Paul Hill looks into how Bestway will now operate following a recent restructure
Following a recent restructure at Bestway Wholesale, retail director Tony Holmes and director of trading for retail & own label Edward Smeaton left their roles.
The restructure leaves Bestway Wholesale to focus on the company’s wholesale, catering and pet businesses, and will also mean a change in the support retailers receive, giving Bestway Retail the full responsibility of supporting franchise shops and company-owned stores, alongside Best-one and Bargain Booze symbol group retailers.
After three years at Bestway, Smeaton joined Lidl as its head of own label and brand buying with immediate effect, while Holmes left after joining the company in 2016. He was also recently promoted from sales director in January.
But what does this mean for the wholesaler moving forward? Dawood Pervez, managing director of Bestway Wholesale & Bestway Retail, explains: “Bestway Wholesale still operates as one company with focused divisions, support offices and depots throughout the UK.
“The Bestway Retail arm now houses our full consumer- retail brand offer including corporate, franchise and symbol group brands – Select Convenience, Central, Bargain Booze, Wine Rack and Best-one.
“By aligning our retail divisions, our customers and suppliers will benefit from a simpler structure and improved service, pulling on the expertise of our consumer-retail teams.”
He points out that within Bestway Wholesale, the focus remains in three areas: traditional cash and carry, delivery to foodservice outlets and the specialist pet product arm, Bestpets. “Bestway Vans Direct also delivers to over 20,000 independent retailers every two weeks and is serviced out of Bestway and Batleys depots,” he adds.
A far as the relationship with retail partners and suppliers goes, Pervez explains that Best-one will still liaise with the same teams, as it is maintaining a dedicated sales force for Best-one headed up by Paul Adams, head of sales and development, and Steve Caldecourt, head of retail multiple accounts. “Our customer contact centre will also continue to support retailers with queries. By grouping our consumer retail brands together, all retailers will benefit from the improved retail expertise and sharing of best practice,” he says.
Also, according to Pervez, this now means that Xtra Local and independent retailers will benefit from an improved focus from the wholesale team, with suppliers having a contact for retail and a contact to discuss wholesale. “In many cases, this matches how our suppliers split their own teams,” Pervez adds.
Plans are also in place to grow both the petcare and catering businesses. “Noel Robinson, who previously led Bestway Vans Direct, will now head up Bestpets as well as Bestway Vans.”
Meanwhile, David Livingstone will continue in his role as head of catering at BB Foodservice. This will place him in charge of all the company’s collect catering offers and licensed drinks range available in depots, for outlets such as takeaways, restaurants, pubs, cafés, coffee shops and the on-trade.
It appears Bestway is future-proofing itself and resetting how it operates as a wholesale business. In doing so it is creating a lower cost base and, in turn, an improved profit line, through a simplification of structures and a focus on what will drive value.
Restructuring leads to senior departures at Bestway Wholesale
