Changes to Consumer Sales - Part 1; merging of Retail and Sales

Hi everyone,

Last week you will have received a communication from our People & Culture department regarding some changes to the Consumer Sales area (PS: that’s us).

Now that we have started our new financial year, I thought it may be useful to give you some further detail and context to the very significant changes we have made to our Consumer Division within Hammonds. Over the next few days I will give you 4 deep dive insights to –

• Part 1; The purpose and significance of the merging of our Retail and Sales departments.

• Part 2; The purpose and function of our Client Relations Team.

• Part 3; The purpose and goals of our Training team.

• Part 4; The prime purpose and function of our Call Centre team.

Today, I’d like to dive into the purpose and significance of merging of our Retail and Sales departments.

For a while it has troubled me that we simply don’t fully utilise some of the extraordinary tools we have to serve our customers. What I mean by this is, using the skills and support of each other to serve our customers really, really well. In other words, in a good way, using each other. For me, this has been at the core of merging our Retail and Sales Departments under the newly formed leadership of Sam Roberts and Nigel Edwards, Head of Sales North and South respectively.

Sam and Nigel both bring a breadth and depth of retail, sales, training, leadership and Hammonds experience that will support the accelerated growth of our business. At the heart of this their goal is to create, with your and my support, a customer experience that totally engages a prospect such that they are compelled to want Hammonds as their provider of fitted furniture. As we say … #inordertolivebetter.

My goal is to create an environment where a customer is at the centre of everything we do. This means an excellent initial experience, be that in one of our Design Centres, via our Website or via our Call centre, be that because of an excellent in-home design visit or an equally excellent in-store design visit, or be that via an excellent ongoing customer relationship where we continue to be interested in our customer regardless of whether they buy or not. In essence, to ensure all our customer’s needs are met, that they have what they want, they have what they need and they have what’s important to them. Through design, through service, through making it our business to take care of them throughout their Hammonds journey … and beyond. It all matters.

This means a great deal of attention to detail, it means consistency, it means expending energy at all times in the service of our customers, and it means ensuring we have the stamina to keep going, the resilience to overcome tricky or awkward situations, and above all it means the full commitment to customer service; regardless of whether a customer ultimately buys from us or not. And I mean that sincerely – the same energy, the same effort, regardless of whether a customer ultimately buys from us … or not. Afterall, their experience, regardless of their purchase, is one of the most powerful advertising/marketing plans we can have.

We expect to make circa 72,000 appointments this year. I want us to create 72,000 exceptional customer experiences. And I’m hoping you’ll be helping me to deliver this.

I needed a Head of Sales North and Head of Sales South to support me, and you, to achieve this goal. I also wanted to ensure that wherever possible we were completely aligned. It therefore made sense that Sales Divisions and Retail Regions would merge and report into Sam and Nigel via their management team. It also meant that Call Centre, Client Relations which also includes some follow up activity, and the Training departments were all geared towards supporting them ... and you.

Although only in its early stages, we are currently considering growing our number of sales divisions and the management team in 2024 to support the business growth plan even further. And for those of you who have had the benefit of visiting our brand new Gateshead Design Centre, you will know that our future for Retail is ground breaking in the UK. Who else in UK retail or the UK High Street has opened a Design Centre like ours in Gateshead over the past couple of years? We are leading the way and, I’m sure you’ll agree, it feels very good.

So, this is just a short update which I hope has given you a little more context to why we’ve merged our Retail and Sales Departments. Tomorrow I look forward to sharing the purpose and function of our Client Relations Team.

Kind regards,

Audrey