Officeworks Nab Guru To Revive Sales

Officeworks hire Marketing guru as sales go flat.
The retailer confirmed the appointment David Haydon as the Director of Merchandise, Marketing, Logistics and Store Development, last week.

It is partly a new marketing and store development role to help bolster Officeworks’ existing marketing team and strengthen  management, a company rep told CN.

David Haydon has “extensive retail experience” in Australia and the UK – his previous role was Commercial and Marketing Director at Kingfisher, Europe’s largest home improvement retailer, responsible for developing high growth markets including China, Poland and Russia.

The retailer is currently working to making sure it has the right people to develop the business and the opportunity to snap up Haydon arose suddenly.

Officeworks H2 ’12 sales rose just 0.3% to $350 million and store sales were up just 0.1% despite opening four new stores, although earnings rose almost 12%.

Previous to Kingfisher, Haydon was the Commercial Strategy Director at B&Q, the UK’s home improvement giant, and has worked at David Jones and Westfield.

Office works plans to open 8-10 new stores this year and is still fully behind its bricks and mortar offering, which complements its considerable e-commerce business, which accounts for 13% of total sales.

The retailer owned by Wesfarmers is now focused on listening to what the consumer wants – convenience – online, or instore, and showing customers its moving with the times.

Mark Ward, Managing Director, Officeworks, said, “We are extremely pleased to welcome David to the team, his expertise in implementing growth and brand strategies and driving innovation at large global retailers will be of huge benefit as we build and evolve our customer offer.”

“I look forward to David joining the team as we build on the success of our ‘every channel’ strategy and continue to grow and develop our range of products and services. The focus, as ever, remains on putting our customer at the centre of what we do.”