Happy New Year and welcome back! We hope you had an enjoyable and well-earned break and are ready to kick-start 2023. We are delighted to share with you our first fully digital ROYD Insight newsletter, having previously produced printed copies. As we move towards a greener future, we hope you find this new digital newsletter just as insightful and informative. Let’s look at the latest news from the final quarter of 2022.
Children in Need fund thousands of charities and projects across the country that support children to feel safer, improve mental health and wellbeing and have more positive relationships.
To this end we are thrilled to announce we have raised over £500 for Children in Need between the 14th-17th November. The whole company raised money in their departments by wearing yellow, and our amazing customers got involved with photos with our sales team.
This was a great company effort in supporting a cause that affects 4.3 million children in the UK.
We are currently developing the use of E-PIM which provides a single platform to store, manage and distribute product data. E-PIM has been specifically developed with the construction industry in mind, many different industry partners using E-PIM to simplify their data management, digital assets and work flow processes.
E-PIM will provide support to our sales team by allowing them to easily communicate and make product data accessible to our customers. The type of product data we will store and manage includes product photography, measurements, and pricing.
In addition to E-PIM, we are also currently in developing a new CRM system with HubSpot.
CRM stands for customer relationship management, and we are implementing HubSpot to allow us to advance our sales process, improve our customer experience and maintain an excellent customer relationship.
HubSpot will support our internal sales and operations services by allowing us to log all sale activity in one place. Whilst we have already started using HubSpot, we will be continuing to develop this system throughout 2023.
Earlier in 2022, ROYD took on another warehouse unit very close to our distribution centre in Braintree, Essex. This additional warehouse will help support the growth of our product range, along with the ongoing growth of ROYD.
We are very pleased to welcome two new members of the team who joined towards the end of 2022.
Joining as Warehouse Operatives, Chris Goate and Stewart Mack will both be assisting the warehouse team to ensure we continue to deliver quality of service we are able to deliver to our customers.
As part of our marketing efforts, we work very closely with 50 active influencers in the industry to increase brand awareness and ultimately drive sales to our stockists. As influencer marketing is fundamental to our marketing strategy, we wanted to further build our relationship within the network and express our gratitude to our integral influencers by holding an all-day event, inviting our 20 UK influencers. This consisted of product talks and demonstrations, a tour of our warehouse and a fun filled afternoon of go karting.
We would like to introduce you to Alex Burman from Erroioc Carpentry as our first ever Influencer of the Quarter. We have recognised Alex for his outstanding content production on Instagram for our three brands, with many tradespeople engaging with his content.
Alex is a carpenter based in Wales with 11.9k Instagram followers and a winner of the Fix Radio tradesperson of the year 2022. By working with Alex and other influencers in the industry, we can promote our product range to a wider audience through their large social media following.
Alex is an excellent addition to our influencer programme, and we look forward to working with him throughout 2023.
Content marketing is at the forefront of our marketing strategy, and we strive to produce content of the highest quality. For this reason, we have created our very own photography and filming studio dedicated to producing high quality content that will ultimately drive tradespeople to your stores.
We are currently working with influencers in the industry to develop an appealing video series… ...watch this space!
We are very pleased to have sponsored TrussBuddyLive on their latest weekly Instagram Live videos. TrussBuddyLive is made up of five tradesmen from different trades who are joined by exciting guests from within the construction industry to discuss a wide range of topics, including challenges tradespeople face, mental health and all things trade related.
Previous guests have included Brad and Sam from Bald Builders, Wayne from Tool Talk and Stanley from SNL_ Plumbing. Plus, an array of industry leading influencers still to come.
The TrussBuddyLive hosts include David from @elwood_enterprises, Alex from @errioc_carpentryltd, Danny from @maddenbuilders, Sean from @trussbuddytools and Sam from @carpentry_bysam.
The sponsorship gives viewers the chance to get their hands on a range of exciting TRACER products and merch, including TRACER T-shirts and the latest ProScribe and ProSquare tools.
In the last few years, there has been an observable shift in the attitudes of consumers. ROYD has seen that the demand for sustainability has been customer driven. Through increased awareness of environmental issues and more offerings coming to market, consumers are frequently choosing sustainable options over alternatives even if there is a price differential. This trend has continued despite undeniably tough times economically.
When it comes to our regional stockists and the national builder’s merchant chains, we see the same thing. Larger firms have shown great interest in our own Zero100 campaign. It features as a key talking point whenever we enter discussions with new partners. This is because many branches are feeling pressure from both their customers and their higher-ups.
A common issue faced by many is the sustainability of the packaging. Screws are mostly sold in either cardboard boxes or storage tubs. While cardboard is widely recycled, companies that prioritise aesthetics often mix plastic and cardboard. This results in packaging that either needs to be separated by the end-user before recycling or, at worst, cannot be recycled at all. While plastic tubs should be recognised as the storage units they are intended to be, not to be discarded as waste on first use.
However, the first issue that comes to mind for most companies when discussing sustainability is cost. Battling rising costs and maintaining business continuity at a time of great economic and international uncertainty is a massive challenge. It is difficult to strike such a balance, but good planning and commitment can see a reduction in long-term costs.
There is plenty of universal advice that could apply to all merchants. Simple changes such as low-energy bulbs for stores and displays, reducing plastic usage, and limiting overall wastage will help offset the risk of increased sourcing costs.
Next, one must consider the carbon footprint stemming from logistics and deliveries. While ROYD and other companies have electrical delivery vehicles planned, action must happen now. Other industries necessitate a Just-in-Time approach to stock control, requiring regular orders to keep shelves stocked. That is not the case in the fixings industry. We propose that stockists, with the capability to hold stock, order a larger quantity of goods but less frequently. A reduction in the frequency of orders means fewer trucks are needed on the road, therefore, helping both the merchant and supplier lower their carbon footprint.
The world is changing fast, and it can be hard to keep up. Sustainability requires careful thought and commitment at every stage of a business’s processes. Starting with their suppliers, being maintained in stores, and finally passing over to the consumer. It is a group effort; however, thought and market leaders have a duty to pave the way for others to follow.
Written by Phil Cattely2022 has been an impactful year for SMART that has seen significant growth in all four regions. Through focus, innovation and dedicated marketing support, SMART have not only built the range to be market leading in terms of performance, but also offer one of the largest ranges of multi-tool blades on the market, and the very best solution for every distributor.
In summary, across the UK and EU, SMART has reached 12 million tradespeople on social media, with 7.7 million of those engaging with our content.
Furthermore, 50,000 tradespeople landed on the SMART website, whilst 100,000 tradespeople followed links to partner sites.
By producing informative video content, working with influencers within the industry and sharing appealing photo content, our results prove that we have made a positive impact on tradespeople that has led to our exponential growth throughout 2022.
As we strive to be at the forefront of global multi-tool accessory innovation and offer one of the most comprehensive and high-quality multitool accessory solutions in the world, we have created some of the most unique blades on the market which have ultimately become the most talked about blades amongst tradespeople.
