MERCHANT FOCUS: HOWARTH TIMBER AND BUILDING SUPPLIES
first impression. It also moves us slightly away from the more masculine, trade environment that builder’s merchants can have,” Knowles explains. “Yet we have also created an inviting environment for the trade, too. Our trade customers know that they can bring or send their customers to us to be inspired and made to feel comfortable about their purchasing choices.” On the outside of the branch, there is a drive through section as well, as Knowles says everything is being done to make it easier for the tradesmen to get in, get what they want and get out again as quickly or as slowly as they want, in order to get on with the job. A seating area for trade customers has also been installed, he says, catering for those builders who make it part of their day to day routine to come in and have a cup of coffee and a chat with the people at the trade counter. “That might be about new products or the jobs they are doing - even the football. Builders are often working on their own and it’s nice for them to get the interaction at the trade counter.”
The aim is to change all of the Howarth branches by 2021 and have them follow the Wakefield blueprint, with the caveat that not every branch will fit the template exactly. The first to be refurbished the Wakefield way will be Corby, Knowles says. “There will be a new all singing and all dancing branch there. We have tried to build a framework that we can adopt for most branches and tailor it where we need to. So Malton, for example, is quite a low headroom site, in complete contrast to Wakefield with its vast ceiling heights. So we will have to work within those parameters. One of our Manchester branches is quite small, as is Brockley Cross in London. In those cases, we will be using the template as a framework, rather than replicating it completely.” It’s important to get the bricks and mortar environment of a branch right, but Knowles says that the company believes getting the people in a branch right is even more important. “People are the ones that make
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net July 2019
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Our trade customers know that they can bring
or send their customers to us to be inspired
the difference in the businesses,” he says. “Because we have such a broad spread of branches and of products within those branches, our competition comes from a range of different companies, but is mainly where there are good people. If a branch has really good staff who know and understand their business, then they will be competition for us at Howarth, regardless of whether that branch is a national chain or another independent.” Knowles says that one thing Howarth has been very conscious of in the past few years is the need to bring younger people through the sector. “Our managing director, Nick Howarth has had it in his head for a while that he
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wants new blood and new life throughout the company. He has been trying to make the industry and the company as attractive to as diverse a range of people as possible,” he says. Clearly some of that is working as the company picked up the Diversity award at the BMJ Industry Awards earlier in the year. There’s also a graduate scheme and an apprenticeship scheme which runs alongside this. “We really do believe as a company, from the managing director down that people are by far and away our best asset, and that goes back to our core values.” New for this year is a sales management training scheme, which the company hasn’t had before and that has led to a new structure, of area managers in above the branch managers. “We have growing steadily over the past few years and the individual branches have been growing as well. Most of that was being channelled through to one person – the MD. By bringing in an extra level of management it allows Nick Howarth to focus more on being a managing director. It gives him the space to think about the strategy and future growth, without having to get tied up with the day to day minutiae of running an individual branch.” Knowles says that everything Howarth is doing at the moment is about trying to make customers’ lives easier. “We want to help them - and us - make more money. We are doing this by ensuring that we are consistent with everything we do across the business, that the message is the same and they know what they can expect from us and understand our values.
“Having this one approach and being consistent, not just in how we look, but also how we do things, is key. We are trying to push that idea about all of us treating customers the same way from the yardman up. That’ what we believe makes the difference to our customers and means they bring their business to us, rather than to someone else.”. BMJ
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