SPAR Australia held its annual Trade Show, which after a two-year Covid induced hiatus, was a phenomenal success with a record number of retailer attendees and supplier exhibitors.
Held at the Gold Coast Convention and Exhibition Centre over three days, the SPAR Trade Show gave retailers the opportunity to network and share ideas while also receiving some great deals from suppliers.
Speaking to C&I on day two of the SPAR Trade Show, Managing Director, Lou Jardin, described these events as “absolutely vital for the networking and the opportunity to share ideas”.
“Our retailers learn so much from each other and the more times we can get them together is critical for the development of the business going forward, for their own businesses as well as ours.
“The turnout has been the best since we started and the support from suppliers and the retailers has been phenomenal. I think they’re all raring to get back to normal and ready to go.
“Every supplier I’ve spoken to, they just love the level of engagement, they love the level of support that they’re getting from the store owners, and, and them embracing the products that they’ve got on display and the features that they are here to promote.”
Jardin says that the key message he would like for retailers to take away from the 2022 SPAR Trade Show is building on the theme the group has been working towards for the past 10 years, and that is “Better Together”.
SPAR International is celebrating its 90th anniversary in 2022, and with that the business has progressed its ‘Better Together’ messaging and added to it ’90 Years of Progress with Purpose’.
“Cooperation between the warehouse, the retailers and suppliers is vital in terms of getting to the next step,” Jardin told C&I.
“The whole Better Together strategy has been developed for the last 10 years, and now SPAR International has added Purpose to its Better Together messaging. So really, the theme for the next 12 months is Better Together. But with Purpose,” he says.
Jardin told C&I that SPAR Australia has achieved phenomenal growth over the past two to three years, and says that’s for a combination of reasons, including confidence from retailers in terms of the business’ strategy and the level of support they receive from SPAR. As well as the level of execution from retailers, which has “created an environment where we’ve got really massive growth”.
“It’s been 12 years since I’ve been involved with the business, and it’s phenomenal to see the growth from where we’ve come from, to where we are today,” says Jardin.
“We’ve always had a long-term plan in terms of our growth strategy, and to see it all sort of come together, makes you stand back, and feel good about what you’ve done. And the support we’ve had from our retailers, they’ve been phenomenal all the way through it. They’ve supported our suppliers that have supported us. And certainly our staff, we’ve got some very long serving staff members that have been really key and instrumental in terms of the success we’ve had.”