Haworth Legacy - From fixing guitars to smashing sales

Since the late 1990s, musicians from around the country have made the trek down the coast to visit Haworth Guitars. The music retailer’s humble beginnings started when former high school teacher turned master luthier Phil Haworth opened a shop in Kiama.

The business has since grown to two locations in Wollongong and Shellharbour, and is renowned as one of the top music retailers in the world.

Whether it’s from the two stores or their popular car stickers, everyone in the Kiama LGA knows Haworths Guitars.

What you might not be familiar with however is the latest business venture with the Haworth names attached to it, Resolve Business Coaching.

Resolve Business

Coaching was founded in 2019 by Glenn Haworth, now owner of Haworth Guitars and Haworths Music School, as well as being Phil’s son.

Glenn spoke to The Bugle about how he went from working for his dad’s business through high school to acquiring Haworths Guitars and taking it to new heights.

“I was always involved in the business from the start. Dad was always keen for me to learn the ropes and help out,” Glenn said.

“Even when I was in high school, I was working in the Kiama Downs shop on weekends.

When I went to university, I studied marketing and economics, and kept working at Kiama Downs.

I knew my dad was keen to step back after I finished uni, but I was really focused on my band The Conspiracy Plan, we were touring around and I was loving it. I wasn’t excited at that age to take on a business.”

It wasn’t until a few years later when Glenn was around 25-years-old that the idea of growing a business started to get him excited.

“I became a real student of business and marketing, and that’s when I really saw the potential of not just running a business, but growing a business.”

Glenn found a way to buy Haworth Guitars from his parents and sent about taking the family business to the next level. During that time, Haworths relocated its original store from Kiama Downs to Shellharbour.

“I was really eager to take it on and start ap- plying everything I learnt about business. That’s when I first started getting business coaching myself.”

One of the first things he wanted to do was open a second Haworth Guitars store, which he did with the Wollongong store in 2013. Glenn admits opening the Wollongong stores was very much outside his comfort zone, but taking on those challenges is what gets him most excited about business.

The next expansion was the Haworth Music School. Glenn started tutoring students in the afternoons and nights, which was so successful that the company expanded into the building next door. The music school has since grown to having around 350 students across its Shellharbour and Wollongong stores.

After expanding the business to new heights, Glenn was able to step back from teaching and explore his passion for helping other businesses.

“I was very keen to explore business coaching because I’d had my own coaches over the years and I’ve learned so much from them. They helped me take my own business to the next level, and I was really eager to try that myself.”

Real sound. Really comfortable.

Glenn put his musings on business growth into a book called Retail Domination, which helped him develop a seven-step framework that formed the basis of Resolve Business Coaching.

What started as a side hustle four years ago has now taken up the majority of Glenn’s time as he steps back from managing Haworth Guitars full-time. Glenn also has a young family which he dedicates as much time to as possible.

“It’s a way to simplify things for me in terms of my time and being able to be a good and present dad, the coaching allows me to do that. I’ll work from the home office one day a week which grants me the flexibility to have a young family.”

Resolves Business Coaching works one-onone with clients or within a group setting, depending on the client’s requirements. “I’ve got about 25 one-on-one clients, and we run two group Mastermind sessions a week where I have some of my clients join in to help other clients with training.”

In addition to personalised training, Glenn recently started running a ‘Business Bootcamp’ with his clients, which brings them together for a day to work on their businesses with like-minded entrepreneurs on everything from marketing and sales to finer skills like staff management and time management. The Business Bootcamp focuses on four key areas: increasing sales leads, converting leads into sales, the average transaction price, and customer frequency.

Glenn says one of the most useful aspects of Resolve Business Coaching is the accountability factor. “A big part of [coaching] is the client actually implementing actions, and that’s where having a coach really helps, not just with strategy and guidance, but with holding you accountable.”

Resolve Business Coaching’s next bootcamp takes place on 18 August at The Hill in Gerringong. There are around eight spots left, so any interested party can sign up via Eventbrite and use the code ‘Kiama’ to receive a $50 discount on their ticket.

by Brendon Foye