8
PROFILE: JONATHAN DOUGHTY
MEETING POINT
Jonathan Doughty and Mark Rumfitt are chairing this year’s BCSC Shopping Centre
Managers’ conference
T
he BCSC’s annual shopping centre managers’ conference
gathers in Bournemouth at the beginning of March this year
and the joint chairmen, Jonathan Doughty and Mark Rumfitt,
believe they have put together a programme that will help
managers navigate their way through the current choppy waters.
“We know we need to give people a good reason to leave their
desks,” says Doughty, Shopping Centre contributor and managing
director of catering consultancy Coverpoint, who is in his first year as
chairman. “It’s almost a matter of street fighting for centre managers
right now. But you never know how far you can go until you’ve been
pushed. In these circumstances the exchange of information can be
essential for survival.”
And Rumfitt, manager of the Hempstead Valley shopping centre
near Gillingham in Kent, is in his second year as conference chair. “We
all know it’s been a difficult year,” he says, “but this is an opportunity
to look back and reflect. It’s going to be interesting to see how others
are coping with the downturn. And equally it’s an opportunity to look
forward to a more positive 2010.
“Christmas was a welcome relief for a lot of centres,” Rumfitt
observes, “and retailers’ margins seem to have held up, probably
because they’re getting better at stock management. I think the
product’s generally better – and better priced as well,” he says.
“We’re right in the cold months now,” says Doughty. “And a lot of
managers are just looking to get through to half term when things
start to pick up.”
But he adds: “The fact that there are fewer retailers left means
there’s more spend at those that have survived. Certainly in the
foodservice sector we’ve seen the spend gravitating towards the big
shopping centres.”
Against this backdrop, the annual Shopping Centre Managers’
conference has been moved to Bournemouth. “We both thought the
conference needed somewhere appropriate for the current market –
it’s all about being affordable,” says Doughty. “And it was an opportunity
to bring the conference back to the South.”
The Bournemouth International Centre is newly refurbished and
the town itself is an interesting case-study. “The integration of retail
and leisure is increasingly important, and that’s what Bournemouth’s all
about,” Doughty notes.
Study tours have also been laid on to some of the varied retail
destinations in the area including the Gunwharf Quays leisure and
outlet retail scheme in Portsmouth; Hammerson’s West Quay in
Southampton and the Castlepoint development on the outskirts of
Jonathan Doughty
Bournemouth.
And a must-see attraction is the new John Lewis at Home store
at the Poole Commerce Centre, the first of a nationwide initiative to
SHOPPING CENTRE January 2010 www.shopping-centre.co.uk
08-09-SCJan10-Profile.indd 10 14/1/10 18:54:36
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