00-00 Golden Boy Malcom_GF.qxp_Grid 22/10/2023 16:53 Page 1
EIHA WINNER: MALCOLM KING
Having amassed an incredible 50 years of service at Lakeland, Malcolm King was last month honoured with the Retail Employee of the Year award at the Excellence in Housewares Awards. PH sits down with Malcolm to find out about his Lakeland career.
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alcolm King started working at Lakeland on 21 June, 1973, when he took on a role cutting and sticking the sheets of plastic, to create bespoke covers for the boats in Lake Windermere and the surrounding areas. A few years later, Malcolm moved to join the teams working on agricultural shows throughout the UK, operating from a popup shop in a curtain-sided trailer. This work took him from the Black Isles in Inverness in the far north of Britain, right down as far as
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loved training colleagues when opening new stores, one of the many highlights of his career. Malcolm also enjoys the buzz of sales in a range of environments. “A real high point was working with our massive shop in the Ideal Home Show event in the late 90s. The shows were packed out and we would easily sell through 15 to 20 pallets of stock per day.” For the last 16 years, Malcolm has worked as a colleague in Lakeland’s flagship
Below: Malcolm King joined Lakeland in 1973.
Windermere store, back where he began his career. One of the things he enjoys most about the housewares industry is the constant newness. He comments: “I’ve loved seeing the innovation over the years from new technology like chest freezers in the 70s, microwaves in the 80s, heated airers in the 00s, and all the associated
There are so many achievements I could list, but winning this Housewares Award is right up there.
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the Royal Devon Show in the South and as far west as The Pembroke Show in Wales. The variety in his career is what Malcolm enjoys most about his role. He tells us: “I’ve managed to do almost every role available within retail. I’ve worked in our warehouse, call centre, agricultural shows, and retailing. “In our early years of trading, we didn’t have computers, so all our customer records were kept on small cards which were manually updated and kept in large filing cabinets.” Over the years, Malcolm would be asked to put his knowledge and experience to work helping out at stores throughout the UK, with an impressive list including Brent Cross, Norwich, Chichester, Cambridge and Cardiff to name a few. Malcolm says he
Inset: Malcolm says winning the EIH award is up there with his greatest achievements during his time at Lakeland.
PROGRESSIVE
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HOUSEWARES