Retail Marketing Conference 2018 - Speakers

Ben Belkacem

Instore customer and POS design manager, Co-Op 

Ben has been with Co-op his entire career. He started his design journey when Co-op started to use CAD for store plans and has progressed from there.

He has worked as part of property, brand, marketing and advertising teams and has designed, delivered and developed various store formats and model stores over the last 12 years, including the latest called EC+.

Ben was also one of the key contributors to the Co-op rebrand in 2016. He currently looks after point of sale and instore customer messages and design.

Gary Stevens

Regional Display Manager, SONOS 

Gary has worked at Sonos for 9 years. His career started within training and merchandising, where he quickly gained experience, expanding into new retailers and territories, covering Northern England, Scotland and Ireland. He moved into managing part of that team and most recently moved into the role of European Display Manager for the last 2 years.

Being with Sonos from an early stage has provided Gary with a huge amount of experience and the opportunity to work in a fast-growing company throughout its continuous development. While in his new role, Gary has been part of launching two major display projects

Scott Bird

 Prestige Customer Marketing Manager, William Grant & Sons

Scott Bird one of the UK’s leading practitioners in the retail marketing of international brands. Scott has worked with numerous world known brands in companies such as Fine Writing Pens of London, Diageo and LVMH the world’s largest luxury company with brands including Louis Vuitton, Dior, Givenchy, Guerlain, Tag Heuer, Moet, Hennessy, Veuve Cliquot and Donna Karan.

Scott most recently joined William Grant & Sons the leading spirits company brands including Glenfiddich and Hendrick’s.

Helen Thomson

Global Digital Payments Manager, Shell

Helen developed a passion for customer relationships following her time in the hospitality industry most recently as General Manager for multiple Whitbread branded restaurants. Joining Shell in 2003, she fulfilled various roles in the company’s sales and operations teams.

In 2011 Helen took the helm of the UK’s Payment and Loyalty programme, a role that combined her customer service experience with her expertise in digital marketing. Over the last six years, Helen has led numerous key initiatives, including: refreshing the Shell Loyalty Scheme’s customer value proposition; unveiling a new CRM strategy involving more than 40 million customer communications across direct marketing, e-marketing and mobile; and introducing Tell Shell, the company’s real-time customer feedback tool.

Kate Ancketill 

CEO & Founder, GDR Creative Intelligence

Kate has spent 20 years helping to future proof retailers and brands, including P&G, LVMH, Macy’s, Microsoft, Samsung, Tesco, and Lego.

She heads GDR's Board Advisory service, advising boards and executive teams on the new technologies and consumer behaviours which will impact physical and digital commerce.

She is the partner keynote speaker on trends for the world’s largest global retail membership organisation, the US-based National Retail Federation.

Siobhan Clarke 

Senior Partnership Development Manager

In 2016, Siobhan joined Macmillan Cancer Support to lead on the commercial partnership with Marks and Spencer and their headline sponsorship of Macmillan’s World’s Biggest Coffee Morning which, since 2010 has raised more than £13m for Macmillan. Siobhan and her team at Macmillan along with colleagues at M&S have driven increased levels of activation of M&S’ sponsorship through a number of channels which in turn has led to significant levels of positive customer and supporter engagement, including increases to the number of M&S Coffee Morning hosts year-on-year.

Prior to this Siobhan worked for Action for Children where she led successful partnerships with well-known brands including FedEx, Network Rail and Barclays. 

Ash Dayal

Head of Merchandising, L'Oreal Paris

Ash has been with the L’Oréal group for 10 years, starting her career at The Body Shop international. Managing all aspects of the in store design and development while creating a luxury premium environment for skincare, Fragrance and Make-up.

After six years Ash moved to L’Oréal UK in 2014. Ash is responsible for leading merchandising and creative design strategy across different retailers in the UK and Ireland in line with the international brand positioning. Ash has been the key lead for L’Oréal CPD over the past 12 months to land Sweetshop, L’Oréal’s biggest makeup reinvention in Boots. From managing very challenging timelines to liaising closely with our Paris teams, Ash has been instrumental throughout the project, bringing together all key stakeholders to land an outstanding brand expression.

Josh Clark-Ward

Assistant Brand & Marketing Manager, M&S

Josh started his career at Marks and Spencer three years ago in the Clothing and Home Marketing planning team, supporting on the implementation of a business wide 18-month marketing plan. Shortly after, he progressed into Menswear Marketing where he led on an innovative customer insight project and category growth plans for Formalwear.

He joined the hospitality team in January 2017 to lead on all marketing communications for M&S Café, and the Macmillan partnership. Josh pioneered a fully integrated marketing campaign with M&S as the lead sponsor of the world’s biggest coffee morning, achieving 10% growth year-on-year. He continues to work alongside Macmillan and the extended teams at M&S to drive and shape the 2018 campaign.