‘Delivery of £300worth of Country Choice stock didn’t arrive’

LAST month, we didn’t receive more than £300-worth of Country Choice stock on a scheduled delivery through our wholesaler Brakes.

I wasn’t sure how widespread the issue was and whether it impacted retailers across the country, but I was informed it had affected customers in the area. I ended up getting in contact with Country Choice directly to �ind out what had happened and they were very prompt in responding to me. It turns out the issue wasn’t caused by anything exciting. It was a BT outage, which affected their delivery systems. Initially, I wasn’t given an answer as to when the issue would be resolved and was left hoping it would

COMMUNITY RETAILER be �ixed within a matter of days. My Country Choice stock was delivered in the end.

Anonymous retailer

A Country Choice spokesperson said: “We can con�irm that there was a technical issue affecting a very small number of Country Choice customer orders on

I’ve learned to adapt to new challenges

THE start to 2023 was di cult, but we have come through it and have learned things along the way.

the evening of 23 July.

“The problem was quickly recti�ied and all affected customers have since been contacted to apologise and make arrangements for the missing products to be redelivered.

“We apologise for any inconvenience that was caused and would like to reassure customers that the incident has now been resolved.”

Community Retailer Of The Week

“LAST month I embarked on a 26-mile hike in the Peak District through the rain. I did this with a friend in support of Macmillan Cancer Support and we raised more than £1,000 for the cause. Coca-Cola Europaci c Partners was also very helpful and donated £500 when I told the supplier I was doing the challenge.

“Macmillan Cancer Support is here to help everyone with cancer live life as fully as they can, providing physical, nancial and emotional support. I’ve done many of these challenges for good causes in the past and I’ve got some more planned for the future.”

“I SELL plants where the proceeds go to several local charities. The idea was started a couple of years ago in the pandemic when a sta member had a couple of surplus plants. Although everybody had a lot of free time, they couldn’t get hold of plants. It’s been really successful. I’ve given £500 to N-Able, a sports organisation in the area. I’ve used £100 for the Millennium Community Garden, in conjunction with the Rotary club. I’ve also used the funds to buy a bleed kit for the community to access. The money from the plants helped fund three kits.”

Being highly adaptable and optimistic, I can take the setbacks in my stride, but my top tip learned from this di cult start of the year has been to focus on setting myself reasonable and achievable goals. Looking back, I just kept going over the past few years. A hospitalised partner gave me the wakeup call I needed to realise that, even if you’re just doing one thing every day or even half a job every day, you have to keep moving forward.

Each issue, one of seven top retailers shares advice to make your store magni cent

In the store, we are back to having monthly team meetings where my team members can contribute and discuss new ideas and initiatives that will help the store moving forward. We hired the village hall to have lots of space and we made full use of the kitchen to make pancakes last month, which were delicious.

Mixing it up, we started with a SWOT analysis where my colleagues came up trumps. It was so good to get their understanding and input. They really did a good job and it created some wonderful discussion and an action list that we are working through together.

I have now stopped annual planning because things are too unpredictable and it’s too much pressure. We still have annual targets, but I only plan for the next 12 weeks. A er all, it seems every third week another juggernaut of information comes along. We need to adapt to new things as quickly as possible, so I am Kissing daily – KISS (Keep it Simple Silly). I had been berating myself for not being better without really realising how far we have come and how much has changed. It’s important sometimes to look back and take stock of just what all those incremental, simple changes and improvements have achieved.

I don’t know what lies ahead, but I know that when I look forward another two years, the site and business will be completely di erent. I keep remembering a teenage leadership session called Storming – Norming – Performing. I am certain with all the changes we have made, we are steering out of the storm phase, on to procedural norming and performing is in sight.