MERCHANT FOCUS: TIPPERS
TIPPERS POINT THE
“W
e came out of the recession ready to build all aspects of the business back up again and we’ve
done it with a combination of acquisitions, taking advantage of new business opportunities and improving our existing branches and product offering.”
So says Joe Tipper, director of Lichfield-based family owned – and run – builders merchants Tippers Building Materials.
Since 2012, the company has added three branches and is in the process of adding two more. It’s also set up a concrete and volume aggregates operation just down the road from its Lichfield head office site and continued to invest in showrooms and branch design as well as the transport offering and staff. “We believe in taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves,” managing director Andrew Tipper says. The branch in Rugeley, for example, was originally an acquisition of another company - G&J Builders Merchants - and then the opportunity came up to acquire a new site and rebuild the branch from scratch. A greenfield development, the new Rugeley branch, which opened in July 2017, gave Tippers the opportunity to build something exactly the way they wanted it. “One of the most difficult things about getting a new branch up and running is getting the right staff,” he continues. “But because we already had the G&J staff on board – operating
20
Fiona Russell Horne talks to a fiercely independent merchant business about expansion, new branches and making the most of opportunities.
out of the old site - we were able to start with a ready-made team of sales and trade counter staff, all of whom knew the products and the customers. We’ve also changed the trading model so that the staff can multi-task across different areas. Any one of them has the ability to deal with any customer from any sector, and we have worked hard to change the layout of the store area and get the product displays right.” It’s working too, he reports, as branch turnover has doubled since the acquisition. The Rugeley branch trade area is split into two with a building materials section and a plumbing section with a small showroom area. Both trade counters are open to the sales office, meaning staff can easily be seen by customers and they can easily see customers who may require serving. The showroom is run separately and is mostly stocked with Instinct products, the own brand of the PHG buying group – Tippers being the only fully mixed merchants to be members of PHG and another buying group, in this case CBA.
The showroom at the flagship Lichfield branch is also being developed and refurbished with a big emphasis on Villeroy & Boch and Hans Grohe on the shower side. The company
also has a very successful tile section, importing its own Spanish tiles, says director Amy Tipper. “Showrooms are all about getting in the right people in the right area who know what they are doing,” she says.
The showroom has plenty of working displays and, on the kitchen side, often has cookery demonstrations which attract a wide range of customers. There’s also a section of the showroom dedicated to the company’s online business
wwwcookersandovens.co.uk. “We’re pleased with how many products we are able to show in a relatively small space,” Tipper says. “While
cookersandovens.co.uk is an online business, it’s also important to be able to have an option where people can come and see the products if they need to, regardless of whether they found us online or not.” The next major project is a branch in Ashbourne, somewhere that Andrew Tipper says has been on the hit list for locations for some time as it’s a nice market town that fits with what Tippers can bring to the market. The plan is to repeat the Rugeley model, a site has been purchased and Tippers have just announced the acquisition of Hangar 4 Ltd, an Ashbourne based builders merchant.
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net December 2018
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 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52
