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Case Study: Wilko

Summary

With current labour challenges across the sector, Wilko Retail Ltd were facing a team member short fall on the run up to peak Christmas demand in their two distribution centres at Worksop in Nottinghamshire and Magor in Newport. 

Our merchandising team identified an opportunity to work collaboratively with Wilko to help support their requirements at a time when merchandising in-store is traditionally quieter, to reduce customer disruption during a key sales period.

Challenges

Distribution centres have lots of new Health and Safety challenges, such as lorry routes and forklift truck movements that the teams were not used to working with. 

The team received extensive training beforehand and they were then able to support in a number of roles including picking stock, loading store deliveries, offloading containers and organising recycling and salvage. 

Results

The Bluestones One merchandising team were able to support both distribution centres with up to 60 people, around the clock, over a 7-week period to help fulfil their peak demand. 

This will now become a successful seasonal collaboration and opportunity for both businesses going forward.

Meet the team: Gary White

Meet Gary White: Managing Director

We’re getting to know the Bluestones One team so, we’ve asked Managing Director, Gary White, about his journey in the merchandising and installation industry and what it’s like leading the team at Bluestones One. How did your journey at Bluestones One begin and what has it been like since?I joined the business in May 2018 and it’s been a whirlwind experience ever since. We built the business from scratch with the support of the group and have gone from strength to strength. We now have a market leading business that will continue to grow and I’m very excited for the next few years. What do you enjoy about working in this industry?No two days are ever the same. We are constantly engaging internally and externally on new projects, ideas and initiatives. As with every business there are always challenges, but as a team we face them head on and come out stronger for the experience. What is your proudest professional moment?There are a few, but we have been very fortunate to be part of such a supportive Investment Group and have won 3 awards in 3 years at the annual awards. Our first one (Best New Business) was incredible but

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Meet the team: Garry Leck

Meet Garry Leck: Lead Resource Co-ordinator

Tell us about your role at Bluestones OneI am the Lead Resource Coordinator and have been with Bluestones One for almost three years now. I started out in the field as a Merchandiser, then moved up to Team Leader before I got offered a permanent role within the office. I spend most of my time based in our North East office where we run a small team responsible for allocating the work to the field staff. On a day to day basis, we allocate the work and resources needed for each job site. How would you normally start your day at work?The start of each day is different and led by what has happened the previous night. The main priority is to resolve any day to day challenges or additional requests generated by the night teams. Once resolved we can move onto the planning of the following days and weeks. What does a typical day at work look like for you?A typical day is mainly dealing with enquiries generated on-site whilst trying to organise the following weeks. If we can get everyone into a job they like with people they enjoy working with, our job is made so much easier.

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