SPEAKER_01: 0:18

Welcome to What's in the Box, the brand new podcast brought to you by Box Technologies, powering retail with purpose. Boxtech delivers innovative and market-leading customer engagement solutions that turn business ideas into a performing reality. From design and integration to ongoing support and maintenance, we're with you every step of the way. Now, this podcast is a little different to what you might be used to. It's audio only, so unfortunately, you won't be able to see me or my guest. Totally unscripted. We're going to talk about retail and his business, and uh we'll probably be doing that for around about 20 minutes because we're busy. Our guests certainly are, and we're sure you are too. So let's get right into it. My guest today is a retail exec who began their career on the shop floor. For 15 years, he's been with Ryman, part of the Theopathetis group, beginning back in 2010 as a store manager. And in his words, that was an experience that instilled a lifelong passion for retail, customer service, and developing talent from within. And I'm sure we'll come back to that in just a moment. Five years later, he won the Retail Week Rising Stars Award for Store Support Manager of the Year. And along the way, he must have done something right because he's now Ryman's chief operating officer. Michael Errington, welcome to What's in the Box.

SPEAKER_00: 1:48

Thanks, Andrew. Really good to be here. Looking forward to having a nice chat and talking about people and how we can learn from retail and how we can develop that going forward.

SPEAKER_01: 1:57

Absolutely. Yeah. Now we were just chatting before before this, uh, and you were telling me that uh you rolled out across a couple of the brands um standard tills. And so when I was reading that intro there, I thought, oh, you must be killing kicking yourself. Oh, I should have come to Boxtech.

SPEAKER_00: 2:13

Should have indeed, but it was a long time ago, and it was actually, I could tell you the very long story about rolling out these tills, but it was just during COVID, actually, because we we went into COVID actually as RIME and not having contactless payments. Can you believe it? Oh wow. And then very quickly during COVID had to realize that we needed to roll out contactless technology and we had to upgrade our till systems, but we got a very good deal. We actually, our IT director went to the Far East and managed to get a great bit of hardware for a very good price that we rolled out, and it's still doing us well today.

SPEAKER_01: 2:41

Good, good stuff, good. Well, we're not here to talk about box deck in such and pause. We're here to yeah, to learn really. I mean, I'm I'm fascinated. And something that I um I picked up, I think that people can see on your LinkedIn profile. You use the phrase rising from the shop floor to the top floor. And I wanted to ask you, maybe we'll kick off with if you tell us a bit about your retail journey, because again, going back to what I I quoted there in the intro, the uh instilling a lifelong passion for retail and developing talent from within. So tell us about your journey and tell us particularly about that, your your passion for uh you know investing in in um in talent from within.

SPEAKER_00: 3:24

Yeah, well, my journey was quite, you know, I started when I was 15 years old, part-time job in a retailer down in my hometown of Eastbourne where I was brought up, and had a great opportunity. My store manager threw a set of keys at me when I was just 16 years old. I'm not sure if that would be legal in today's day and age. I was like, you can run the stores on a Sundays, and I got that's when I got my passion for selling and and driving sales. I came up to the north for university, finished my degree, and that same company then offered me a job as a store manager, and that's how I have continued my journey. And it's been really just around testament to delivering results, but also I think one of the key phrases I live I live by is the harder you work, the luckier you seem to get. So it hasn't been a it hasn't been an easy journey. There's been a lot of hard work in it. But I think the good thing about retail is if you put in that hard work and actually and actually dedicate yourselves and get invited and get inspired by it and key about selling and developing people and and trying to find new ways to drive that business forward that you're working in, those stars really shine in retail and have a great opportunity to progress. And be that you start as I did as a weekend sales system or weekend duty manager, you know, you get noticed by directors. I spend a lot of time out in stores speaking to store managers and store teams, and probably learn more than I ever do looking at a spreadsheet or BI system by just having a chat with the store colleagues and the and the colleagues in the offices as well. And I think the key thing about retail for me is I'm always amazed by the the talent of the colleagues out there, both in the support centres, warehouses, deliveries, and in our stores as well. You know, the the talent and the passion they've got for the business and the insights they give you. I've never seen it in other other businesses that I've been in working with.

SPEAKER_01: 5:00

Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it? Because I always feel that retail I mean, I I I've been in retail now for what getting on for 27, 28 years or whatever. And and I I love it. And one of the reasons why I do is but it's as a sector, as an industry, it it's probably if you compare it to, I don't know, telco or utilities or energy or whatever, retail is so relevant to all our lives because we're all shoppers and it's part of our communities and so on and so forth. And I just think that people who work in retail and particularly the stores have a real passion for it.

SPEAKER_00: 5:41

Yeah, yeah, and as I said, I see that every time I go out to see them, and it's fantastic. I mean, just recently I had a letter from a customer of one of our stores and talking around the impact they have on the community and supporting local people in the community. I know we say a lot that our retail store colleagues are often the voice that people hear when they come in and do the shopping, it's probably maybe the only set of voices people would hear in a week. And it's it's amazing the passion they have for their, not just retail, but I think the passion they have for their customers, particularly in in local stores and and in local towns, it makes such an impact.

SPEAKER_01: 6:15

No, absolutely, totally. Let's talk a bit about because obviously I mentioned that Ryman is part of the Theopathetus group, along with Robert Dyas, Boo Avenue. Yep. Yes, yep. Tell us a bit about from a maybe give us a sort of group perspective, and then we'll talk a bit about specifically about Ryman and some of the things that you're doing there.

SPEAKER_00: 6:42

Good, yeah. So we've got the we've got actually four brands, so I'm going to add another one into the mix, which is part of the Ryman Group Limited, but actually from a TPRG group, we've got London Graphics Centre as well, which is a high-end stationary and art specialist retailer in Covent Garden that trades from one site online and in the store. They pick from the same store as well. But from a group perspective, it's a really interesting time. We've got, I think we were talking earlier around the benefits of the group structure and how actually, both from a sales perspective, it one business is slowing down, particularly with hot weather and and cold weather, the other business sort of takes up the slack, which is a positive from a group perspective. But actually, from a group, it's been one of the key things, and I had the privilege of being mentored by Theo throughout my career in the group and through KIP, our group CEO, which is very grateful for. But it does give you an insight into different types of businesses and how they operate. I mean, if you think about it, we've got Ryman, which is a traditional station retailer that's on a bit of a journey at the moment, and should have probably, you know, I think COVID should have probably killed Ryman as a business, if you think about the fact that the city was our heartland of people being in offices and working, and then suddenly COVID hit and then no one came back to work after that. I mean, I know we're now seeing that come back and we're doing some changes, which I'm sure we'll talk about. But then you've got Robert Dyes, a hardware retailer, that's very different. But actually, if you look at that business, we've got a business that's over 50% online now from a Robert Dyes perspective compared to Ryman, where it's very store and bricks and mortar focused. The online business now takes more money than the stores in Robert Dyes. And then you've got Boo Avenue, which is a blend of both, but very fashion and fast-paced retailer and a very young retailer as we start to go forward. So it's great, and the interactions we have as teams across the businesses really do help us think a bit differently and get best practice from each of us and think a bit differently about what we can do.

SPEAKER_01: 8:27

So is there that sort of cross-fertilization, if that's right, of ideas and knowledge and experiences and so forth?

SPEAKER_00: 8:36

Yeah, definitely. I mean, all of us sit together probably once a week on various different steer codes that we have across the business. Some of our functions are group functions, which is why then all of the leads of the businesses sit together to make sure we're going in the right direction. You know, Boo might want something more than me that's going to be better beneficial for the group bank account. So clearly, whatever is going to be the best for the group is what we go after. And then actually, we just have general catch-ups as well. And you know, we share information, we're quite open with each other and sharing data. And actually, the big thing for us now, particularly between Ryman and Robert Dio, I mean, you'll be aware that we a number of years ago we started to open joint stores where we are implanting Ryman into Robert Dious, where Ryman is not in the towns in the south, particularly, and we're going to continue doing that as we see some good benefits, both not just cost savings, but actually customers seem to really resonate with that as well. And we're seeing better footfall into those stores than we're seeing across the rest of the estate with the both brands together, which has been a really key learning and interesting for us going forward. But also power of buying when we buy for both brands together is the real benefit and something we're starting to really take forward from a purchasing function now as well. And we share resources to get the buying and the best volume from our suppliers. I mean, two combined businesses' sales are far more important to suppliers than two separate businesses, and also less work for them and for us.

SPEAKER_01: 9:53

Yeah, absolutely. When we were talking earlier, I was um recounting my experience when uh back in the days when I was at the SuperDrug and always remember there when it was in those days part of Kingfisher, along with and this is a trip down memory lane for uh listeners, Comet, Woolworths, yeah, very much so, yeah. And obviously BQ is still very, very much with us. But one as an example, all those four companies I just uh mentioned sold batteries and all four sourced them completely separately and individually. I think that's changed now, but um, yes, you'd think you'd think it'd be easy, wouldn't you?

SPEAKER_00: 10:33

But um it it needs a bit of attention to uh it needs attention, it needs a bit of a push from the people at the top to encourage people to share that buying power. And interestingly, if it was batteries that started it with Kingfisher, interestingly, the first discussion we had about group sourcing was around batteries as well, so it must be something about that particular product category.

SPEAKER_01: 10:52

Yeah, absolutely. Now, listen, you you mentioned earlier uh that Ryman are on something of a journey, and I wanted to uh ask you about that. So, as an example there, Ryman Design. I remember having a look at, and forgive me, in London, can't remember exactly which part of it, but this is a couple of years ago, and I thought it was a fantastic store. And the one thing again, going back to people, I I remember from that, I got chatting to the store manager, and she was so passionate about and just so open and happy to talk about the uh the business. But tell us about Ryman Design because I know that you're rolling it out to to uh uh to more stores.

SPEAKER_00: 11:34

Yeah, I mean, we started this just probably around two and a half years ago, coming up with the concept of Ryman design, clearly taking some of the opportunity from PaperChasing in the market, but then putting our own spin onto it with Ryman as well. It's really fortuitous uh how that's come about. I mean, you said about the colleagues actually, that colleague that you I think you met, which was either in our Marble Arch or Bishopsgate store, which were some of our first Ryman designs we opened, we bought some team on from PaperChase, as well as my my lead for Ryman Design, Dee, who's been integral for it. But actually, they had they were involved in the creation of that brand. So that's how that passion has come through, I think, from them. So they helped with what's the look and feel of the store going to be like, what sort of environment do we want to create, how are we gonna merchandise? And Rhyme and Design is actually outperforming the rest of our estate, which is really positive. And I'm sure you've seen in the in the media, Theo owned us for 130 years, or we've seen he's owned us for 30 years, sorry, we've been trading for 130 years, he's owned us for 30 years this year. So his key part was modernising the brand, as we said, and and Rhyme and Design is a key part of that, not just opening new ones. And I think if you look at the type of customers we're serving in Rhyman Design, it's a far more high affluence sort of customer that we're looking at, and it works well in city centres and it works well in sort of shopping centres. We're just about to open our store in Blue Water, actually, in the next couple of weeks, which is very exciting for us. Hopefully, just in time for Christmas trade. The team have pulled out all the stops. Uh, we only signed the lease a week and a half ago.

SPEAKER_01: 12:57

Oh, right, exciting. I'll I'll definitely have to have a look at that. I tend to get down to Blue Water yeah, reasonably frequently and always uh always it it's a it's a really interesting and and uh I think it's uh you don't often see very many empty units. There. A lot of footfall.

SPEAKER_00: 13:15

Yeah, hugely busy centre. We've we've got Boo Avenue in the centre as well. So, and that's a good performer for the group from that perspective. And again, no, well, clearly we look at the numbers to understand where we could open a store as well, where we think it's gonna do well. But Ryan Design has really resonated well with the customers. I mean, the card market that we're we're working in, we've got about 18 meters of cards in some of those stores, greetings cards, which is great for repeat purchases. And we're working with a number of designers that so we're supporting independent designers as part of that partnership as well, which is really resonating well with customers, and we're continuing to grow on how can we bring in more products that you can't find anywhere else. I mean, very excitingly, um Theo and I were out in the Far East to China and Japan recently, meeting with some of our stationary suppliers that are mainly based in Japan, which was really good, and we've got some great plans working with them given the trends we're seeing for Japanese stationery coming through the market. Anyone wants to have a look on TikTok, feel free. There's loads of great products out there that you'll see winning Japanese stationery awards. Sorry for me getting excited about stationery, but I've worked in stationary retail for a long time. Give me a good pen and I get very excited. And you know, and then the Far East, the opportunity for us to develop that Ryman design brand, I think, outside of just bricks and mortar of Ryman design stores where we're going to get to around 30, you actually start to think now what's the opportunity for us to bring that brand to the wider estate and help me bring Rhyme and Design brand to 200 high streets across the UK, which will be really exciting as we take that forward.

SPEAKER_01: 14:39

Now, you mentioned the greeting cards and so forth, and I believe I'm right in saying that through your app, people can create personalized greeting cards and then pick them up in store.

SPEAKER_00: 14:52

Yeah, you can indeed. So from our app or our website, it was a new launch that we did again around a year and a half ago now to launch a Rhyman app. It was one of our key things that we wanted to focus on. And we did it in very quick time. I think we developed and launched the app and printing service within about three, four months and turned that round. And let's continue to see the growth from it. Our greetings cards business has sort of remained fairly steady from a personalization, but we've seen good growth on that. But the the key success we've seen from that is actually two things. We've seen a fantastic uptake of customers downloading the app and shopping with us through the app. And actually, the interesting learning for us as a company that's never really, as a group that's never been involved in apps, is the engagement you get with your customers from a marketing perspective through the app. And I think one of the key things for us to look at is how we then use the personalization aspect to become even more personal through those app notifications rather than broadcast groups or very large groups of people you've bought this type of product, we're going to send you a push notification. But people are far more engaged with push notifications from the numbers we've seen coming through, actually. And I think there's a great opportunity to really personalize that even more as we start to start to develop that app through. And then alongside that, that greetings card printing. I mean, the key exciting thing for me really has been the launch of our print services online and through the app. I mean, print services are a great and one of the biggest USPs we have now to differentiate ourselves from just other retailers on the high street. We can now, you can come into our stores and print, be it your CV, be it your presentation for the office the next day, be it your dissertation or thesis. You know, we can bind it, we can print your canvases, your pictures. We just started a partnership with CWE, we've already got good partnerships with DHL from a service to drive more footfall into those stores. But the app has been really exciting in bringing the online and the stores together. Uh, we've launched document printing online for the first time when we went live with the app. And the really exciting thing is not just the fact that it's resonated really well with customers and we're seeing good sales growth from that, but 95% of people that order their print online or through the app are actually coming and picking up in our stores. So it's really interesting that actually not only is that helping at a profitability level for the business, but we're not having to ship it, but it's actually driving a load more eyes and footfall into our stores where we know our store colleagues are the best assets we've got to market our business and talk to customers. So then we've suddenly got a load more customers walking into our stores and experiencing ryman. And that's where I think the journey that we're on is around that omni-channel trying to bring stores and online together and how we make I think that's the key thing for the future of retail, particularly on high streets. You know, we're also looking at other opportunities with same date fulfillment and things like that from our store estate. But then how do we get products into our stores? You know, we've already always been known as a traditional office stationer, or you can come and get your key, your black notebooks. Customers want something a bit nicer now, and I think if we're driving that new footfall in, and the two new stores we just opened have included post offices in them from a footfall perspective. So, how can we develop stationery that people want rather than just what they need? And then when they come in, they see the wonderful products, they see the chair, and they see the newness they pick up and purchase as well with greetings, cards, and gifting coming into that as well. So you can see how that is really starting to come together in our future plans and what we've done so far.

SPEAKER_01: 18:05

And you mentioned earlier that I'll give you a nice pen and all the rest of it and so forth. And it got me thinking, we know that if you look at film as in cameras, uh Polaroid seems to be more popular. We we obviously know that vinyl records, so we're I'm talking analog now. And is that the case with you know uh people wanting to have a beautiful fountain pen, for example? I mean, I can't remember the last time I picked up a fountain pen. I think it was probably at school, and that was a long time ago. But it it it's kind of it seems to be those tactile things people seem to be wanting to uh wanting to have as part of their lives now.

SPEAKER_00: 18:49

I think I think they do, and I think they want something nice as well to have as as part of that when they're using it. But I think it plays into where we are as a as a not just as a country, actually as a world. There's so much noise around us and and you can't switch off from your digital devices. And and actually I think the act is a bit of the personal thing that, and I know not many people do it anymore, but writing a letter or a card to somebody is a very personal touch when you want to say thank you or you want to wish them a happy birthday or anything, rather than just sending them an email saying happy birthday or anything.

SPEAKER_01: 19:18

It's more personal than a WhatsApp message.

SPEAKER_00: 19:20

Indeed, it's very much more personal. And then, you know, I think people are just trying to, you know, journaling is great for mental health and and well-being, taking, you know, and there's some interesting studies. I'm getting boring now, but there's some interesting studies that actually, if you sit in a meeting and write it down on a notepad or a bit of paper, you take in far more and you pay more attention to the meeting than tapping around your laptop and getting distracted. And even schools, you know, you learn more by writing than you do by typing. So it's an interesting, and then there's also, as I said earlier, the mental health benefits. And we're actually seeing that with some of the work we do with our charity partners. So we work with Starlight, the British Dyslexia Association, and the Helen Arkle Dyslexia Trust, and and a lot of, as you can see, there's a nice link there with our product ranges and how we create the team well-being going forward, supporting children in hospital or or helping people study with dyslexia and and the success of it.

SPEAKER_01: 20:11

Yeah, yeah. But Michael, we're I I said at the beginning that we tried to keep these nice and short and sweet and all the rest of it. We're we're yeah, we've hit 20 minutes, just over 20 minutes. So we'll probably call it a day there, but I think that's absolutely fascinating, and we could carry on talking for for quite a while, I'm sure. So that's all from what's in the box for now. New episodes will be dropping every two weeks, so please stay tuned. And if you want to find out more about Box Deck, please follow the link in the description. Thanks for listening, and thank you so much, Michael Errington. Thank you.