SPAR Scotland kicks off major retailer recruitment drive with strengthened team

SPAR Scotland has launched a new recruitment drive at it looks to accelerate its transformation plans.

The Scottish wholesaler and convenience retailer already services over 300 SPAR stores and has a distribution network with a fleet of 55 vehicles covering countryside to coast.

The new initiative has been driven by the transformation of the business led by chief executive Colin McLean. Key areas of investment have included the transformation of logistics, the warehouse, technology, trading, marketing and sales support. Recent investment has gone into a new fleet and stores with the roll out of new refrigeration and refurbishment works about to commence in key company owned stores.

Supporting this retailer recruitment drive is another new addition to bolster the sales team. Joining recent hires, Craig Lynn and Neil Ogilvie, to look after independent SPAR retailers with Steve Irons, is Jane McCulloch as one of the business development managers (BDM).

Jane McCulloch said: “I’ve been working in retail for 22 years having started with Asda whilst studying Retail Management at Glasgow Caledonian University. I worked for various retailers during my career including previous time at CJ Lang where I enjoyed 7 years with the family run business. To widen my skill set I moved on to work at United Wholesale Scotland followed by the last 4 years with Costcutter Supermarket Group. I am delighted to have returned to CJ Lang where my independent retail career started as I firmly believe SPAR is the strongest brand within the convenience sector in Scotland.”

McCulloch joins a growing retailer recruitment team. Craig Lynn recently re-joined the business in the newly created post of head of recruitment. He will work with Steve Irons who leads the sales team and spearheads this new retailer recruitment drive.

Neil Ogilvie and Jane McCulloch are newly appointed BDMs, joining the existing experienced team of BDMs Jonathan Sinclair, Steven Whyte, Stephen MacGregor and Derek Murray, regional sales manager. Karen Conway will continue to support all new accounts coming into the business and Gordon Wilson will work with entire independent sales team to offer additional administrative support.

There is also a dedicated development team within CJ Lang who focus on supporting the onboarding of all new retailers as well as taking responsibility for refurbishment projects for long, well-established SPAR retailers.

Steve Irons, wholesale sales director at CJ Lang, said: “The transformation of our sales team is very exciting. We are always searching for great people who are sales driven and passionate about independent convenience retailing. We want to give our retailer customers the best support, so they have the confidence to invest and grow their business with us. We are eager to hear from retailers across Scotland as we embark on this new recruitment campaign.”