The 7th Year of Rochdale Business Awards
This year, we supported the business awards by putting an award together to celebrate local retailers, that are independent within the Rochdale borough.
It was a great process, as we teamed up with local entrepreneur Gregory Couzens. Greg’s hair salon, Gregory Couzens, has been in operation for years in Rochdale and is possibly one of the longest trading retailers in the town.
Our second partner was with Chris who is the Regional Sales Director for Shoppers Anonymous, a customer service delivery business who are experts in helping businesses deliver excellence in sales and customer services.
Above is Rochdale Council CEO, Steve Rumbelow, kicking the event off.
We Were Overwhelmed with the Positive Response
We were blown away by the response from the Rochdale borough, and applications, for the awards first year out. From all these amazing businesses, we did manage to make the cut of applications down to three finalists based on their applications and business history plus a series of face-to-face meetings and interviews and, of course, encounters with our mystery shoppers.
Rochdale Business Awards 2017: High Street Retailer of the Year
Top Three Finalists
All three finalists were amazing but there could only be one winner! A huge congratulations to Chantilly.
Such an amazing business that’s delivered exactly what they said they did. They are a great bunch of Passionate, people that go always above and beyond at every point they do.
A shining example of not just great retailers in Rochdale but an excellent example of British retailing and what retail experiences should be. I am proud to have presented the award to them.
Furthermore doing this was amazing to allow smaller independent retailers to step up and show how great they are,and have a voice amongst the larger retailers, who in my opinion could learn so much from the smaller passionate retailers, who aspire to be the next big retailer.
Putting passion back into Retail
I am passionate about wanting to get retailers working better together in 2018. My conclusion is we have become so comfortable with online shopping and trading and that we are neglecting our best part of any business… the part that involves people.
Consequently, we must work together to improve the standard in retail to inspire people to start online and finish in store, because they get amazing experience in store, from the people in those stores!
After all, people buy people… let’s not forget or overlook this.
Watch this space next year, as I try and inspire more retailers to seek WORLD CLASS SERVICE, just like Chantilly does, and our teams do every single day.