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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 Lowe

Meet Gary Lowe, Operations Director

How did your journey at Bluestones One begin and what has it been like since?I was lucky enough to be one the first to join Bluestones One and since joining the business we have grown significantly, we are now a strong business with a great reputation for being customer and people focused. Why do you enjoy about working in this industry?Everything! From interacting with customers to visiting stores and meeting the teams that do the hard work at the shelf edge. I have some great relationships with customers and our field teams which we have built over time. Every day is both challenging and rewarding and I can’t imagine ever working in any other industry than this one. What is your proudest professional moment?It is really difficult to pick just one moment as there have been many in my career. But if I had to pick one, it would have to be when we won ‘Best New Business’ at the Bluestones Investment Group Awards. To share this accolade with my fellow Directors made me very proud indeed. What are your values as a leader?I have 3 values I tried abide by in everything I do: 1. Lead by example. 2.

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