News


Philips has appointed Joanna Elliott as senior marketing director of the UK & Ireland Consumer Lifestyle business. Joanna joined Philips in 2010 as senior marketing director where she was accountable for long term strategy and marketing for the Health and Wellness group across Western Europe. With B2B and B2C experience, Joanna also led marketing teams at Sage UK, Jackel International and Coty S.A.


Stefano Marzano has been


appointed chief design officer at Electrolux, to lead all design-related competencies in the Group. For the past 20 years, he was chief design officer at Royal Philips Electronics. Until 1998 he was a professor at the Domus Academy in Milan. Marzano is a member of the European Design Leadership Board.


BSH Home Appliances has appointed Brendan Bulfin as the company’s new head of Customer Services in the UK. Mr. Bulfin succeeds Bernhard Vocke who has now moved to BSH head office in Munich. Brendan Bulfin originally joined BSH in 2004 as national service manager with a brief to re-structure the UK Service Division. In 2008, he moved to California, where he created a new framework for Customer Service in North America as the company’s first director of service in the USA.


Neff has


announced the appointment of Jamie Norris as the company’s new area business


manager for the North West of England. Jamie has extensive sales, design and


management experience in the kitchen industry, from both trade and retail perspectives.


Selling consumer electronics


THE new generation TV displays, gloriously showcased in Las Vegas at the CES 2012, are stealing the limelight from tablets and gaming gadgets, while connected devices are about to transform our work and leisure habits.


At a time when the media


are whetting consumers’ appetites for the next big thing in CE technology, the market analyst GfK reports that consumer electronics suffered badly in 2011, declining in value by 14%, which amounted to around £800 million loss at retail. This trend continued in January 2012, and its main causes included heavy price erosion and some product


cannibalisation (for example, MP3 players by smartphones). Moreover, the complexity of


modern CE technology leaves consumers confused, with 27% of them giving up at the final stage of the


consumer journey and failing to purchase the intended item, reported Gildas Pelliet, managing director of Sony UK, at the press briefing during Sony Technology Conference in London. “This 27% is the size of the lost opportunity in our sector and it means that we should simplify the way we engage with consumers.” While some young technology geeks are already looking to trade in their first tablets for the latest model, many consumers still don’t know how internet TV works and how they could benefit from it.


Sony marketing director Shaun Dorrington argued that “demonstration is now more important than ever” if consumers are to buy into this wonderful new technology, and the retailer has a greater role to play than before. I am sure that we all agree with this. And yet, the prospects for the electrical retail sector are,


to say the least, uncertain, with the Javelin white paper predicting that by 2020 there will be 38% fewer electrical retail stores in the UK. Unless a concerted effort is taken to support retailers on the high street (and the Mary Portas report clearly is not going to be significant in this respect), customers (even those who favour the internet) will have nowhere to turn to for specialist advice and that all- important demonstration.


Anna Ryland, Editor aryland@datateam.co.uk Helping the heroes


AT its annual conference in Marbella, members of Combined Independents (Holdings) has raised £16,000 in support of the Help for Heroes charity. In a charity auction, CIH agreed for Hugh


Watchman, its brown goods buyer (pictured on the right, with the cheque), to be ‘sold’ to work in-store with members. Mr Watchman spent two days working for CIH members RGB Hi-Fi & Video and Stellisons, after each member bid £2,500 to secure Hugh’s services. Beko agreed to match the £5,000 sum raised.


In a separate auction, Colin Rodgers, Samsung’s general manager, Independents, offered to work in a CIH member’s store for two days, for the highest bidder. John Digwa, managing director of PRC Hi-fi & Video, secured the services of Colin, with a winning bid of £5,000.


6 The Independent Electrical Retailer February 2012


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