Store Manager Role - Cheltenham My client is an award-winning garden centre retailer with four stores and a growing ecommerce business. Their stores are premium garden centres, offering exceptional indoor and outdoor horticulture departments, a range of quality gifts, homeware, furniture, and clothing. Their high-quality restaurants provide freshly prepared, seasonally changing menus, creating an exceptional experience for their customers. As an independent family business, my client has built a fantastic workplace culture focused on fun, wellbeing, and team collaboration. They are proud to have won numerous national awards, including Best Workplaces 2023, Best Workplaces for Wellbeing 2023, Best Workplaces for Women 2023, Best Workplaces 2024, and Best Workplaces (Retail, Hospitality & Leisure) 2024. My client has a fantastic opportunity for an experienced Store Manager to join their Cheltenham store. Reporting to the Executive Chairman, you will ensure that the Cheltenham store remains at the forefront of premium garden centre retailing. You will achieve this through excellence in standards across all categories, including food and restaurants, the highest levels of customer service, a continual colleague development approach, and adherence to the long-established my client values. Key Responsibilities: Ensuring Excellent Retail Standards and Delivering Commercial Targets: Line management of department managers for Seasonal, Leisure, Gardening, Plants & Outdoors, and Pets. Ensure that sales targets are met, wage-to-sales budgets are achieved, and shrinkage is effectively managed. Collaborate with the Head of Brand & Digital and the Director of Buying to ensure that visual merchandising and seasonal changeovers are executed with premium retail standards according to plan and brand guidelines. Work with the Head of HR & People to ensure that staffing levels are appropriate, particularly during seasonal peaks, and ensure resource is in place across all activities. Collaborate with the Warehouse Manager at the Wychbold store to ensure the right mix of product categories and merchandiser resources, maintaining full product shelves and working to newly installed merchandising procedures. Ensure my client remains a Garden Centre of Excellence, achieving top scores in the GCA annual audit and establishing the store as the Destination Garden Centre for the Midlands. Lead weekly store standards walk for the Chair, Director of Buying, and Head of Brand & Digital, regularly reviewing the customer journey. Ensure POS standards are maintained and collaborate with the Marketing and IT teams to evolve an in-house POS system for department-level signage production. Creating a Culture of Customer Delight: Oversee customer support and ensure the store is clean and welcoming from entrance to exit and through to the car park interaction. Manage customer service relations, handling all inquiries for Cheltenham departments and ensuring they are dealt with in a timely, constructive, and GDPR-compliant manner. Manage the Duty Manager rota to ensure there is a visible management presence on the shop floor at all times, capable of handling customer service issues and emergency scenarios. Work closely with the Head of HR & People to roll out customer service training across the store. Work collaboratively with the Food@Webbs and Events teams to ensure resources and standards are in place to deliver an exceptional customer experience. Developing People and Systems for Service Improvement and Efficiency Gain: Contribute to the overall Great Places to Work score by developing a culture of trust and inspiration among colleagues, ensuring their development and progression. Develop managers' specialist knowledge and support colleague progression within their teams. Champion the use of a new warehouse inventory management system to ensure accurate stockholding, record wastage, and provide greater customer stock visibility both in-store and online. Work with the Finance Director and Director of Buying to develop a clear markdown policy, protecting margins and presenting markdowns with high retail standards. Champion the use of workflow and reporting systems such as Teams and Business 365, improving communication and business intelligence at the store and category level. Ensuring a Safe Working Environment: Collaborate with store management teams and security personnel to ensure safe and effective opening/close-down store routines. Regularly test security, fire, and emergency protocols, ensuring Duty Managers are capable of showing calm leadership in emergency events. Provide timely feedback to the Head of Estates on store repairs and maintenance requirements. Ensure Duty Managers are available to manage contractors and day-to-day operations. Work with the Head of Estates to ensure all areas of the retail site operations remain a safe place to work and that departmental health and safety responsibilities are adhered to at all times. The Successful Candidate Must Have: Experience in managing large-format stores with high turnover, ideally within a high-quality positioned retailer. IT literacy, with working knowledge of EPOS systems; being tech-savvy is a major plus. Strong leadership skills, with the ability to listen, respond, and influence others. A talent for coaching and giving constructive feedback to drive common ways of working and improve team performance. A passion for identifying and developing talent, creating a successful and collaborative team culture. Strong problem-solving abilities, with the capacity to resolve challenges and build trust across the store team. The ability to set clear objectives that align with my client’s overall business goals and brand values. A broad thinking approach, with the willingness to accept different opinions, beliefs, and behaviors. Understanding of the dynamics of working for a fast-paced family-owned business with a strong heritage brand and deep community ties. This is a full-time, permanent position, working an average of 39.5 hours per week on a 2-week rota. This involves working four weekdays, plus every alternate weekend (working four days one week and having one weekday plus the weekend off, then working six days the following week, including both weekend days). Our Reward Package Includes: Salary up to £45,000 depending on experience. 25% colleague discount on most categories, including plants, gardening, furniture, clothing, and food. 50% colleague discount in our restaurants. Holiday entitlement of 33 days inclusive of bank holidays. Pension and life cover. Healthcare schemes (upon completion of the 6-month probation period). Free parking.