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UK c-store connections fires into action
June 17th-19th saw the first C-Store Connections forum for the UK convenience retail market at the Don Carlos hotel in Marbella. Over 100 retailers and suppliers gathered for a potent mixture of conference sessions, one-to-one appointments and social networking – and if the 2 days last week are anything to go by, in the words of one of the retailers, Rowan Black, “it’s set to become one of the premier events in the grocery industry calendar”.
Fiona Horan – one of the directors at OpenRoom – was delighted with the response. “c-store connections was launched in the toughest economic climate for years, but we always felt we had a concept which would be welcomed by the market. There was a real buzz around the event and it highlighted everything’s that great about this vibrant sector”.
Some of the biggest names in c-stores and fuel retail joined the forum, including 99p Stores, Musgrave Retail Partners, Motor Fuel Group, Euro Garages, Select & Save and Warner’s Retail. A strong showing from leading retail equipment and service providers including Jordans, Capital Cooling, Kleerex, Planova and Torex was complemented by a raft of the best in food-to-go and design and branding companies (Subway, Country Choice, National Organic, Simply Coffee, ais>BrandLab and Bradley McGurk).
The event kicked off with a conference chaired by James Lowman of the ACS and featured a series of presentations that were pitch perfect in setting the scene for the ensuing 2 days. The Q&A sessions were particularly lively – much due to James’ skills at engaging with the audience. The rest of the event was dedicated to meeting people: over 550 pre-arranged appointments were set up between retailer and supplier followed by an informal social networking program. The highlight was a dinner at the spectacular Don Carlos beach club with entertainment from upcoming singer/songwriter Adrian Benn.
Plans for the follow up 2010 event are well underway. Watch this space!
Feedback from our Delegates:
“yet another successful event for us. We’ve come away with various opportunities to follow up and businesses to inspect in developing relationships further, so extremely positive for us”,
Tony Evans, Christie & Co
“an extremely successful and worthwhile conference. People I spoke to were thoroughly impressed with what they achieved from the conference”
Kam Sanghera, Managing Director, Select & Save
“I found the forum very useful and productive and came away with a lot of work - which is brilliant”
Stephanie Pridmore, Sales Director, Bank Machine
“Suits my business perfectly because it’s highly focused. I meet suppliers I need to talk to and as a direct result of this forum I will be spending serious money”
Guy Warner, Warner’s Retail
“well worth spending a couple of days away from business”
Raj Chandegra, Desi
“From a suppliers perspective I thought the quality of the retailers at the event was good. Across the board it was evident that the right suppliers and the right retailers (in terms of size, ambition, enthusiasm, products/services etc.) had been selected.”
Tim Brown, Business Development Manager, Jordons
“It was both useful from a business perspective (meeting existing and potential suppliers) and also on personal perspective (seeing old and making new friends)”
Sanjeev Patel, Capital News Group
“What worked for us was the format and your enthusiasm to make it a successful event for all the attendees, it’s now down to our own follow up to make it work for us”
Aubrey Ghose, Managing Director aisBrandLab
“We made some great progress from the meetings and learnt of many new concepts that we had not yet been introduced to – once again, making this a pleasurable yet invaluable experience!”
Shane Thakrar, HKS Retail
“this event has to be seen as one of the premier events in the Grocery industry calendar”
Rowan Black, JT Green & Sons
“We came away with some very good opportunities both from an organic and prospective point of view for Country Choice”
Martin Hayes, Country Choice
“well organised, interesting and relevant – and an excellent location”
Mark Proudfoot, Proudfoot Group
“The appointments program was excellent and we have taken a lot out of them to work on in the coming weeks. The event was also very good for networking and building relationships”
Nick Fraser, Fraser Group
"The event has given us the tools to come and start to develop different strategies on how to make our stores stand out from our competitors. It's opened our eyes to what can be achieved in the convenience sector"
Vrinder Singh Khaira, Premier Singh’s
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The format is ideal. I found it energized, purposeful and reciprocal in that all parties had an agenda; it’s up to you to make sure there was a match!
Alex Russell, Managing Director, SmartAxess
OpenRoom runs a global portfolio of B2B forums and its business model is built around the success of combining networking with focused, pre-matched appointments.
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