IN PERSON: RICKY COAKLEY THE VIEW FROM BOTH SIDES
Ricky Coakley, operations director at Lawsons, has had a merchanting foot in both corporate and independent camps, as he tells Fiona Russell Horne.
Q: What is your current role?
I’ve been group operations director at Lawsons, for two years, and was previously in a similar role with Saint Gobain at JewsonCivilsFrazer and Minster Insulation.
Q: What brought you into the industry? Post A-Levels, and not wanting to go to university, I was working on the golf course with my uncle. My mother said I needed a real job, so she applied for two for me: management trainee at Jewson, and trainee accountant. The Jewson role paid £1,000 a year more, so that was how I made my mind up. I never intended to go into merchanting, I just ended up here.
I was on that programme for two years before becoming an assistant manager, and given my first branch to manage at 21. It was only a six- person branch - Acton High Street - , but we did OK, winning Jewson Branch of the Year in my first year. That meant I was given the chance to run Jewson Wembley, which is where I had originally started. That was hard, because, at 23, I was managing employees who’d been teaching me when I was a trainee. Over the two years I was there we tripled the turnover, and put four hundred thousand on the bottom line. That meant I was asked to go and run an ex-Castle Timber branch, which wasn’t performing. We turned it around, putting a million pounds on the bottom line in the three years I was there.
Q: How did you manage to do that? This is a simple industry at heart. If you do the right things well, and you do them better than your competitors, you will always be fine. A lot of what we did was restoring some of the strengths of an independent, while using the strength of a national - buying power, stock availability, and resource. You marry the two together, motivate the staff properly, and you come up with quite a powerful mix. It’s probably the hardest I’ve ever worked. In the merchanting world, if you want to progress to senior director, you need to understand what it’s like to run those flagship stores. It was quite an ask, if I’m honest, for a 25-year-old to deal with 40 staff, all of whom come with their own issues and problems: parents passing away, people getting ill, their own problems. It taught me a massive amount at a fairly young age.
Q: What happened next?
I left Jewson to run the south-east of England as regional director for Minster Insulation and Drylining. That was a big step up and a different mindset as it was distribution rather than pure merchanting. I did that for two years and then was asked to do the national operations director role for Minster. That role then expanded to take on JewsonCivilsFraser when we set that up, extracting all the civils business from the Jewson branches, and setting up 26 stand-alone depots.
It was great experience, but my passion was always to get back into merchanting. I presumed that that would be with Jewson, having been there for so long. However, the job had changed, and there was a danger of it becoming quite removed from the day-to-day: diversity and inclusivity plans, sustainability plans, long range budgeting, all that sort of stuff which is good, and needs to be done, but it’s not buying and selling, getting to know the customers, and making sure you sell them what they need.
Q: How did you make the leap to Lawsons? I’m based in Watford, so Lawsons have always been on my radar. They made contact and asked if I’d like a chat. I went into the business as a regional director for six months, becoming group operations director about two years ago.
Q: What are the mean differences? The thing that strikes you is there is no protection. If something happens you haven’t got a big department that will deal with it for you. if it’s on your watch, you deal with it. So, the exposure is far, far greater, as an independent, but the autonomy is as well. There are only four directors: Jeremy Norris, the md, Mike Hillier and Paul Rushent, plus me. A very flat organisation, we’re agile and can make decisions really quickly. All of us as directors like to be in and around the business, involved in what’s going on. It works well. Another difference is the number of different hats I get to wear, depending on the day. The role covers sales, profit, health and safety, transport, property, people. In an independent, you aren’t quite as channelled as you might be in a more corporate business. It’s definitely a flatter organisational structure, with more of a family feel. Simon and John
August 2024
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net
Lawson still get around the business; they talk to the staff; they listen to the staff. We still do the Lawson’s Christmas party, the Lawsons Fun Day, and we encourage the branches to go out together and have some fun. There’s less red tape than in the more corporate world. There’s a little less process too, which can be a good thing and can be a bad thing, depending how you manage it.
I’d say that first and foremost, the priority at Lawsons is keeping our people safe because that’s the first must win battle. After that, it’s keeping colleagues happy. On the back of that is how we make sure the business is as profitable as possible for the for the family that owns it. As someone in an independent business you have a vested interest in working to make it better. You’re not working for the corporate machine, you are making money for the guys who are in and around the business, who pay everyone’s wages, and whose family built the business from scratch 100 years ago. Everyone’s very approachable and open, and with that comes the fact that you can’t hide. If you’re not pulling your weight, or doing the job properly, you will be spotted.
Q: What is it about this sector that gives you a spring in your step down the stairs in the morning?
The people side is huge for me. To be able to influence people’s careers, to bring them through and see their lives change via the hard work they put in, hard work that you have enabled them to do, is massive. Also, you don’t need to be educated to degree level or whatever. You can go from entry level to good money as a branch manager in five or six years, with proper support, training, and coaching. I also love the customer demographic of an independent merchant. You come up against all sorts of characters. It’s a very grounded industry, and that’s one of the great things about it. BMJ
11
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40
