Louisa Loudon

Providing specialised consultancy services for entrepreneurs, startups, and established corporations. My expertise focuses on business planning, leadership development, organisational effectiveness, strategic planning, and employee engagement. I help executives and business leaders navigate complex challenges, enhance their leadership skills, and drive sustainable growth.

Head of Retail Operations managing 5 retail outlets, covering a Luxury Multibrand store (27 brands including Valentino, Fendi, Zenga and Dolce & Gabbana), BOSS and Samsonite (including managing and growing our Wholesale account)

Senior Retail Manager managing the Leather Goods Portfolio, covering 17 stores including Mulberry, Longchamp, Coach, DKNY, Tory Burch and Michael Kors, with a turnover in excess of £70million. I have built strong relationships with my brands, based on trust and respect of brand DNA, unlocking a collaborative working partnership to build and execute solid plans for sales growth throughout the pandemic and recovery period delivering +£8.5m in domestic sales vs 2019 across the portfolio Key Achievements •Built strong relationships across my portfolio enabling me to work in partnership with the brands to build strategic plans to drive strong commercial results through a variety of channels including people, product and pricing strategies •Identified opportunities to unlock sales potential and through engaging key internal stakeholders have been able to collaboratively build new ways of working to benefit sales growth across the whole retail portfolio •Maximized opportunity to grow capture and conversion by engaging with Store Managers across the total Village portfolio, setting up Capture & Conversion Sessions to network, share ideas and brainstorm opportunities for improvement for the Store Managers to take back to their brands and giving the whole business insight to further grow sales potential and customer experience within the Village

Travel Retail District Manager for 36 sites, standalone and shop in shop concepts, across EMEA with an annual turnover of $47million. I was the in-market Brand Expert collaborating with internal and external leadership to manage the day-to-day International franchise business. I enabled my franchise partners to achieve sales targets, attain operational excellence and flawless store execution by providing on-going support and training. I onboarded new partners and supported them throughout new store openings from shop design through to the actual store opening Key Achievements •Building strong relationships across my area to allow me to support my Franchise contacts to maximize the potential of their business, through product, people, and service •Enabling the store teams in my area to fully understand our service model to allow the execution of a seamless and consistent customer experience across all doors balanced with the individual nuances of the country and location they were based in •Working in partnership with internal Merchandisers to ensure they fully understood stock package and logistical issues through data and physical store visits to bring to resolution quickly, benefiting both parties simultaneously

Regional Manager covering 14 brands (17 stores) including Kenzo, MaxMara, Jimmy Choo, with an annual turnover 8 million KWD (£20million). I developed a robust retail strategy to drive KPI performance through the development of Area and Store Retail Teams, Operational routines, Marketing Strategy and Merchandising team routines. Key Achievements •Worked across internal functions to put ways of working in place to be cost and time efficient whilst gaining maximum output, principle focused on logistical improvements of product flow into stores •Developed retail strategies to grow and develop the business in economic downturn focusing on leading change through the engagement of the Area and Store Managers and Head Office Teams. •Established root cause of performance issues within the sales team. Worked across functions to bring to the business new and innovative ways of training and working to develop store teams to be the best they can for themselves and the customer driving strong LTO and several internal promotions

Area Manager for 21 stores in Kuwait covering 15 brands including DKNY, Kenzo, MaxMara and Jimmy Choo. My main focus was to drive sales performance of stores through coaching and development of Store Managers and maintaining strong relationships with the host brands to ensure the correct balance between brand integrity and market appropriateness was delivered. In addition, I temporarily oversaw the Brand Management side of the division managing the merchandising team to plan and allocate stock, strategy planning in terms of product launches, SALE etc. Key Achievements •Key player in the working party writing, trialing, and rolling out Standard Operating Procedures for Stores, whilst influencing key business changes required to grow sales, margin, and our teams •Developed and rolled out of Store Manager specialized training courses to help grow capabilities of Store Manager population •Delivering 14% growth in sales (12% growth in margin) in my first full quarter within my area compared to country 6% growth

Store Manager for Alshaya. Store Manager for the flagship River Island within Avenues Mall, annual turnover approx. £7million. My key focus was to drive store and team performance through coaching and development of my Deputy Manager and Management Team to enable them to understand how to develop and grow a sustainable business plan. Key Achievements •Worked with the Brand Team to provide strategic and constructive feedback to the Host Brand around product to build a robust stock package that is relevant for our market •Embedded key routines in store to build the Management team a clear structure in which they work to ensure that all tasks are completed at the right time and we constantly deliver for our customers •Development and growth strategy to ensure we grow our own talent as a brand

Store Manager in Oxford, annual turnover £4.2million. I managed the store through a team of 4 Manager's. Key accountabilities are to ensure we delivered all aspects of legal compliance from Health & Safety through to people policies, brand integrity, cost control, development of the team and offer the best service on the High Street. Key Achievements •Area Cost Control Expert supporting the other Store Managers to effectively manage their P&L •Introduced 'Town Meetings' bringing all Arcadia brands in our town together to share knowledge and build commercial business plans. •Improved Model Store consistency scores achieved and maintained through coaching and developing my Management Team

Accountable for Stranraer branch, annual turnover £13million. Accountable for the performance of 5 Duty Managers who had the responsibility for 125 general staff members. Key Accountabilities including - Health & Safety, Legal Compliance, Stock Record Accuracy etc. Key Achievement •delivering a business structure change successfully as well as delivering all KPI's and focusing on development of the team.

Accountable for a busy City Centre store with an average weekly turnover of £8.5million. Delivering KPI's through the management and leadership of 5 Duty Managers, who had the responsibility for 96 general staff. Key accountabilities included managing costs to deliver profit, development of team, sales growth etc. Key achievement •turning around an underperforming store to a performing store on all KPI's.