Q&A: Bodycare’s Tony Brown on building a ‘truly national brand’

A year after the business was sold to Baaj Capital, Bodycare is going through rapid changes to fuel expansion in the country and strengthen its foothold as a health and beauty retailer. 

Led by chief executive Tony Brown, Bodycare has the ambition to be a “truly national brand” as it embarks on a journey to expand to southern parts of the country with its first store in London opening in Walthamstow two weeks ago.

Brown, joined Bodycare a year ago and has previously held roles of retail director of British Home Stores and interim managing director at Peacocks, before joining 99p Stores as chief operating officer. 

Brown talks to Retail Week about what has changed with Bodycare, expansion plans and the biggest challenges in today’s environment.

What changes has Bodycare gone through in the past year? 

“Pretty much everything. Everything from the look of the stores to creating a brand image. The previous look of the stores was very good, but it was very black and white, and very staid in its approach to developing range and own brand. 

“We had virtually no own-brand range a year ago, whereas now probably 20% of our range will be our own-brand coming out of this year. 

“I think more importantly the biggest change we’ve made inside the stores apart from the look and feel is in the product mix and developing significant growth both in sales and margin. The business was focused pretty much wholly on brands before, which diluted margins. 

“We started bringing in higher-margin products and tertiary brands next to our branded products. We’re trying numerous seasonal products, and we’ve seen no resistance from the customers to pick up the odd bits and pieces, whether it’s a bathmat or a dustpan and brush set. 

“For example, when the weather was warm, we bought some kids’ water pistols and sold 2,000 of those in a week.

“So, it’s a bit of sticking to our knitting as far as bodycare and beauty is concerned and our focus will always be on those areas. The other lines are primarily margin growers, so we can get a blended margin, which is starting to work. We’ve moved the margin forward by four points in the past year, which is no mean feat.”

What is the biggest challenge you’re facing at the moment? 

“I think cost price inflation (CPI). We get significant CPI increases almost every week. Managing that process without having to pass the full cost on to the customer is one of our biggest challenges. 

“We pride ourselves on knowing what our customers will buy and how much they’ll spend, because we have decades worth of history. 

“Everybody’s looking for value these days and our job is to make sure that we maintain our position as cheaper than our high street rivals by working on our pricing policy.”

Who is your biggest competitor and how do you differentiate yourselves from them? 

“Our high street rivals are mainly Savers, Superdrug and Boots. I think if you look at it from a purely cost basis, Superdrug and Savers would be competition that we keep a very close eye on. They do some very, very good stuff. 

“We believe our model going forward is a better model for the customer because the way we lay out our stores, I think gives better clarity and navigation. This isn’t a criticism of those two retailers. They are very, very good retailers, but their stores can be overwhelming at times. We’re fanatical about making sure our range works.”

Where do you see the business going in the next five years? 

“Our investors and owners Baaj Capital are fully invested and fully involved in the development of the business. The goal for the next five years is to grow the business into the areas that we currently don’t operate in.

“Our capacity inside our distribution system can cope with another, probably 50 to 70 stores. So, I would say in five years our goal would be to grow by another 70 stores without significantly increasing our infrastructure costs. 

“We want to establish ourselves as a truly national brand rather than a northern powerhouse by expanding into East Anglia, the South coast and within the M25.”