was not just about one brand tempting customers to switch from another rival product," she suggests.

While not admitting that any of these challenges are easy to overcome Dunn and Humby are currently enjoying the opportunity to get back into the thick of the data.

Wondering why Asos has invested in Covetique

Asos this week reported that it had invested a significant minority investment in Covetique. For those people who are wondering what exactly this business is all about, here is an interview with its co-founder and CEO that ran on Retailinsider.com back in March.

Nicola McClafferty of Covetique

The Person: Nicola McClafferty
The Company: Covetique
The Job Title: Co-founder and CEO

Investment banker to online fashionista – now that’s a career journey: It certainly is. But McClafferty has always specialised in the internet/digital sector even when first working in investment banking after university. However, like many others before, working with entrepreneurs made her want to ‘get closer to the action’ which she did by moving into venture capital. Balderton Capital was her home for three years where her absolute speciality was e-commerce investment.

Anyone we know? Betfair and Lovefilm to name two. But from 2007-09 it was online fashion that really caught the imagination and the idea of an online consignment store for pre-owned fashion came to life.

Do you mean second-hand? Wash your mouth out. I mean pre-owned. But if you are having difficulty grasping the concept then McClafferty has a neat one liner for you: ‘Net-a-porter meets Ebay’.

Got it. But what’s wrong with selling clothes on eBay? Nothing at all. But McClafferty is very interested in secondary market places emerging in verticals. According to her, Ebay has not grown into the best site for some products and luxury fashion is one of them.

And why not? In a word, because people selling Miu Miu sequin flats for £165 are highly unlikely to stand around in Post Office queues waiting to ship them off in brown cardboard boxes. Nor are they fond of taking digital photos of said shoes in their living rooms and concocting a description. And as for engaging in bidding…. No, no, no. Covetique collects your items for free, authenticates them, photographs them, writes the sales patter and ships them on for you once sold.

And they make? 37.5% is their commission, which she says is lower than the offline stores. Hot tickets right now are Mulberry and Burberry.

And sales? Not happy to talk publicly about numbers but month-on-month it’s going very well and they are beginning to ship globally aswell.

So is anyone else doing this? Not really according to McClafferty. There are a handful of smaller players and Ebay will always do a big trade in fashion but mainly it’s a few offline stores around London. She enthuses about the UK’s more sophisticated market place which houses such companies as ASOS – whom she admires for stretching across such a wide demographic and translating so well internationally – and Net-a-Porter. We also have a good attitude to second-ha… sorry pre-owned goods.

OK. Brass tacks. Who does she want to be using her site? Now it gets interesting. At the moment McClafferty feels there are two distinct groups buying and selling. Sellers are so far only UK based and the vast majority of them have never sold anything before. But once they start its all systems go. They have a right old clear out. She wants to get to the stage which she has seen in New York where women consider this revenue stream as part of their monthly income. Buyers on the other hand are ‘aspirational’, fashion savvy but not in a financial position to buy new. However, McClafferty reckons that some crossover will start to appear soon.

Dare I ask about men? Not really. She has yet to be convinced there is a market for selling-on men’s designer fashion. Women just think differently about retail and probably clothes. Women are more about brand trust – as long as the retail experience is good and they trust the name of Covetique they will use the site. In fact, McClafferty has taken all this a stage further. The site allows you to create your own personal 'selling wardrobe' which buyers can then access – on the grounds that if they trust/ like one thing you sell they might well like all the others. McCLafferty says this is popular with US women ‘dipping’ into UK women’s wardrobes.

OK, this is a very young business. Who’s funded it? The two founders (Bobby Devins is McClafferty’s business partner).

To the tune of? ‘Enough’ according to McClafferty.

So are they in it to sell it or make it a high end Ebay? In a word she wants it to be the global destination for online consignment. She is very optimistic about its chances both in the UK and globally and ideally she would like to get to the point where a woman walking into Harrods buys a dress with one eye on how much she can re-sell it on Covetique. The message is: Women of the world, arise! And make your wardrobe work for you!

That’s quite a step-change in thinking: Admittedly but McClafferty sees digital technology as being instrumental in that. Leveraging social platforms is the way forward and she expects platforms to be much more tightly integrated for sharing tastes and discoveries. In essence making it easier to find what you already know you will like. For Covetique social shopping will change how women engage with fashion .

Shangri-la? Depends on whether you like shopping. But certainly the era of ‘smart fashion’ is about to dawn and Nicola McClafferty is right there to help you monetise it.

Is the internet really that convenient?

Buying goods on the internet was once purely about paying a lesser price than when purchasing the same items from a shop on the high street.

Buying online = time for other things

Plenty of research has since shown that this is no longer the case and the primary reason that consumers buy online is because it is convenient. Yes, it's so much easier to browse on your mobile or tablet and then await the seamless delivery to the home than it is to traipse down to the shop only to find that they haven't got the size you want in stock.

This is all true and there is no doubt that buying online has taken some of the leg-work out of shopping. But it has also added in a lot of effort too. At a presentation a short while back from a Google exec some startling facts were revealed.

For starters - did you know that customer shopping journeys have become so complicated that they take seven-times longer than was the case 10 years ago.

In an age of multi-channel journeys, price comparisons, and the proliferation of tablet devices a great deal of time and complexity has been added into the shopping journey. Secondly, can you believe that the average journey for buying clothes now takes a staggering 27 days!

And, apparently, this includes six separate searches and the visiting of seven websites. This will no doubt be elongated by great deliberation and multiple viewings of the items under investigation.

Although many people would classify much of this exercise as extending the enjoyable 'leisure' activity that is shopping, it seems that for many people the experience of buying goods on the internet has got a whole lot more inconvenient.

And this does not even include the issue online shoppers continue to face with the last-mile delivery of goods. That really is another wholly inconvenient story.

Insiders' View of the world of headhunting

Third part of the regular column – ‘Excerpts from a day/week in the life of a head-hunter’ working in the leisure/hospitality/retail sectors:

[Unfortunately such is the sensitivity of the head-hunting profession that it is rarely possible that the names of the Insiders’ clients can be divulged.]

Just checking we are paying our senior people enough

Monday

9:30am Critical client research project

In the last column I related how I was given an interesting research project by a new client who believed it was under attack from other companies in its sector. It sought to highlight the pay packages of people at its peers working at the group board level and those at regional board level. The objective was to identify their long term incentive plans (LTIP) and to ensure their own people’s packages were competitive.

12:30pm Time to hit the phones

Having earlier identified the target individuals to contact it was time to begin making phone calls to them after lunch when we know the senior group board people will have likely cleared their desks of emails and made any urgent calls. By 8pm when we’d hoped to have contacted half of those on our list we’d made no contact with anybody at all.

Tuesday

9:30am Trouble with the client

A call from the client was fraught as we’d clearly made very little progress. They were nervous about our capabilities – despite knowing that our task was always going to be tougher than we’d ever envisaged. We’d been commissioned out-of-sector, with the client company operating in the construction industry. Little did we know that there were effectively only two key head-hunters in this sector, which meant most senior people had no reason to return calls to an unknown operator like us! And for less senior individuals their next job came from a chat down the pub with their mates rather than with a head-hunter.

1:00pm Success at last

Still in the dark about all this, a conference call was convened with the senior parties at the client who was keen to find out exactly how we were contacting the targeted individuals. We made the decision after the call to change tack somewhat and go for the regional board people. Hey presto, we had more success and started having conversations, but even then it was clear that people in this industry were uncomfortable talking to head-hunters about personal information. What was also surprising was the number who did not know the details of their packages.

Wednesday

9:30am Further progress

Under extreme pressure, as we’d taken on the job and wanted to complete it successfully and had a planned conference call with the client on Friday, we managed to make sufficient progress with all the people we needed to contact - at the regional board level.

Are you following?

1:00pm Complex packages

For the group board level people we decided to gather the information from their company’s annual reports. We had to call on our accountant for help as the complexity of some of the LTIPs was staggering. Even a Chartered Accountant struggled to decipher the underlying packages.

Friday

9:30am Locking-in senior executives

We had a clear enough picture of the group level packages, combined with the interviews from the regional directors, to compare our client’s incentives arrangements versus the rest of the construction sector. The outcome was that they are all tied into incentive agreements paying tens of millions of pounds over the next 10 years. Their employers had looked at their key executives post-recession and sought to tie them in for a few years when it was hoped they would contribute during a period of returned growth.

What we found was the incentive packages in this sector are enormous when compared to others including retail and hospitality. And critically as a head-hunter it was interesting to see how the construction sector does not freely return calls. The reason I guess is that they typically don’t have any interaction with an end-customer so the senior figures are in the main not used to communicating with people who they don’t know. It was an interesting – if somewhat pressured - assignment that highlighted how very different it can be dealing with individuals in different sectors.

Sponsored column by Nigel Sapsed, director of executive search specialist Sapsed Stevens

Movers & Shakers Q&A with Jon Rudoe

Brought to you by Retailinsider.com and K3 Retail

Jon Rudoe, director of online at Sainsbury’s

1. What is the greatest opportunity for your business?

 For any business, the greatest opportunity is always to understand the customer and their needs and then to be able to act to deliver that for the customer in as economically efficient way as possible. So for us that manifests itself in lots of ways: focus on customer service from our delivery driver colleagues in grocery online, or opening up our click & collect network in non-food, or developing our website. At the moment, this focus is really paying off in the growth that we’re experiencing and also the positive feedback we’re getting from customers.

2. What is the biggest challenge to your business?

 There are lots of challenges: prioritising the relative opportunities in our business, understanding the complex nature of how customers relate to us in this multi-channel world, finding the right way to solve all the new problems that a multi-channel world throws at us... fortunately, they’re all fun!

3. With the benefit of hindsight what would you have done differently so far?

 You can never spend enough time with colleagues and customers, and every time I spend time with our colleagues who deliver the great service that drives sales I remind myself that I should spend more time doing that.

4. What is the future of the physical store?

 That’s a big question. You’ve got to remember that this will play out very differently in different categories. In some sectors, a very rapid change and disruption has taken place. In others, like food, it has been much slower, and whilst I think there’s a tremendous role for Online to play, food is an experiential purchase. I can see a lot more use of technology in store, either for home ordering or to assist with the in-store shop.

5. What will the high street look like in a decade?

Again, that’s a complex one to answer. One of our advantages in our convenience store model is that we bring history and trust with us in to the smaller format, and I think that’s a trend that will continue. You’ve got to remember that the shifts in customer behaviour driven by technology aren’t yet complete, so we may not be able to see the full picture yet.

6. Will mobile devices be the primary sales channel in the future?

Mobile is important, that’s obvious. It’s always on and always nearby. That will do different things in different categories – music that change has already taken hold, but with food it’s a little different. We already see a lot of customers topping up their Online grocery orders on their phones...

7. What other retail business do you admire?

There are many. I really admire any business with a customer focus that has delivered for that customer, whilst also delivering the economics as well. Many businesses do that on occasion, but where leadership teams have created sustained delivery that’s particularly impressive. I won’t name names, but there are a few large e-commerce pure-players who have grown massively from a standing start and those I think have done a great job.

8. If you hadn’t been a retailer what would you have liked to do?

If I hadn’t have been a retailer... I think what I do is quite well-suited to my personality: I love working with lots of people, I like solving problems (both for customers and the numerical puzzles that also exist in our world), and I enjoy the competitive element in a business where you can measure the performance of your team every day or week. Given the people bit, I would love to teach something, and as a hobby I love music, so something in that kind of area.

9. What marks out of 10 do you give yourself so far for achievement?

 In Sainsbury’s we have a value where we ‘cheer on our progress’ – it reminds us to celebrate our improvements, our efforts and the small steps that go in to building something great for the customer. It’s a great reminder not to be too harsh on yourself and the team of which you’re a part when there is always more to get done. Given my personality I would probably give myself quite a low mark because there’s always more you can do when you’re building an Online business for the customer, but that value helps me to taken time and realise how much we’ve achieved and are achieving for our customers.

10. Who would you place in the Top 20 Multi-channel/e-commerce Movers & Shakers?

 There are some great people in the multichannel space in the UK. I try to take time to hear other people speak – just the other day I heard Ishan Patel from Aurora speak, and I’ll often read the material that Michael Ross and the guys from eCommera put out. Those are just a couple of folk whose thoughts have stuck in my head recently.

Innovative Retailer - Hobbycraft

Brought to you by Retailinsider.com and PCMS

The Name: Hobbycraft

The Place: Around 70 stores but expanding fast, and online too

The Story: In 2010 Bridgepoint bought Hobbycraft for around £100 million. In 2011 Catriona Marshall was brought in as CEO with the mission (which she has chosen to accept) of overhauling everything. She was previously marketing director at Pets At Home, another Bridgepoint phenomenon, and here she is taking it to a whole new level. In less time than it takes to learn your cross stitch from your chain stitch Hobbycraft has perfected a whole new customer. I give you - Jean and Emma.

No, not Jean or Emma. It's CEO Catriona Marshall.

Right. Super. And who are they? The personification of core customers. It’s really clever. Most businesses go out and research their current customers and then act accordingly on what they find. That would be Jean. But Hobbycraft has gone one further and created the customer type they need to expand with and she is the lovely Emma. Two totally different spenders.

What’s Jean shelling out for? Ah, now Jean is from the post-war generation. She bakes and cooks from scratch and believes in ‘make do and mend’ and lining your own curtains. She is the traditional golden goose of crafting. But there are not enough Jeans and she is, sadly, mortal.

So enter Emma: Indeed. Emma is the mum to Jean’s grandma. It’s still about nesting, it’s still about family but Emma is not a born crafter. She does this for her children and to spend time doing fun things with them. She’s not bothered about learning to sew as a life skill but she is bothered about sewing Hallowe’en trick or treat bags. She isn’t going to make her own icing but she wants ready-made seasonal cake decorations for her children’s cup cakes.

And the trick here is to not lose Jean...whilst capturing golden gosling Emma: Correct. Not easy but Marshall has completely changed the business model. A year ago the shop window would have been dominated by embroidery, which is, like, so Jean. Now the shops have wooden floors, vibrant colours and a lot more signage for the uninitiated with big glass frontages.

Which is, like, so Emma? You’re catching on. Hobbycraft shops are now around 4,000 sq ft smaller than they were and have 35,000 SKUs down from 50,000. And guess what, smaller shops selling fewer products are making more money. Proof that Emma exists.

Forgive me for mentioning money but isn’t austerity the driver here? Categorically not. Both Jean and Emma are an affluent demographic anyway and this is not about thrift. Marshall thinks it is a return to good value and good values and is probably more about the pleasure of gifting than about not being able to afford to buy. It’s an emotional thing.

And are there many new shops to get emotional in? Yessir - 11 shops have been refurbished in 2012, 20 more will get the changeover in 2013. And 10 brand new stores were opened last year, 14 this year, and 18 are forecast to open their doors next year. But they are not on the high street – another blow for Jean as this is where she likes to shop – but retail parks and out of town locations. If you want to capture Emma you have to go where she goes.

The new look

She’s quite high maintenance this Emma character isn’t she? She certainly knows value for money. She won’t spend £5 on an activity that will only take the children half an hour, but it if can last an afternoon then it is okay. A lot of work has gone into Emma and she is paying off big-time. In the two years that Bridgepoint has owned Hobbycraft its turnover has increased 30% per annum and it is in Emma’s categories where the growth is being seen.

What are her faves? Up-cycling furniture, jewellery-making, deco-patches, paper crafts and her entry point – decorating cupcakes. She wants beautiful things but they need to look a teeny bit homemade. Think vintage 1940s tea parties. Oh, headscarves, scrummy scones, flat lemonade, pear drops, Kath Kidston aprons, children with funny fringes…

Alright, calm down. Back to business: What still needs to be done? Right now Marshall is working on getting some pace into the business. She has a strict five-year plan and by January 2013 the basic transformation will be complete. Products, shops, people and local markets have all been sorted out and the new website is launching this month. As Marshall puts it ‘the plumbing’ is now in place.

And next? Multi-channel. As from 2013 the drive will be on m-commerce, click & collect and the development of apps. Also up for discussion is the own-brand product strategy.

Surely other people must be hopping on to this crafting bandwagon? Yes, but it’s very fragmented. Lots of companies touch on it – Wilkinsons, John Lewis, The Range, The Works and Dunelm Mill. ‘They all do little bits well’ but Marshall feels the market can become radically bigger. And with the 2012 Retail Week Emerging Retail Leader of the Year Award under her belt Hobbycraft is definitely one to watch. 

PCMS Group is a leading independent supplier of software and services to the retail industry; PCMS Store and Multi-channel solutions have been chosen by over 98 retailers including Arcadia, John Lewis and M&S. 

Retail Species - the specialist headhunter

The Person: Orlando Martins

The Company: Oresa

The Job Title:  Founder and MD

The Story: If you want to find someone for retail, then this is your man. Executive search maestro and board builder extraordinaire. He has turned finding staff into a virtual art form and stands almost alone as a male in the very feminine world of recruitment.

Ah, but this is not your normal recruitment agency is it? To say he has identified a niche is an understatement. In Martins’ own words his outfit specialises in executive search and board building for businesses who want to thrive in a cross-channel world.

You focus on multi-channel retailers then, or omni-channel retailers, or whatever they are calling themselves today? Martins says that while he has worked with many multi-channel and pure-play clients actually the point is that the majority of consumers use more than one channel. And so Oresa works with consumer-focused businesses of any kind that want to exploit the cross-channel behaviour of their customers.

I think so. Let’s get down to what Mr Martins actually does: Righto. He works with the non-execs and MDs of his clients to imagine what their dream teams could look like, then ‘sculpts’ what they think they want into something that is appropriate and achievable, and delivers it to boot.

OK, could I just zone in on the word ‘sculpt’ here: I thought you might. As he puts it ‘this is not a bums-on-seats operation.’ It is not just about filling specialist online retail vacancies but about making his clients ‘future-proof’ in this fast-moving sector. He works in partnership with companies, over a number of years, to deliver sometimes the whole board; and the importance to him is making the right decision to help those companies grow long term.

I get it. Average day…? There’s never an average day in executive search, he chides. However, as head of the company Martins will be meeting clients, interviewing senior candidates and overseeing his headhunters as they run their research projects to identify and narrow down the suitable talent pool to shortlist for, and then fill, particular roles. He’ll take a few calls from contacts asking for introductions to people he knows, or asking for career advice. And then he has to hold together the business side of things too.

So I take it you don’t just stumble into this line of work? That would be right. Martins background is entrepreneurial and that essentially is what he continues to do. Between 1999 and 2001 he ran start ups, worked for a US dotcom, then turned around a restaurant. And after all that he came into executive search; initially in hospitality. However, he quickly moved into the retail space.

Pourquoi? Retail, after all the start-up and online business experience he had, was where all the action was at the time. And that over blossomed into the cross-channel selling practice he now runs - Oresa.

And Martin’s finest hour would be what…? Well he’s hot on advising on organisational change. And at Joules Clothing he did exactly that, building a board of directors including the MD and HR director. And earlier in his career he placed key parts of the operating board at the phenomenally successful ASOS. He’s proud of that one too. Finally he’s getting much satisfaction at the moment from growing and developing his own team of headhunters and researchers.

And the future direction of Orlando Martins could encompass…? Well anything. He’s not one to limit himself. Oresa has recently undertaken a re-branding exercise and Martins’ ambition for the business is to help a wider group of businesses (fast track, turnaround or in-need-of-change) to realise their potential.

Now I’m curious about what you need to be a good head hunter? Well, tenacity, passion. You need to be intuitive and good at asking questions, matching an instinctive networking ability with great contacts. And an exacting intellect.

Obviously I have all those things. When can I start? Not so fast. As he makes clear there are lots of executive search companies and lots of recruitment companies. Lots of PR noise is often made by companies when all they really provide is a CV database. What is actually required is a differentiator – he has experience of helping retail brands build up whole boards that are fit to tackle the challenge of ‘retailing in a cross-channel world’. That’s his USP, so get one of those first if you want to make it as a headhunter.

And finally, his dream assignment? Never one to rule out anything for real he struggles to think of an assignment that he’d be happy to file in the dream category. Finally he comes up with the chief executive role at luxury goods group PPR. As the company is family controlled, and founder François Pinault handed over to his son François-Henri Pinault in 2005, it’s one that’s unlikely to trouble him any time soon.

Movers & Shakers Q&A with Murray Hennessy

Brought to you by Retailinsider.com and K3 Retail

Murray Hennessy, chief executive of Trainline

1. What is the greatest opportunity for your business?

The greatest opportunity for Trainline is to continue to play our part in growing sales in rail, which as a transport mode is really “coming of age.”  As we help make buying rail tickets easier we will be contributing to what is a fast growing market, which will in turn provide us with the opportunity for significant growth for many years to come. Key to this is transforming the customer experience through a combination of mobile retailing and the delivery of electronic rail tickets direct to your phone, a printed e-ticket or a smartcard.

2. What is the biggest challenge to your business?

Our biggest challenge is that we don’t run the railways as well!  There are a number of areas where we would love to improve the overall customer experience but we are limited to just the retailing. In particular, investments in electronic ticketing have taken time to be put in place as it requires co-ordinated action between 17 franchised train companies.

3. With the benefit of hindsight what would you have done differently so far?

Our marketing has really worked. With hindsight I would have invested earlier.

4. What is the future of the physical ticketing?

Just as with air travel, the future of ticketing in rail is electronic rather than physical. This does not mean that physical tickets will not exist – they may well.  However, the vast majority of tickets will take the form of barcodes on a piece of paper or on a mobile device, or, increasingly stored on a Smartcard, as with Oyster today. This has the possibility of transforming the customer experience in a very positive way, and hopefully putting an end to any form of queuing, allowing people to save significant time and stress at the station.

5. What will our business look like in a decade?

We like to think that it will be significantly larger and even more of a household name than it is today. It will remain the number one specialist in rail and committed to improving customers’ rail retailing experience. While it will offer hotels, car rental and other ancillary purchases, it will have remained focused on retailing of rail. To achieve this we will need to have continued to build fantastic intuitive customer experiences across multiple platforms. We anticipate a significantly greater proportion of our customers will be using us whilst they are on the move. Rail is well suited to this for obvious reasons. Importantly, given the continuing growth of UK rail in general and of the online/mobile segment in particular, we anticipate that we will still be experiencing double digit percentage growth.

 

6. Will mobile devices be the primary sales channel in the future?

First of all, it is not clear what we will mean by mobile devices in the future.  Clearly, phones, tablets and tablet-like devices will all be in the mix, but what else? So, yes, mobile broadly defined, will certainly be a major channel and probably the primary one.

7. What other retail business do you admire?

 I greatly admire John Lewis. This is a bit of a “cheat” in terms of an answer because I used to work there. The organisation is hugely value-led. It has managed to translate its values of honesty and fairness into its shops and to its other channels. It has done this by taking a long term view of life. And, the results of this speak for themselves. Another multi-channel retailer I admire for similar reasons is Patagonia – they try to embody their beliefs in their offering.

8. If you hadn't been a retailer/provider-to-retailers what would you have liked to do?

Well, I’ve done a lot of things besides retailing within business. I was in the restaurant industry with Pepsi and later Tricon Restaurants (now called Yum Brands) and in travel as CEO of Avis Europe. So, let me change the question a bit. What if I had not gone into business? Well, a fighter pilot, off the deck of a carrier sounds almost as exciting, but failing that, medicine.

9. What marks out of 10 do you give yourself so far for achievement?

High marks for what we have achieved and the direction we’ve been heading in but lower marks for not having moved faster in some areas so call it a six or seven out of 10. 

Aldi holds no.1 spot in Top 25 Drinks Retail Websites for October

Brought to you by Retailinsider.com and Cookie Reports

With the top four retailers holding their positions in the table of the Top 25 UK’s leading drinks retailing websites for October, it highlights that merchants are readying themselves for the vital festive period by initiating little (potentially risky) changes to their online stores.

Aldi, Spar(UK), The Whisky Shop and Fortnum & Mason all remain unmoved in  their slots at the top of this month’s rankings, according to the monthly table of UK websites for drinks retailers, produced exclusively for Retailinsider.com by website testing specialist Sitemorse.

To produce the rankings Sitemorse runs automated software that page-by-page reads the first 125 pages of each website and analyses on the basis of six key criteria - function, code quality, user experience, accessibility, performance and SEO capability.

However, the position at the top is closer this month as Aldi scored 7.26 out of 10 compared with 7.98 in September, which takes it closer to second-placed Spar(UK) that again scored 7.08. They are yet again the only two retailers to score over seven out of 10, which Sitemorse regards as the figure all merchants should aim to achieve.

In contrast with last month there were no large movers in October, with only Marks & Spencer moving up more than one place as it climbed from 17th to 15th spot that follows its advance of three places in September.

The Wine Society also continues its move northwards as it climbs one more place into seventh spot after advancing three places last month. Rather surprisingly it is one of only three specialist drinks retailers in the top 10 – alongside The Whisky Shop and Bargain Booze – whereas the bottom three places are all taken up with dedicated drinks merchants.

Laithwaites, Naked Wines and the Sunday Times Wine Club prop up the table again this month with poor scores of 2.30, 1.88 and 1.79 respectively, which highlights that they have some way to go before they match the performances of those players at the top of the table.

It is likely that improvements to their sites would result in them driving more revenue as the online drinks category continues to grow - by 20% between September 2012 and the same month last year (according to the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index). The month-on-month change between August and September this year was an increase in sales of 9%.

Only one retailer was excluded from the Sitemorse testing this month, with Sainsbury’s not included in the Top 25 table because of its reliance on JavaScript. In contrast, Londis re-joined the table this month, and holds a creditable eighth place.


Top 25 Drinks Retail Websites – Oct 2012

Company Name +/- Score out of 10

1. Aldi same 7.26
2. Spar (UK) same 7.08
3. The Whisky Shop same 6.74
4. Fortnum & Mason same 6.24
5. Budgens +1 6.22
6. Bargain Booze +1 6.12
7. The Wine Society +1 5.18
8. Londis new 5.10
9. EH Booth & Co -4 5.00
10. Lidl -1 4.93
11. Iceland -1 4.20
12. BeerMerchants.com -1 3.96
13. Majestic Wine -1 3.84
14. The Drink Shop -1 3.77
15. Marks & Spencer +2 3.66
16. Tesco -2 3.10
17. Selfridges -2 3.10
18. Slurp.co.uk -2 3.04
19. Asda -1 2.90
20. Waitrose same 2.84
21. Virgin Wines -2 2.76
22. Laithwaites -1 2.30
23. Naked Wines -1 1.88
24. Sun Times Wine Club -1 1.79

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