DWS' ACHIEVEMENTS
A highly dedicated, strategic and results-driven senior manager with board level experience who has a successful background in the achievement of profitable business growth. Exceptional and broad experience gained from exposure in head of department roles for E-commerce, Retail and Wholesale, both office and regional field based. Experienced in working with leading Global and U.K. brands, from founder owned, private equity and public limited businesses. This experience has been gained across retail sectors within premium lifestyle, fast fashion, apparel and footwear, operating in menswear, womenswear and childrenswear.
I take pride in my professional achievements.
HEAD OF SALES - E-COMMERCE, RETAIL & WHOLESALE. (BOARD LEVEL)
RAGING BULL CLOTHING
Record sales and profit achieved within 2 successive years with sales at +32% LFL Year 1 & +29% LFL Year 2.
£2m new business added due to New Sales channels - Zalando, NEXT LABELS, Stitch Fix, Myers department Stores (Australia), 30 wholesale accounts & Agent.
Strong online growth of +38% LFL & +32% LFL over a two-year period for the Raging Bull website due to better operational and commercial planning with excellent engagement and successful management of third-party agencies, Web Developers, PPC, Affiliate, Social & Digital Marketing. As a result, Conversion increased +0.5%, AOV +£8 and UPT +0.2 points.
Successfully led the team through a period of change within the House of Fraser environment, moving from a concession model to wholesale whilst increasing the locations from 28-51 stores, this doubled market share within the business and delivered an additional £0.5m in profit to Raging Bull.
Excellent communication skills with the ability to influence at all levels from Director to Store personnel, forming strong relationships with brand partners working collaboratively for brand launches, the creation and introduction of communication tools e.g. newly created brand & visual guidelines.
Having identified the need for better and more consistent reporting within the business, working with the FD we devised & launched better reporting tools to help make more informed decisions at all levels.
Having identified & planned the need for increased HR support with the appointment of an outsourced HR agency secured, engaged and the people strategy devised collaboratively resulting in the launch of revised policies and procedures for Raging Bull along with a funded Learning and Development programme to coincide with a new appraisal process.
Working within influential stakeholders, Phil Vickery the founder, 3 investors (Nick Beighton CEO ASOS, John King - Ex CEO House Of Fraser, Stefan Cassar - Ex FD House of Fraser) and Shannon MD of whom this was the third time working with over the last 23 years.
HEAD OF RETAIL – STORES AND CONCESSIONS, 70 LOCATIONS WITHIN THE U.K. & IRELAND
GANT CLOTHING – A GLOBAL PREMIUM LIFESTYLE BRAND
A member of the Senior team, reporting to the MD and accountable for annual Gross Sales in excess of £70m across stores and wholesale concessions within Selfridges, Harrods, John Lewis, House of Fraser, Brown Thomas and Fenwicks.
As a team we achieved 3 years of record profits for the U.K., 1st year +153%, 2nd +30% and year 3 +18%.
Full P&L responsibility with a payroll budget of £3.5m and each year delivered a saving to budget for all controllable costs.
Excellent leadership, communication and succession planning demonstrated, resulting in the highest communicative leadership score within the business of 85% and an overall NPS score of +67% Vs a U.K. average of +32% for employee engagement.
Due to the consistent operational excellence delivered within the U.K. Retail stores, the U.K. was selected as the centre of excellence with global initiatives piloted within the U.K. Projects successfully delivered - New store concept, Click & Collect, Ipad’s into stores, a work force management system and a global gift card solution.
Excellent project management and collaborative working with the GANT Global and U.K. Teams, in addition to external contractors to ensure the smooth relocation of the Global Flagship Store at Regent Street London.
High customer engagement and training delivered within stores which resulted in 4 successive years of increments for conversion, ATV & UPT.
Strong collaboration with the HR & L&D teams to devise, trial, launch and embed a full suite of tools for store personnel for policies & procedures, brand values, customer service & Leadership that was supported with a 6 module L&D programme for store and assistant managers that led to the annual GANT Academy graduation.
Great evidence of leading by example through succession planning, resulting in the Regent Street store manager and Edinburgh store manager becoming Regional managers for the brand.
As chair of the weekly trade meetings with key depts, B&M, Marketing, Ecom, Visual and OPS all present, strong commercial acumen & decision making displayed with the ability to listen and influence at a high level.
RETAIL DIRECTOR - E-COMMERCE, RETAIL & WHOLESALE. (BOARD LEVEL)
FLY53 CLOTHING – A MENSWEAR APPAREL BRAND.
Responsible for the implementation of the strategy from board meetings for all channels, E-Commerce, Retail and Wholesale. Year 1 growth +110% & 59% LFL, Year 2 +52% & +28% LFL.
Strong leadership of the E-commerce team to improve commercial and operational practices that resulted in +88% LFL growth in the first year and +60% within the second. In addition, we added an EBAY store for better stock management and improved full price sales on the FLY53 E-commerce store.
Strong relationships established with brand partners within House of Fraser that led to a concession agreement to roll out a minimum of 7 concessions per year.
Working within the Creative Director (Founder) we selected a store concept agency and produced a concept that delivered a reduction in capital investment of 75% whilst increasing the product density by 25%.
Improved operational, commercial and visual delivery through the introduction of guidelines to support concession managers, to educate, coach and to be able to measure ‘what right looks like’ for the brand.
AREA MANAGER – NORTH OF ENGLAND/WALES AND FOR ALL OUTLETS NATIONWIDE.
FAT FACE CLOTHING – A LIFESTYLE CLOTHING BRAND.
Accountable for an Area Store complement of 25 stores and the 8 outlet stores, with a turnover in excess of £32m, 380 employees and a payroll budget of 2.8m.
Over a 3-year average, the area delivered the highest LFL performance within the business, savings Vs all controllable costs for each year and the highest Mystery Shop score within the business of 83%.
Great emphasis in creating a high performing team from working collaboratively with the L&D department to introduce, Myers Briggs, Belbin, Tuckman’s high performing team and the nine box grid models. This resulted in high team engagement with an area NPS score +18% V’s the company average.
Great evidence of succession planning within the area through developmental objectives and coaching with the promotion of 2 store managers to cluster managers who then went on to become area managers.
Respected and trusted within the business to have been chosen to lead some business wide projects, stock loss prevention and the Outlet project to for better management of terminal stock and the implementation of consistency across all areas of the Outlet business. The outlet project delivered a +16% YTD improvement and +29% Vs the company average.
AREA MANAGER
FJ RETAIL (FRANCHISE & OWN STORES) - LEVI’S, TIMBERLAND & CATERPILLAR
Fully accountable for 12 stores with a combined turnover of 16m.
First year trade reversed from –2% to level within six months and the second year, +18% LFL delivered.
The area achieved the highest conversion rates within the Timberland and LEVI’s brands in the U.K. delivering 14% and 17% respectively.
Through great retail and operational processes, stock loss within the area for Timberland was –0.34% and LEVI’s -0.67%
With my peer’s we collaborated and wrote 4 development workshops and delivered to all 60 store and assistant managers, Time Mgt & Leadership, Effective Communication & Presentation skills, SMART objective setting and Coaching & managing great customer service.
The project for implementing the Timberland franchise stores within the business, along with the range planning and buy was given to myself resulting in the successful opening of 2 stores within a year.