THE ERT INTERVIEW VIC SINCLAIR
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In the last 10 years, change has been monumental. Consumers have become far more demanding in recent years; previous standards aren’t good enough anymore – you have to be exceptionally good.
Highlights and lowlights
Lewis, you have to think about how you sell the product. You have to go the extra mile to engage with customers – not everyone wants to look at pictures on a computer screen, they want to feel, touch and see. Selling things by catalogue with rows and rows of washing machines or fridges won’t be the future, so to get people to come in you have to be a destination. Offer cooking demonstrations using the appliances you have in-store, show people how they work. Work closely with the manufacturers as they’re always keen to do this sort of thing.
Everything has changed since I started and in the next 10 years it’ll change again. You have to anticipate and make sure you’re at the front of the curve and not at the back, because at the back, in this modern world, it will mean curtains.
Q: Has your personal life been influenced by your work? VS: When you look as a customer and as a professional buyer, your opinions do change. Over the years I’ve made objective decisions with buying things for my home. I now influence my wife whereas before I had very little influence
over the appliances that we had! But now I’m the go-to person for my whole family – they all ask me what appliances they should get.
Q: What will you miss at John Lewis and about the industry as a whole? VS: Across this sector I’ll miss all the characters; a lot of them have become great colleagues and friends over the years. I’ll miss the product too – I love change and innovation and I’ll miss being a part of that.
At John Lewis I’ll definitely miss the people, it’s
a great place to work. The reason the company exists is for the happiness of the partners who work there; it’s part of our ethos to ensure that we’re working together as a team.
Q: What are your plans after you finish working? VS: It’ll probably be quite hard to go from 100mph down to 20mph, but I’ll definitely sit back and reflect, for a week at least! And then I want to throw myself into quite a bit of sport. I’m a keen golfer and I want to take up tennis. I’ve also got a brand new bike sitting in my garage that I want to take out. And I’ll probably go on a few holidays!
For the last 15 years, Vic Sinclair has witnessed a lot of change in the consumer electricals market and here he shares some of his memories.
UK production One of the lowlights I’ve felt in the industry is the demise of UK production. When I came in to the market we had a lot of cooking and white goods brands that manufactured across the country and that quickly diminished and disappeared. It’s a great shame and I miss the fact that we were once a producer in this country.
Product innovation
A true highlight for me, though, is product innovation – I love seeing what people are doing now. Take washing machines – they’re moving towards auto-dosing. And energy efficiency in the industry has moved forward dramatically. When I joined it was C and D ratings, but now most things are A or A+. Also, developing the John Lewis brand
was particularly enjoyable, especially seeing it develop into the huge success it is today with multiple product ranges. It’s very popular and I feel proud that I was a part of that.
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