Tony Wilkes, centre manager at The Brunel shopping centre in Swindon, has won the retail industry’s most prestigious national accolade of Large Centre Manager of the Year, at the 2011 SCEPTRE Awards, held in London at the Dorchester hotel.
The SCEPTRE Awards reward the best practice and the best people in the UK and Ireland shopping centre industry.
The judges said that Tony’s performance in the two years he has been at the centre was dramatic.
“During 2010 Tony Wilkes drove a 20 per cent reduction in service charge and empty premises fell from 25 per cent to 4 per cent,” they said.
“Average spend at The Brunel is up 59 per cent over two years. This all adds up to one of the shopping centre industry’s most dramatic turnarounds.”
The Brunel, with 100 retailers and 2,000 personnel, had been led by three managers over six months when Tony Wilkes joined in August 2009.
The number of people passing through the centre had been falling, but Wilkes believed that by encouraging his management team to take intelligent risks and learn from mistakes, he change the culture and motivate them.
Wilkes invested in training, mentoring, staff awards, gave them new responsibilities, and shared with them his SMART five-year business plan.
The team rose to the challenge to support his bid to reconnect with tenants and reposition the centre as a popular South West destination.
He also played a part in setting a new UK bench mark in private/public partnerships, for example by encouraging the council to retain the experimental lower car parking fee structure, and by increasing ecycling from 20 per cent to 80 per cent – turning much waste into revenue streams.
Tony increased promotion and marketing activity across the region, including fashion shows, interactive events, car-park campaign, the Brunel’s first gala awards dinner celebrating retailer and staff successes (tenants gave Wilkes a standing ovation), As a result, footfall rose by 20 per cent in 2010 alone, people stayed on average 82 per cent longer in the centre, and over 2009/10 average bag spend rose by almost 60 per cent.
Staff turnover also fell dramatically – from 25 per cent to two per cent.
Wilkes says that he owes much of his success to his family.
“I couldn’t have hoped to win top centre manager for the UK without their support, and without the values that my parents gave me as I grew up,” he says.
“They taught me that being a winner is not about how hard you can hit, but it’s about how hard you can take being hit and still keep moving forward.
“It’s been thrilling to win this award, but it really is an award for the entire team.
“It’s been a great challenge, but I couldn’t have done it without their enthusiasm, commitment and sheer hard work. I couldn’t be more delighted for all of us!”
