Adam Tamsett, General Manager at intu Derby


‘While the advent of online shopping and quick, easy methods of purchasing has caused


disruption to traditional forms of retailing, Adam believes that embracing change is essential to the sector’s ongoing success’


Paradise Island Adventure Golf and that has been very successful. Our footfall in the evening has gone up by 30% year-on-year and this is bringing in a new and different demographic of customer that we may not have seen previously. In turn that benefits the retail element as there are more people in the shopping centre.” While intu as a company is clearly established and


successful, behavioural differences between cities and regions means that a one-size-fits-all approach is not always possible. Even in the East Midlands, there are significant


differences between those who visit our three major cities of Derby, Nottingham and Leicester and that calls for a more tailored approach to intu’s delivery; including Derby. “Every centre is different and every city is different,” says


Adam. “Although the overall strategy of creating a destination


and an experience is the same across our centres, you have to do it in a different way in every city. Nottingham is very different to Derby, for example. The former would arguably be stronger on higher-end fashion at the moment but when the weather is bad we see more customers come across to Derby, because the centre is all under one roof whereas Nottingham is a place where you’re likely to browse the whole city. So you have to look at what’s already there and what the demands are of the people in each individual place. “Also, the catchment between Derby and Nottingham is


quite different. Derby’s catchment tends to be further West and South with the M1 acting as a bit of a boundary, with


Nottingham pulling more towards the North East and South; so it’s quite interesting to see the people who come through the doors.” The old adage of “if you can’t beat them join them” feels


quite pertinent in relation to the Retail sector’s relationship with technology and ecommerce. While the advent of online shopping and quick, easy


methods of purchasing has caused disruption to traditional forms of retailing, Adam believes that embracing change is essential to the sector’s ongoing success. “We still use traditional methods such as exit surveys but


there are more modern ways to track our customers. “For example we are launching a mobile research


programme which allows us to track mobile behaviour of customers in real time, including how affluent they are, where they’ve come from and what the previous places they have visited are, which is really exciting. “We’re able to track a lot more than we have ever done


before and that informs us of the best places to spend our marketing money. Before, you might run radio, TV, outdoor advertising campaigns but unless you had a measure it was often very difficult to tell tangibly how those campaigns were doing, whereas now we are increasingly spending money online and able to track the success of these campaigns much better and tailor our offers to customers accordingly.” Adam also believes that online and physical shopping do


not have to be mutually exclusive. Indeed, he sees real advantages of combining the two – for both customers and the retail stores.


business network December 2018/January 2019 45


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