P-05 South London hospices working together to improve retail. (19th November 2022) - Vickers, John
Abstract : Background: The retail team from St Christopher's Hospice has given consultancy support to neighbouring hospices, Greenwich & Bexley Community Hospice (GBCH), and Princess Alice Hospice (PAH). Through the hospices working in partnership together, retail practices have improved, and there has been significant new income generation across all three South London hospices, to support end of life care directly. This has taken place for the last 18 months and is still ongoing. All three hospices support the submission of this abstract. Aims: To share retail knowledge and experience with neighbouring hospices. To generate more income for each hospice. Methods: St Christopher's Commercial Director was seconded part-time to GBCH, and then following this to PAH. In addition, St Christopher's retail team has supported its neighbouring hospices to carry out refits for new shops. Support includes: Development of retail strategies. E.g. right stock, right time, right price, right place. Transforming logistics for shop stock and collections. Managing property portfolios, and renegotiating leases. Project managed shop refits. Recruiting retail staff and supporting restructures. Coaching and mentoring retail staff. Results: Significant increase in trading profit for GBCH, and PAH. St Christopher's also reduced its costs. Working in collaboration brought smarter work practices. Economies of scales reduced costs and gave greater negotiating power. Being able to share shop data with transparency allowed all charities to understand opportunities. Conclusions: Sharing a retail strategy with proven success supported retail boards to have confidence in making decisions. All hospices have different experts; pooling this knowledge makes sense and we deliver more for everyone. It is ok to charge for consultancy time across hospices, if it delivers benefits for everyone. There is a difference between fundraising and retail skill-sets, and we need to resource for that.