Andrew Harrison

Known to his colleagues as Stat because of his love of figures, Best Buy Europe chief operating officer Andrew Harrison is the key man who delivers the numbers for the retailer and partner Carphone Warehouse.

Carphone reports interim results today, and ahead of the disclosure City analysts were confident that the business stats should please - the retailer’s share price has more than doubled since it was demerged from telco TalkTalk in March.

Harrison remains responsible for Carphone’s UK and European businesses. Like many of Carphone’s top brass, former management consultant Harrison is a long-standing staffer. He joined back in 1995 as strategy manager when, as he can no doubt instantly recall, the retailer had just 27 Carphone shops. There are now more than 800 in the UK alone. Today not only is Carphone a giant in the UK, but has Phone House stores on the continent and Harrison became responsible for operations in Europe last year.

Carphone has grown exponentially and the products it sells put it at the forefront of the seismic technological advancements that are changing life on a host of levels. The retailer is striving to put itself at the heart of the ‘wireless world’ of technological transformation, which has enabled a dramatic shift in everything from dating to news - and, of course, how people shop.

Wireless world is the internal name of the in-store format Carphone is increasingly adopting, as can be seen at its Westfield London shop, where all sorts of techie gizmos are on sale alongside the mobiles that were the foundation of its success.

The rising complexity of many

such products provides Carphone - which made its name on the back of a reputation for service and impartial advice - with the chance to be one of the consumer’s guides of choice through the digital maze. Among the initiatives steered by Harrison was a shift away from staff commission based on sales to one reflecting customer opinion about their experience with the retailer.

Outside hours football follower Harrison is a big Wigan Athletic fan - it’s his hometown team - but that is a passion that has sometimes cost him. On one occasion he was in California when the Latics were playing Spurs and lost 9-1. He jokingly complained afterwards that every goal cost him as much as three dollars as he had to pay to receive text updates abroad.

Work has also changed Harrison’s personal life. He is married to Tristia Clarke, TalkTalk’s commercial director, who he met at Carphone.

While Carphone is doing well, one stat that Harrison would like to change as quickly as possible is the loss generated by Best Buy, the big-box electricals business launched this year in partnership with the US giant.

Harrison took on his expanded Best Buy role in addition to Carphone duties after the shock departure of predecessor Paul Antoniadis in August, as revealed by Retail Week (July 8). He reports to chief executive Scott Wheway as the business strives to make life harder for electricals market incumbents Dixons and Comet.

It is likely to be a long slog. In a note issued ahead of today’s results, broker UBS increased its forecast loss for the Best Buy big-box division by £5m to £50m this year and next.

The City will probably not be unduly worried about that - the start-up losses were always going to be between £40m and £45m - but numbers in red are not Stat’s favourites.