Learning from hard lessons
Published: 28th Apr 2017

Jacques Pretorius.
Jacques Pretorius, head of group sales, Bolton Footwear
Cape Town, SA – Despite a tough trading period in South Africa for all fashion manufacturers and retailers, we are very optimistic about the future. We learned some hard lessons in 2016 and are now capitalizing on the growth opportunities that we have created with our newly structured sales force. Summer 17 has already kicked of under the new structure and we are seeing cross selling of brands and previously missed opportunities now being addressed.
The fact that we are now operating under one Bolton footwear umbrella has created a unity amongst the sales force. We are now able to penetrate our markets better and we are closing the gap between current demand and our product offering. The change in structure is also assisting us in defining our brand identity for each and every brand and we have already addressed issues where there are similar styles between key brands.
It is still early days, but after some early successes with our import pre-sell we are now closely monitoring our own manufacturing range sales for summer 2017.
It is a proud day for us at Bolton Footwear and we want to thank our entire customer base for being so patient, and embracing the changes we have made. Ultimately it was done to service our customers better. – [+27 (0)21 590 7000, j.pretorius@jordan.co.za]
Tags: Jacques Pretorius, Bolton Footwear
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