OPINION
CORONAVIRUS JAMES LOWMAN, CHIEF EXECUTIVE, ACS
THE NEXT PHASE:
LET’S NOT FORGET WHAT WE’VE LEARNED
ACS BOSS JAMES LOWMAN OFFERS SOME TIMELY ADVICE ON HOW TO COPE WITH WHAT LOOKS INCREASINGLY LIKE A SECOND WAVE OF CORONAVIRUS, URGING RETAILERS NOT TO FORGET WHAT THEY LEARNED IN THE FIRST WAVE.
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ince the start of the Covid crisis my colleagues and I at ACS have not just been working to help members to deal with the immediate challenges they’ve been facing, we’ve also been leading a discussion about what we can all learn from this experience. Which of the behaviours we’ve seen over this period will last, which are specific to this time? What would we do differently if we had our time again or if the same issues emerged again? Some of this work has been formalised – see our Covid debate sessions during August and the many ACS
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Live discussions and Local Shop Podcasts where we’ve tried to capture some of the most important things to learn. What we’ve fought shy of has been defining some sort of playbook, because a) with such a complex set of issues and so many unknown and changing factors it would be pretty arrogant for anyone to think they knew ‘the answer’ to the questions about what happens next and how we would respond again, b) businesses and communities are different, so there isn’t a plan that works for even a decent minority of convenience
