Celebrating its 110th anniversary this summer, Potters of Hockley is a fine example of a long-established independent retailer that has reinvented and revived itself.
INNOVATION IS NOT the monopoly of the newcomer. A mere six years ago Potters of Hockley introduced a cookwares area for the first time. In March this year the company represented the British cookshop sector in Chicago at the gathering of the world’s best retailers at the International Home + Housewares Show.
Potters director Tom Carter is amazed and thrilled by the remarkable growth the business has experienced since he and third-generation owner Clive Potter decided that they needed to reinvigorate its offer. Founded as a traditional ironmonger’s in 1909 by Clive’s splendidly-named grandfather Inifer Potter, the shop has been a fixture in the Essex village of Hockley ever since, occupying a prominent position at the main junction in the high street.
“It’s difficult to describe exactly what we do,” says Tom, “but I hope locals think of us as that unique shop in Hockley that sells everything. The original ironmongery developed into hardware, tools, DIY, garden products and so on, which are still a core for us, but the cookshop has become a huge part of the business in the past six years. It has transformed how people regard us and has actually helped the hardware side.”
The route to selling a huge selection of cook-wares was not a direct one. Around 2010, Clive and Tom remember, “the hardware side was plodding along nicely even if it wasn’t going anywhere”. Faced with that familiar independents’ problem, falling footfall in their high street, they decided they need a new draw. As their high-street location and modest size ruled out opening a garden centre, in July 2010 they added a decorating centre, hoping that this would prove an irresistible magnet to local consumers.
“We thought this would make a difference to us even though what was then the biggest B&Q in the country had just opened nearby in South-end,” Tom recal
ls with a laugh.
At the same time, he began adding new lines into the housewares and cookshop offer in the store. By September 2012, with the deco centre flatlining, a new direction was chosen and a small dedicated cookwares section, complete with a demonstration area, was opened. By the end of the first day’s trading Tom and Clive knew they needed it to be bigger, such was the positive reaction from customers.
A larger area was opened in May 2013 and the impressive department seen today was completed in April 2017. For a small independent, even one owning its own freehold, it has been a rapid course of progression and development.
“We had operated in our original unit since 1909, but we’d also owned and rented out the large building next door for years,” says Tom. “We took back a small slice of it for the deco centre, which we then converted to the cookshop. By the time we opened it in September 2012 I was exhausted as I’d been running the hardware business while planning and researching the new side. But we knew we were on to something and needed more space, hence the two expansions in 2013 and 2017.”
Clive recalls: “We soon realised that we could properly specialise as a cookshop and so make a destination that would attract people from outside the area. The timing was good too because The Great British Bake-Off was pulling in massive viewing figures at the time.”
The complicated task of designing and redesigning the space was handled by interior refurbishment and fit-out contractor Interior Precision, which happens to be based next door to Potters. Tom has plenty of amusing stories – although they probably were not amusing at the time - about trying to operate a shop while a plastic greenhouse tunnel linked different sections of the floor as construction work, rewiring and retrunking continued.
Attention to detail is important at Potters: the signage on the corner site has been updated three times in seven years.
“After we decided to go for the cookshop, I visited many other shops and did loads of research,” says Tom “Especially for the most recent phase, when we added the big electric sign on the back wall, I knew exactly what I wanted and Interior Precision made it happen – below budget and on time.”
Despite its relative newness, the cookshop now dominates the Potters site, but the traditional hardware side is still very important. The original shop itself was upgraded during 2016-2018. The entire shop works well, projecting confidence and professionalism in all it offers. The property, including the neat car park to the rear, is maintained to an admirably high standard; the signage alone has been updated three times in seven years.
The overall effect is that Potters is a contemporary retail business that trades with authority. And it continues to develop.
“This has got to be a big browsing shop,” Tom states. ”In the past 18 months giftware and impulse purchases have grown so much, so now we have candles, gift mugs, cushion’s, women’s scarves… In cookwares itself we want anyone to come in and find something missing. I am obsessive about having a great product choice.
“We have a garlic press at £4.99 and one at £50. We stock a can opener at £1.50 and one at £30. Our frying pans start at £12.99 and go up to £150. We probably sell most frying pans at around £50 but we must have a selection. We want to be affordable but not cheap. There are plenty of large chains like B&M and The Range that do cheap things. We have to be different. We want to remain quality-driven while not alienating people. I do believe more people are realising they get what they pay for.”
He is quick to point out that the refocusing stimulated by the cookshop has had a positive effect on the hardware side of the business: “We have lifted up our level here too. We now sell Farrow & Ball Paints, which would not have considered us as a stockist six years ago. But our customers want beautiful paint to go with the beautiful products we sell in the cookshop.”
So what’s been the result of the shift in direction? More customers, younger customers and customers from further away. But still Tom is not resting easy: “We are still having to fight for foot-fall. Rayleigh, Basildon, Southend and Chelmsford are all bigger towns near us. The village has lost its large supermarket and all three banks – the last closed four years ago - so I am concerned about Hockley as a retail destination.”
One response to this issue has been Potters’ enthusiastic embrace of online retailing and digital marketing. Having had an information site for Potters of Hockley since 2010, the business went transactional three years ago with a site concentrating on the cookshop. It really took off two years ago with an overhauled site on the Shopify e-commerce platform. In April 2018 the business installed a Vend Epos and stock control system, which works with Shopify, to unify all its stock management. Some 3,000 of Potters’ 19,000 SKUs are offered online and about 25% of total sales come via the internet.
“I can easily see that going to 50% in the next two years,” Tom asserts. “Make no mistake, it’s hard work and I still make more money selling something in the shop, but my average sale online is £50-£60 compared to £16 in the shop. Our business will grow because we have the right product and the right people. Even online we want to offer service to reflect the experience people have in the shop itself even if the customer is in Scotland or Northern Ireland.
“Pricing is crucial online and so if I cannot compete on price with a product because someone sells it cheaper, I won’t stock it.”
The website and social media feeds for Potters are handled by 21-year-old Brad Burden, who joined the firm two years ago as an apprentice. Tom seems to have an eye for hiring the right people for the job. The excellent displays in the large windows and around the store are the responsibility of Alison Hobbs, who was recruited six years ago. Like many independents, Potters has a loyal core of long-serving staff.
“We do have trouble recruiting the right new people, but if they are right for us, we don’t have trouble keeping them because we are a forward-thinking and growing business. As long as people work hard, there are opportunities for them.”
Tom, 38, is himself a fine example of what a career in retailing can achieve. Having slipped out of the education system at the age of 12 – “I never got on with school” – he started work in retail sales at 15. He joined Potters as a sales assistant in January 2002, aged 21. Three years ago Clive Potter made him a director of the company and Tom is in charge of the day-to-day management as Clive is mainly occupied in running another business, hiring out tools.
Tom buys for cookshop, most homewares and gardening, while Greg Sleebush and Anna Pugh share the buying chores for DIY, paint, ironmongery tools and some housewares.
This excellent business has a core customer base aged 40-65, equally split between the sexes. The growth of the cookshop has seen consumers in their early 20s coming through the door. Despite the seemingly high-profile of the store – it has won more than a dozen industry and local business awards since 2012, including twice being named Bira’s Cookshop of the Year – the message needs to get through to new consumers.
“We will be knee-deep in celebrations for our 110th anniversary in October, when Sean Wilson, best-known for playing Martin Platt in Coronation Street for years, will be presenting workshops and tastings for his award-winning cheese business. We have attracted high-profile names to Potters since 2012, including Raymond Blanc, Ken Hom and Bake-Off winner Candace Brown, and the events are very popular, but there is always more to do.”
To illustrate this, Tom relates the story of a woman who has lived just four miles away from Potters for 29 years. She recently came into the shop only to pick up some DIY things at the request of her husband. She had no idea that the six-year-old cookshop existed and immediately went on an impressive spending spree.
Although he is pleased with the reach of the website, its fortnightly email newsletter and Potters’ daily social media feeds, Tom is reviving a printed catalogue this year after a break of a couple of years: “We have got to keep shouting about what we do, so we are producing a 30-page magazine and catalogue that will include vouchers, recipes, events dates and lots of products. We are hand-delivering 40,000 copies in an eight-mile radius of the store.”
Old methods and new ideas work well together at Potters.
POTTERS OF HOCKLEY
2-8 Main Road, Hockley, Essex, SS5 4QS
- Founded: 1909
- Staff: 5 full-timers, 8 part-timers Opening hours: Mon-Sat 8.30-5.30 Closed on Sunday
- Bira member since 1952
- Major brands include: Addis, Brabantia, Dulux, Farrow & Ball, Joseph Joseph, Kenwood/Delonghi, KitchenAid, Le Creuset, Stellar, Wrendale
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