Interviewed by Balqees Alramahi for MBSC Sales Management Project Date: November 12, 2024
Balqees: We interviewed the e-commerce director, Majid, and we interviewed the commercial food category manager, Sultan. Would you like to just tell us from your experience, or would you like me to start with the questions? I feel that when you tell us your story, you can tell us more, and then your conversation will drive the questions.
Reduan: I have worked mainly in non-food and operations, but also in the head office in merchandising sourcing. I started my career as a section manager in one of the biggest hypermarkets in Morocco. Then I joined UAE Markets with Carrefour for four years as operations department head for the light household department. Then I moved to Oman as a merchandising manager for Oman stores.
In 2016, I came back to UAE as a merchandising manager for the same categories - bazaar, light household, or general merchandise, as we call it here. Then in 2020, I became head of merchandise for the same department. Finally, I joined Panda at the beginning of this year as head of textile and general merchandise.
So my main experience is in non-food, though I have good knowledge of food and the retail industry in general. But my career was much more focused on non-food sourcing, merchandising, and sales.
Balqees: We have questions about many things in sales. Do you want me to start with the questions?
Reduan: Let's go through it and I'll give you straightforward answers so that it's compact and clear for everyone.
Balqees: In account planning, how critical is your approach to account planning for meeting growth targets and addressing customer needs?
Reduan: Account planning is one of the principles in our business. No sales can happen, no profit can happen - nothing can happen without proper planning. The planning starts from knowledge of the categories, preparation of the categories, and understanding your categories.
There are different variances in retail. We have what we call regular range development, where we interfere in range development and therefore sales. It starts with planning the items itself - meeting suppliers, selecting suppliers, then selecting the range, then going into the depth of the range. Here we talk about the category role - are we going for a big category or a small category? Are we impulse? Are we a destination in this category?
If we are a destination category, we definitely have to prepare for a larger assortment. We have to do market studies, see what's happening in the markets, and prepare for what we would like to have or execute. It really differs based on the target itself. But planning is key to any successful business - we cannot sell unless we plan well. This includes planning the merchandise, supplier accounts, financial aspects, stocks, etc.
Balqees: So you have standardized account planning procedures for how you manage the accounts?
Reduan: It depends on the sector. There is some standard planning for certain divisions and departments. For replenishment, for example, it's purely planned system-wise. Before we make a replenishment for any kind of goods or range, we have to plan it in advance - there's a process for that.
But when we're talking sales, there's no written planning - it's more based on experience itself. And again, it differs from category to category. It's not a written science, but something you accumulate through experience.
Balqees: We have another question about key account management. If you've answered it in the previous answer, we can skip. How essential is our key account management program in maintaining and growing relationships with our most critical customers?
Reduan: Key account is part of what I discussed, which is vendor management. Key account management is basically how we deal with, organize, and plan our relationship with our vendors. First, we have the vendors, which are external partners we work with. But we also have internal team members - other departments we work with. Both require proper communication and planning.
For external vendors, we're supposed to have a file for each supplier. We meet with each supplier at least once a month to evaluate and see where we're going. We have annual visits, contract annual meetings, etc. For every vendor, we have a key account file including their main indicators - stock, sales, profitability, how things are going. We also have qualitative criteria in terms of service level, etc. So yes, it's another key element in our daily management.
Balqees: We have a question about sales development and execution. How important is structured sales development and execution support for advancing prospects through the sales pipeline?
Reduan: It's extremely important because it falls into the same cycle of planning. Sales don't just happen - sales only happen when you plan for them. In the retail business, we work with calendars. We have our financial objectives - daily targets, monthly targets, annual targets, etc. - for every line on the P&L: sales, margin, total commercial, stock inventory, and total profits.
To reach those numbers, we have to work with the marketing calendar. We look at which events we're targeting. In retail, we have Ramadan, outdoor seasons, winter, Christmas in some areas, which we plan for well in advance. We plan not only for promotion sales but also for sourcing - how do we source it? Where do we source it?
In general, the preparation starts six months in advance for long seasons, and three months for normal execution campaigns outside of seasonality. So yes, it's another planned structured area where we work on a daily basis.
Balqees: Do you have training for the processes? What are your resources when you deal with sales development and execution? Is there training?
Reduan: Of course, there is training for each company, not only with us. For any big season, there are processes, like I explained. Sourcing, for instance, follows a fixed process. We start at least six months in advance with our sourcing and collections, whether it requires traveling overseas or staying local.
We work with our planning departments, global sourcing departments, and warehousing. We prepare everything in advance and everything follows a process. It's a written process. But even for seasonalities where there aren't big processes provided, we rely on the accumulated experience of category managers to prepare. There is a process, but it's an automatic process - something they do by default because they know that if there's a promotion a month from now, they have to prepare it now. It doesn't need to be written - if they don't do it now, they won't reach their target on time.
Here in Panda, even normal execution like leaflets has its own process. It starts two to three months in advance, and we have to follow the steps provided by the company. But again, the most important part is the actual experience you have and the knowledge of the products that will make it successful or not.
Balqees: When we spoke to food category, they spoke about specialty coffee. Do you do any early pipelines or lead management when it comes to non-food category? And how do you achieve your sales goals when it comes to such early pipeline and lead management?
Reduan: Well, food has depth in the assortment. It's another world and it's complex, where the assortment is so deep that they go into sustainable range. Nowadays, all over the world, everybody is talking about sustainability range, organic range, specialty range, Asian range, Arabic range - there's variety. They have to go there because the volume of business in food is huge, much bigger than anything else.
The non-food sector is much more focused on seasonality, and our seasonality is much more complex than the food part. With food, you have the ease of having goods locally - rice is always available, milk is always available, chicken is always available. But you won't find a frying pan all the time. You won't find a screwdriver unless you have somebody strong to produce it locally or you source it yourself.
To source these items, you have to plan well in advance. It's harder to get goods to the shelves in the non-food area because it requires more effort. Therefore, even the depth in range wouldn't be as large as in food. So we're not into specialty yet, but we're more into seasonality and micro-seasonality.
It's a different model, but the processes and planning remain the same - it has to be done well in advance. For example, take Ramadan in non-food - it's a huge season for us. Our goods come from overseas - China, Turkey, Egypt, we have different sources. To prepare for that, we have to plan for the goods and sourcing at least six months in advance.
We have to fix our shopping list and see what we need for the next Ramadan. This Ramadan is done since April, but the next Ramadan planning will be done in April. So just after the first Ramadan is over, we start working on the next one. We fix the shopping list based on what we sold in the actual season and what we learned from it. We take into account customer trends - what did they buy, what didn't they buy? Is the market shifting to a new trend?
Reduan: We use all this information to fix what we call a shopping list. Then we start looking for sources, whether overseas in different locations like China, Turkey, Europe, etc., or locally with our partners. With local partners, the process is easier - we simply tell them what we want and ask them to bring it for the next Ramadan in advance. But when it comes to our own products or imports, we have to research where it should come from, how much it will cost, check it physically overseas, then plan for its arrival. The process is complex and requires a lot of planning and workshops to be done much earlier.
Balqees: There is a question about support tools and technology. How effectively do you implement and integrate sales support tools and technology? Do you have anything in that aspect that influences your sales team workflows?
Reduan: To be honest, for the time being, technology isn't restricted, but it's much more highlighted in the electronics division and e-commerce. When we talk offline, it's mainly in the electronics division where everyone has to be up to date, not only in terms of products but in terms of highlights and how things are done and exposed.
You cannot sell an iPhone just by displaying an iPhone. It has to be displayed within a stand, within a certain highlight, because you're not selling only the product - you're selling the experience. The experience pushes for the product to sell. This is the area where technology is much more used, particularly in terms of highlights execution on the floor. Processes remain the same, but we use technology much more in this area than others.
Balqees: We have something called commercial messaging. Is this something that is in your category?
Reduan: This might be related to marketing, but what I can say is it's basically another way to sell products. We have to make a good reach to the customer. Customers nowadays, with the online shifting and everything becoming easy to do from home comfort, offline is much more challenging to make the product reach the customer.
The commercial messaging, if I understood it well, is about making the customer aware that there's an item they can come and collect or buy from any retailer. But it doesn't have to come as an ad. For instance, with Tefal, we don't just say "we have Tefal" - we have to encourage them to buy by mentioning discounts. It has to come with a commercial sense to the customer.
Balqees: When you manage the sales operations function, in what ways does the sales operations team actively contribute to creating strategic advantages? Do you drive any strategies when it comes to your contribution as a team?
Reduan: Listen, operationally speaking, the sales team or the operation team is really the heart of retail. What we do as category managers is to provide the good product to the sales team. But in the end, the sales team or operation team will sell it effectively. We can't work without them - they are the ones generating the whole business for us.
So definitely there is a strategy. There is a human strategy. There is an operation strategy run by all the ops team, which makes this happen. It's not just important - it's crucial for the functioning of retail.
Balqees: But how does it influence a strategic advantage? Do you think it does in your area? Like, does your operation drive decisions and influence them in a way that it becomes a strategy?
Reduan: It definitely comes in a strategic aspect because it's a big area of development for retail overall. We can't just sell a product without doing the proper highlight. The highlight is done by operations. How do we do our highlights? How do we expose the items? How do we sell our products? How do we create the ambience for the customer in our stores? This is the strategy.
If you see today in the market, for example, you go to the big discounters - they are more into bulky displays rather than clear planograms with category management. Because this is their strategy - they play on mass. They sell fewer items but massively, and they encourage people to buy because they provide a good price with a massive, attractive display.
When you go to modern retailers such as us, it's another world. It's a combination of both. We have the massive displays in some areas, but we also provide assortments. We also provide category management solutions, displays, technology. This is another strategic way we run the operations. This plus the category management both creates a good experience for the customer.
Balqees: You were saying that you try to create an ambience for the customer. But is anybody collecting feedback on how the customers behave in the shop when it comes to non-food category? Do you have people recording or asking for surveys?
Reduan: We have an insights department under the marketing umbrella who handle this kind of data. We have frequent surveys that we do in the stores with operations. Operations give us consistent feedback from customers on their journey in the stores - how they feel about the display, how they feel about the new experiences that we provide them, customer experiences in the stores, the new displays, etc.
We collect a lot of data through our insights department, and they share this data with us. Any feedback is reflected in our next decisions. To give you a quick example - if we see that customers have a good response to the organic range, then it's a must to enlarge and develop it further. But if we see that in local markets the response was weak and people are still into the normal range, then we have to take that into account and shrink the display instead of enlarging it. Customer data and their feedback is extremely important for our next decisions.
Balqees: They drive how you design your product display. You have a salesperson standing in front of the display too, right? And that person also is how the insights department is recording the feedback, isn't it?
Reduan: The sales representatives are basically recording the qualitative kind of feedback. They provide us with real-time feedback by phone, just by talking to us. But the surveys are the official ones. The salesperson is not supposed to collect any data - they just give live feedback to us by saying simply, "Look, there is a demand on item X, for instance, so we need to develop it."
The surveys give you much deeper, much more qualitative and quantitative feedback. So we have to rely more on that, but the salesperson does actually give us nice feedback and qualitative feedback about how the customer behaves in the store.
Balqees: Do you use customer relationship management and tracking in your client interactions? How important is CRM for managing relationships and tracking client interactions? Do you think that is part of what you just spoke about? Are the surveys recorded there?
Reduan: Not only the surveys, but there's also loyalty data. All the loyalty program data is an automatic kind of feedback you get from customers - you don't need them to talk. By the way customers purchase by category through the loyalty programs, any company can have a clear idea about what the customer prefers. So the insights are very important, but the loyalty data is equally important. Both go together in the CRM department and provide very qualitative feedback to us as commercial people. That definitely and directly impacts the way we drive the business and make decisions.
Balqees: Cross-selling and up-selling, do you do that in your area? How crucial is cross-selling and up-selling to maximize your revenue?
Reduan: It is very important because it provides an easy shopping experience for customers and reminds them about what's happening in other departments. Take an example - if we go to the ice cream department, you will always have customers coming in a rush to buy ice cream. They would never think of going to non-food to buy anything, but when they see a cross display of an ice cream scoop, they might remember that they need one.
We are providing these kinds of nice reminders to customers. I don't want them to go home and then remember they're missing something, plus it gives us an uplift in sales. Same goes for other categories - with oil, for example, we can display a small frying pan next to it. It's an impulse kind of business, but it's also a good reminder for the customer. It is extremely important in the retail world, and it gives synergy between the food and non-food departments.
Balqees: Performance measurement. How important is performance measurement for managing the sales team and driving improvements? Do you measure performance?
Reduan: At our level as commercial and head office commercial, we do not measure the salespeople's performance. It's done at operations and the HR department where they do it quantitatively. But I know it's being done, though not in all areas. It cannot be done in a frying pan area, for example. We don't put any target to our people to sell a certain quantity of frying pans. We ask them to provide a qualitative service to the customer, assist them, give them the right information about item specifications.
Our team has to be trained more in the specifications of the items so they can answer customer questions. But when it comes to electronics, for example, there is always a target. Because we have people by brand sometimes, and that brand has to sell that much. That can come from the commercial team - they put a target for each merchandiser or salesman. But in the rest of non-food, it's more about giving the customer nice assistance and feedback.
Balqees: When it comes to your team, how do you acquire talent? How do you retain them? Are there training programs, succession planning within this sector that you're in?
Reduan: Like any company, there is a semi-annual and annual performance review, which is mandatory evaluation for everyone. For training, there are two kinds. There's the official one, or what we call the process one, which is fixed and set by the company. Everyone who comes in has to go through certain weeks of training, operations. They have to make what we call rounds in all departments to understand how each department works.
Then there's the training which is never written, which is basically the accumulation of experience that anyone has that they must pass to their team. It's not written - it's something you get from a senior who knows "better," in brackets. That depends on each manager, but it's a duty for all managers to give all their business knowledge to their team. This is the only way they can progress and have a fair performance review. By the way, this is one of the main important elements to maintain them and keep them within the job.
Balqees: But what kind of talent? In food, they said they look for industrial engineers and accountants. With e-commerce, they said they look for people who are agile and more tech-savvy. But in your team, what kind of talent do you acquire initially without training?
Reduan: We always need someone with a commercial flair, someone who loves to buy and sell basically. Not everyone wants to buy and sell - many want to do a very normal nine-to-five job. But commercial requires a lot of flexibility, creativity, and dynamism in terms of how they do business. This is the kind of talent we prefer.
Whether they're coming from engineering or any normal discipline doesn't make much difference because anybody in non-food can start from scratch and build a career. But it depends on the position - there are some positions where you need someone with specialty. You cannot bring anyone and ask them to do sourcing, for example. It requires someone with experience in sourcing. But for commercial, if there is this flair, if there are these basics, anyone is welcome and can become something good in this area.
[Interview concludes with thank yous and arrangements for follow-up questions via email and survey]