In the late 70s in the UK, after seven years in the animated film industry, I needed a more reliable income so I joined Wrighton International, at the time Britain’s leading kitchen cabinet manufacturer.
I quickly absorbed knowledge of sales & industrial manufacturing & my design skills were soon recognized. Within 18 months I was invited to join Britain’s premier kitchen & bath sales organization which was also a Wrighton dealer.
At that time Humpherson’s was not only Britain’s largest kitchen & bathroom dealership, with 7 showrooms & over 120 full displays, they were also the BEST! As dealers for internationally renowned kitchen brands such as ABC Cuisine, Bulthaup, Salvarani, Sie-Matic & Wrighton, appliances from Gaggenau, Miele & Neff, & bathroom products from Adamsez,Twyford & Aqualisa, coupled with ownership of a domestic tile manufacturer & a staff of over 120 sales, design & installation professionals, Humpherson’s dominated the high end market of London & south east England.
During my tenure with Humpherson’s I became one of their leading sales / designers and within a year I was assisting with designs for the prestigious new Humpherson’s at Heal’s location.
In July 1981, marriage brought me to Canada. Landing at the onset of Canada’s worst recession, I initially took work outside of my field to establish Canadian Experience. Within months, however, I moved to join one of Canada’s first European-style kitchen manufacturers, Unique Laminated Kitchens of Guelph.
I immediately took stock of their situation and set about improving their operation. I was soon able to impress on the owner the need for a uniform ordering system for dealers & acknowledgment procedure for the company. I also began work on redesigning the product to ease manufacturing. I designed displays which gained recognition at the Toronto Home Show and introduced the first 32mm system kitchen to Canada, complete with levelers, in January of ’82. Unfortunately, the recession bit hard & early that year and by May the company was forced to let me go.
By July, I had moved back to the GTA and started negotiating to buy a house. By September I had found employment with the German furniture retailer Musterring where I established myself as a lead designer & salesman in the domestic furniture field.
During this time I was also contracted by my previous employer to complete work on their cabinet system and to create a new code system & catalogue. However in 1983, with the recession still biting & less than a year after opening it’s custom built flagship store, Musterring made the decision to cease operations in Canada. I was given the position of sales manager of the liquidation centre, which I successfully fulfilled until the wind up in ’84.
Without missing a beat I accepted a sales / design / administration position with The Kitchen Studio, a dealership for the internationally respected German manufacturer Poggenpohl operated by The House Of Viking. Sales increased & the owners wanted to raise the profile of their subsidiary... but at the lowest possible cost.
I had little time to formulate a strategy but convinced the owners to exhibit the product at the first Canadian International Kitchen & Bath Expo (IKBE) and to then re-use the manufacturer-subsidized displays in the showroom.
The display won an award for Best Foreign Manufacturer (a category which I was later told had been especially created because the event organizers did not want to give the top award to a foreign company.) Nonetheless, the publicity helped, the displays were re-used and sales increased again. However, in late ’86 The Kitchen Studio was sold and I received an offer to rejoin Unique Kitchens, by then under new ownership, which I accepted in January ’87.
I struggled for a year to process orders, maintain consistency & institute quality controls at Unique. I trained staff, I designed & built materials storage racks to minimize waste and dealt with increasingly concerned dealers whose orders were frequently delayed, or short-shipped.
Unfortunately, by the end of ’87, it was clear the new owners were more interested in pursuing the builders market than maintaining their established dealer base. In January of 1988, out of frustration, I reluctantly resigned to join The Robinson Group, a dealership that had decided to manufacture its own cabinetry. Unique was sold to Barzotti Kitchens later the same year & the brand name retired.
For the next 25 years, I helped build & secure the success of The Robinson Group. Initially, by increasing sales and streamlining ordering procedures, however within a year, I introduced an entirely new 32mm cabinet system. This radically different system allowed for extraordinary flexibility while actually simplifying manufacture ( it is currently used by several US, Canadian & European manufacturers & forms the basis for the current IKEA kitchen system first marketed in 2015 in the US & Canada.)
In 1990 the fledgling company was recognized for its exhibit at the IKBE. In the early 90’s I developed an intuitive alphanumeric coding platform to allow easier computer assisted ordering & acknowledgment. Over the years, I guided sales staff & designers alike in producing harmonious, on-budget solutions while maintaining a steady hand on the procurement, presentation & ordering processes.
My “Buy Don’t Build” philosophy -- coupled with my ability to discover new product, processes & suppliers, my knowledge of hardware, furniture & appliances, combined with skilled integration of standard products into custom designs -- consistently allowed the company to "box above its weight" and helped establish & protect its reputation for excellence. However in 2012, after almost a quarter century with The Robinson Group, it was time to move on.
I had been approached some years earlier by a company close to my home & after lengthy negotiations, I accepted an offer from Neff Kitchens to join their team to assist with custom cabinetry quotation but in mid-2013 reorganization, restructuring & new ownership led to the decision to eliminate the position.
I am currently available for long-term hire, contractual positions or private commission.