NEWS EXTRA HINDLE BOWS OUT WITH FINAL
CHAIRMAN APPEARANCE BMF chairman Peter Hindle MBE made his final public appearance in the role at BMF Members’ Day.
“As you know, after six years in the role I will be retiring in March 2020, although it may be a bit earlier if the board can pick a successor any earlier. “From a financial point of view, the BMF is in great shape, with revenue up 9% and membership up 7% in the last year. We now stand at just over 700 members across the supply chain.”
Hindle said that there were four main stand-out points, that he believes shows the Federation is in good shape. “The first is training with the continued development of the training academy. The importance of youngsters coming through the industry is fundamental to our future.
“Market data is the next area to look at and we have come a long way in terms of the data we have available. Our forecasting is now outstanding. Thirdly, our political representation is now much stronger. I think the work of Brett Amphlett, our Policy and Political Affairs Officer,
is key. We are now big enough to have a voice and a big enough voice to be heard. “ Hindle continued that the benefit of the networking opportunities afforded by BMF membership cannot be underestimated. “The 29 regional centres are a great resource but need to be used more. Instead of waiting for the centres to put on an event or a training course, I’d like to see the regional managers step in and really use them, making them come to life. They can really benefit the members in terms of the networking and collaboration opportunities they can offer.”
The BMF is in great shape, Hindle continued. “We haven’t put the fees up for six years, we have all the value addeds coming from the various services.
For me, it remains to say good luck. I’ve been very honoured and very proud to have served as your chairman for the past six years. I was very honoured when they asked me to
NEWCOMB: TOGETHER WE ARE STRONGER
BMF CEO John Newcomb gave delegates a rundown of where the BMF is heading over next 12 to 18 months.
BMF Membership numbers have risen17% over the last 3 years. There were 655 members this time last year, there are now 701 members, which is the first time they have been that high since 1992. “At a time when most trade associations are seeing declining membership, that is a great achievement,” Newcomb said. The breakdown is: 360 merchant members, 247 supplier members, 94 service and associate members, with collective £31.4bn member turnover and 130,318 industry employees.
Moving forward, Newcomb said that one of the cornerstones of the Federation’s focusses strategy would be increased
8
personalisation of the offer to build value to members. It was announced at the 2018 Members’ Day that the Federation would undergo a process of segmentation of its membership, in order to better understand its diverse needs and requirements. This work has now been completed and Newcomb said that the research threw up six defined segments.
“These are: Plumbing and Heating merchants which account for 15%, what we are calling Unignited Advancers, who don’t engage with us are 30%. Then there’s Aspiring Progressors, whose engagement is on an ad hoc basis with minimal use of BMF
services at 25%. The
Active influencers are 11% and the last category, Focused Improvers account for 19%.” These high engagers, Newcomb explained, have a real belief in what the BMF are doing; they engage because they believe and they feel they belong. The low engagers need to engage before believe, they are reactive rather than proactive, and they have a weaker sense of belonging “We will be working on how we can get closer to those members, finding out what is important to their businesses and being more proactive in encouraging their engagement. The three main categories that we
will be focusing on for this are the Plumbing and Heating, Unignited Advancers and the Aspiring Progressors. We know that we will need to provide focussed service bundles.”
Newcomb said the overall objective moving forward is to move the BMF from something that’s important to members’ businesses to something that’s essential.
“Together we are stronger. We have demonstrated this with our successes over the past seven years, all working together with one common objective. That’s a very powerful message to send out to Government and the wider industry.” BMJ
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net October 2019
be chairman back in 2014. I felt it was a great opportunity to be able to put something back into an industry which had been good to me througout my career. So it just remains for me to say to you all, best wishes, thank you and good
luck.BMJ
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
