Haskins Garden Centres appoints Training Manager

Published: 01 May, 2008

Haskins Garden Centres have appointed Leon McGready as the company's first Training Manager. The new role will draw upon Leon's 18 years experience of retail management, training and HR support with Homebase and more recently Sainsburys in Southern England.

All the training requirements for the 450 personnel employed across the company's garden centres at Ferndown, Southampton, Worthing, East Grinstead and the head office in Ferndown, will be arranged and facilitated by the trainer.

Julian Winfield, Managing Director of the £30 million turnover Haskins Garden Centres, said that the appointment of Leon will enable a wide range of skills to be enhanced within the organisation

"Customer service and product knowledge support is vital to the ongoing success of a retail operation. In addition to compliance, legislative and health and safety training, Leon will oversee and develop the existing induction and career development training.

"We plan to introduce more product knowledge, technical and practical skills based packages for everyone with a requirement in the company."

Horticultural workshops and product knowledge seminars will be actively encouraged from suppliers, as well as other external training sources.