DEEP DEEP CUTS SMART NEW ZEALAND
GREETINGS FROM DOWN UNDER SMART UK
‘101 USES OF A MULTI-TOOL’ VIDEO SERIES RETURNS SMART EUROPE
HARDWARE CHAIN BAUHAUS STOCKS SMART SMART SCANDINAVIA
AT NORDBYGG 2022
SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
SMART GLOBAL
SMART
DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
GLOBAL SMART GLOBAL
Dear SMART clients, partners, and employees, How the time has flown by so quickly! We are now over halfway through the year and so many incredible things have happened since our last edition of DEEP CUTS. This issue celebrates growth and progress, which is exactly what we had hoped for. A recurring theme this issue is also travel: countries have opened up and regulations are relaxed, so we were finally able to make use of our passports and go to other places again. It was good to be able to travel again, because that meant that SMART SC could attend Nordbygg, the biggest trade fair for the building and construction industry in Northern Europe. Read our quick recap from the show on page 10. After Nordbygg, SMART is scheduled to attend the International Hardware Fair in Cologne in September, showcasing our product range, Made in Britain blades, and our promise to sustainability. Flick through to page 8 to read more. We’ve also been seeing lots of exciting new developments for video content! SMART UK and master carpenter Robin Clevett are set to reunite this month to film the final set of episodes of the viral ‘101 Uses of a Multi-Tool’, and SMART EU will be launching their own Dutch video series for Dutch-speaking tradespeople and DIYers. Read all about it on pages 4 and 6. As always, our customers are essential to our success. SMART EU is proud to announce that one of the biggest hardware franchises in Europe, BAUHAUS, has recently partnered up with us and now stock a good range of our blades in four stores in the Netherlands. For a quick history of the chain and where you can find the stores that stock SMART, go to page 7. Additionally, SMART NZ has been busy developing a planogram scheme that is nearly impossible for customers to refuse, as well as planning a giveaway that will certainly entice both distributors and end-users. Read the full scoop on page 2. We wouldn’t be where we are now if it weren’t for the help of our teams and fellow colleagues. It’s crystal clear that as the business grows, so does the need for more support. With this, we are happy to welcome eight new starters, with seven being in the UK office and one in the NZ office. Check out these fantastic people on pages 5 and 3. What an exciting issue we have here! I won’t keep you here for too long, so for now, please enjoy this quarter’s newsletter and I hope to see you in the next one. Sincerely, Katya Soedigwan EU Marketing Coordinator On behalf of SMART Global
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Special thanks to the following people in making this edition of DEEP CUTS possible: Robert Mallory, Global Marketing Director David Suckling, NZ Director Simon Suckling, EU Sales Manager Olivia Busby, UK Content Marketing Lead Denisa Buckley, SC Customer Service Specialist Stephanie Eastlake, UK Senior Graphic Designer
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NEW SMART NEW ZEALAND
GREETINGS FROM DOWN UNDER SMART NZ SHARES THEIR RECENT WINS AND EXCITING PLANS
What’s been happening? Over in New Zealand, we have just passed the shortest day of the year, so it’s upwards and onwards from here! Since we are in the Southern Hemisphere, it has been winter for us. The weather has been pretty settled, very little snow, and no major Antarctic storms rolling in, though it seems we need to be on the lookout for a few strong seas coming in around the Wellington coast. Now, let’s get down to business. SMART is continuing to grow our sales across the small market, with sales up approximately 25% on 2021. The new kit initiatives we launched last year are starting to get the 2
attention of the market and provide growth for the business. Additionally, we’ve been busy with implementing a new planogram scheme for SMART product displays, which has been progressing very well.
What’s this about a new scheme? Our new in-store on-shelf and offshelf planogram scheme is proving to be very successful to our merchants. The return they are getting per square metre of in-store ‘real estate’ is second to none, garnering NZ$90,000 in revenue, which is the best in the industry! This is a huge success in presenting our customers with a solid scheme that is nearly impossible to refuse.
An easy-to-understand profile with three or four different options has made the whole initiative an incredible success. We are seeing customers increase their range from small format up to 45 – 60 SKUs, becoming a huge return per square metre of retail ‘real estate’. By changing the emotion that drives stores to buy from stock to return on investment as well as demonstrating the real success of this scheme and support we provide, our customers also benefit with higher sales and profits in their pocket. Customers can choose from two options: the SMART Free-Standing units, or a system that fits within their in-store fixed planograms.
DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
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Speaking of Free-Standing Units, we are excited to be releasing our range of Free-Standing Display Units, or FSDUs for short. Once again, it carries the idea of a small footprint, but a very high-quality piece of in-store display and merchandising material. We have released five different sizes of these FSDUs for the Green and Blue Range and we are now developing an arrangement around our offering. This can be configured so that they can display side by side, back-to-back and even sit squarely on a standard pallet. They make great sales builders for aisle, end of aisle, and beside the sales counter, as well as industryspecific aisle such as Plumber’s Kits in the plumbing supply aisle. Photographing of the range is yet to be completed, but we have placed a few in the market already. Check them out!
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What’s up next? We have so many exciting things coming up! To complement our new in-store initiative, we are excited to have created a new role, In-Store Merchandising Support Manager, and we are even more pleased to welcome Andrew Parker into this post. His daily tasks will be centred around the rolling out of the new in-store initiative, which requires a lot of store planogram relaying, updating and getting new lines into store. Our sales team are in stores every day, making new business, so Andrew will be there to follow up, do planogram installs, relays, and updates at the same time, Andrew also will be tidying up any displays that are messy, short of stock, and even sorts out competitive brands that are invading our space in store.
Andrew will also be coordinating all the various merchandising assets we have, keeping the representatives up to date with latest information, keeps their tablets updated, so our teams are on the ground with a passion to nail the SMART sale! In addition, Andrew is going to be our roving brand manager in our highly visible Mercedes Sprinter Van. Also, what better way to kick off the summer than by hosting a crazy giveaway? SMART will be setting itself apart with a major prize drawing: win a Wave Runner. The promotion commences in October and is intended for end-users with retailers and stores supporting this scheme. We are certain that this will drive high levels of awareness, interest, and sales for the SMART brand.
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SMART UK
‘101 USES OF A MULTI-TOOL’ VIDEO SERIES RETURNS ROBIN CLEVETT AND SMART UK REUNITE FOR FINAL 36 EPISODES As experts in the multi-tool industry, we feel it’s important to share our knowledge to tradespeople and DIYers to ensure they get the most out of their multi-tool. With this in mind, we created the “101 Uses of a Multi-Tool” video series which focuses on the many uses of the SMART multi-tool blades, as well as sharing useful tips and tricks. We divided the series into two seasons, with the first half showcasing the usage of SMART blades and accessories in a studio with various materials in several different activities. These include cutting bricks with the 62mm Extreme Diamond Blade, cutting notches in wood with the 19mm Purple Series Blade, and removing tile adhesive with the Rigid Scraper Blade. For the second half, we decided to take it on tour and film on various construction sites. In this season, we demonstrated how the multi-tool and SMART blades 4
could come in handy in professional settings, such as removing grout in an old kitchen, cutting facia and soffit boards in a tricky roof structure, and safely cutting wood flooring to create access holes. With a total of 65 episodes published on various social channels, the video series has proven to be helpful for the trade and DIY community, as well as raising questions and discussions on how much a multi-tool could be the preferred tool in certain situations. We hope that when we
wrap up the series, it continues to be insightful for our end-users. We can’t wait to resume filming this month and new episodes are expected to be released towards the end of the quarter.
Keep your eyes peeled for the latest videos on social media: instagram.com/smarttoolsuk facebook.com/smarttoolsuk
DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
UK
SMART UK SMART UK WELCOMES SEVEN NEW TEAM MEMBERS PUTTING MEANING BEHIND ‘THE MORE, THE MERRIER’! As the industry continues to grow in the UK, we quickly realised the necessity of having more hands on deck to provide additional support for the SMART brand. With this, we are pleased to be joined by seven new team members across a variety of departments. Please give a warm welcome the following people in our lineup:
JILL PLUME
BRODIE MURPHY
LIAM JOHNSON
STEVE COCKSEDGE
LEIGH DAVIES
AROOSHA DAR
Internal Business Development Executive
Key Account Manager
Telesales Support
Key Account Manager
Warehouse Manager
PHIL CATTLEY
Marketing Assistant
Sales Ledger Clerk
Great to have you on the team, folks!
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SMART EUROPE
SMART FILM THEIR FIRST DUTCH VIDEO SERIES EXPANDING OUR REACH BY SPEAKING THE LOCAL LANGUAGE After the success of “101 Uses of a Multi-Tool”, we are very pleased to announce that we will soon be launching our very first non-English video series for SMART!
arsenal of filming gear ready to go which made the set-up a smooth and easy process.
This video series first came to fruition when we noticed a fastgrowing community of tradespeople and DIYers in the Netherlands and Flanders (Northern Belgium) but for whatever reason, no one was making content for them. Although there were various how-to and application videos in English, we saw that the Dutch and Flemish tradespeople and DIYers preferred to engage with content when it was presented in their native language.
Later in April, SMART UK’s Content Marketing Lead, Olivia Busby, travelled down to Belgium for the weekend to film with EU Marketing Coordinator, Katya Soedigwan, directing the set. In a two-day period, five episodes were filmed. As we release them on our social media platforms in the upcoming months, we hope they garner high levels of success and engagement for the online community.
That’s when we came up with “Multi-Tool TV”, a series focused on everything and anything related to 6
the multi-tool, with its main delivery in Dutch and aimed for Dutch-speaking end-users. With this, we hope to not only make SMART the preferred brand of multi-tool blades and accessories, but also to place ourselves as an educational and informative platform. After finalising the concept of the series, we teamed up with Danny Visser, a Dutch DIY enthusiast based in Flanders, to be the host of the show. Danny proved to be perfect for the role as he was not only already familiar with SMART products, but also because he was a content creator himself! He had an extensive
instagram.com/ smarttoolgroupbenelux
DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
EUROPE SMART EUROPE
HARDWARE CHAIN BAUHAUS STOCKS SMART LET’S MAKE SMART AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE IN EUROPE! A great win for SMART last quarter was the partnership with BAUHAUS, one of the biggest hardware chains in Europe! Before we get down to the nitty gritty, let’s take a look at the giant that is BAUHAUS. BAUHAUS first opened their doors in 1960 in Mannheim, a city in the southwest of Germany. Quickly after its inception, BAUHAUS opened branches across the country, with the 100th store launching in 1989 in Flensburg, a northern seafaring town right next to the Danish border. BAUHAUS opened its first international store in 1972 in Austria, marking the start of their European journey. 16 years later, they made their way to Scandinavia, opening branches in Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Norway and Iceland between the years of 1988 and 2012. In total, the company has 250 stores spanning across 19 countries across the continent, including the Netherlands. With BAUHAUS priding itself in being the go-to store for DIYers and tradespeople alike, SMART will certainly skyrocket and become popular amongst customers. BAUHAUS Nederland currently stocks a good assortment of products from the Blue and Green range, including the ever-so-popular WWW.SMART-TOOLGROUP.COM
H4MAK, Rapid Wood Blades, and Bi-Metal Blades. A total of 24 blades are available to purchase in-store at four BAUHAUS branches across the country: Den Hoorn, Groningen, Hengelo, and Venlo. Although they are sprawled out, these locations are indeed extremely strategic. Den Hoorn is a small village cosily nestled in between the Rotterdam-The Hague metropolitan area, one of the busiest areas of the Netherlands, encompassing four cities and being home to nearly 3 million citizens. Groningen is way up north, creating accessibility to not only Dutch end-users, but also Germans, especially those who live right on the border between the Netherlands and Lower Saxony.
The same idea extends to Hengelo, a small city is also close to Lower Saxony as well as North-Rhine Westphalia, designating itself as one of the most important connectors between the Netherlands and Germany. Venlo is pretty much a German city, being a stone’s throw away from the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region, comprising of the large and industrial cities of Cologne, Düsseldorf, Dortmund, and Essen. As time passes, we are expecting to see a high number of foot traffic from Dutch and German customers alike. From here, we hope it will be an easy ride to making SMART products available throughout many different European countries.
DID YOU KNOW? BAUHAUS is not only a nod to the founder and owner Heinz Georg Baus, but also contains two German words: ‘bauen’, which means ‘to build’, and ‘Haus’, which means ‘house’.
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SMART EUROPE
SMART TO ATTEND INTERNATIONAL HARDWARE FAIR IN FALL 2022 MARK YOUR CALENDARS FOR THE ULTIMATE TRADE EVENT OF THE YEAR After a number of delays and setbacks due to the pandemic, the International Hardware Fair will finally commence this Fall. Taking place on the 25th to 28th September at the Koelnmesse in Cologne, Germany, over 2000 suppliers and exhibitors will be presenting their latest innovations in the hardware industry. SMART is pleased to be able to attend the show, alongside TRACER and Optimaxx, representing the three brands of ROYD UK. The previous show in 2018 hosted well over 47.000 visitors from 143 countries, and it is expected that these numbers are to be repeated this year, with a high chance of an increase. This show could be a major turning point for SMART in the upcoming year, providing us 8
a chance to speak with potential partners from many different regions, including Eastern Europe, Turkey, and even India. It is a no-brainer that sales support is crucial in these situations, though, it isn’t the only requirement. Planning
an exhibition requires some artistic creativity, specifically for the stand development. What catches a person’s eye is the brand aesthetic, and that is exactly what we want to present here. We are happy to be working with a third-party to organise the stage, ensuring a high quality design that will set us apart from competitors. Although it may need some tweaking, the mockup of the stand is already enough to make us look forward to the show. The stand encompasses 95 square metres in total, with SMART having a good 40 square metres
DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
EUROPE SMART EUROPE
dedicated to the brand, showcasing a large assortment of blades and accessories for visitors. Speaking of blades, one of our main talking points for the trade fair is the production of our Made in Britain Starlock blades. By having our blades produced and assembled locally in Britain, we are able guarantee a high level of quality and performance, where we can closely monitor how our blades are developed and ensuring that each and every blade is completely perfect before going into the hands of our end-users. WWW.SMART-TOOLGROUP.COM
Besides the blades and accessories, we plan on presenting our ‘Zero100’ Sustainability Campaign, which stems from our promise of having 0% single-use plastic packaging and in the supply chain, as well as moving towards 100% recyclable packaging. We’ve committed to do this by 2023, which will significantly reduce not only our carbon footprint, but also those from our customers. Furthermore, we are pledging to be carbon neutral by 2025, with an additional carbon offsetting initiative to continue in monitoring and reducing our environmental
impact. As Europe is slowly putting sustainability regulations on companies and organisations, we aim to be one step ahead of the game and be the market leader in not only quality but also corporate social responsibility. So, are you booking tickets to Cologne yet? We hope to see you there!
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SCAN SMART SCANDINAVIA
SMART AT NORDBYGG 2022 QUICK RECAP OF OUR FIRST TRADE SHOW IN SCANDINAVIA In our newsletter from the first quarter of this year, we announced that we would be attending Nordbygg, the biggest trade fair for the building and construction industry in Northern Europe. We were excited to finally be attending an exhibition after a quiet couple of years due to the pandemic.
We were also incredibly pleased to not only have EU Sales Manager, Simon Suckling, from the Netherlands with us for the exhibition, but also NZ Director, David Suckling, all the way from Wellington.
Nordbygg 2022 was held on the 26th to 29th of April at Stockholmsmässan, the largest exhibition facility in the Nordic region, located in Stockholm, Sweden. Boasting 70,000 sqm of event area, there was more than enough space to facilitate 200
The show was an immense success. In our presentations, we put focus on three points: the Made in Britain blades, new and improved 100% plastic-free packaging, and readily available local stock as we have a warehouse and staff in Sweden.
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seminars, 900 exhibitors, and 40.000 visitors throughout the four-day show. As Nordbygg’s main language is Swedish, it was crucial that we had SMART Scandinavia’s Sales Manager, James Carlen, to lead the way.
DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
NDINAVIA SMART SCANDINAVIA
Visitors were interested and impressed by the fast growth and forward-thinking innovations of the SMART brand, and we were grateful to be able to speak to numerous suppliers and potential customers during the fair. If you didn’t get to visit Nordbygg, worry not! SMART will be attending the highly anticipated International Hardware Fair in Cologne, Germany. Go back to page 8 to read all about it.
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SMART GLOBAL
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DEEP CUTS | SMART GLOBAL NEWSLETTER | Q3 2022
GLOBAL SMART GLOBAL
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DEEP CUTS SMART Tool Group Global
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