Gordon entered the Retail business straight from school with William Timpson’s & Sons Ltd and then as a management trainee with Bracken Fabrics. Working his way up from the shop floor was offered his first Directorship at the age of 21.

He went on to hold senior management positions with Wallis, Sears, Lonrho, and Lizars, and successfully fulfilled roles such as National sales Manager, Merchandise Director, Sales and Marketing Director, Managing Director and Chairman.
He started a successful delicatessen and coffee shop run by his family. 

Gordon was an associate of the Industrial Society assisting with retail elements.

Ten years ago Gordon launched his present company and is Managing Director of The Retailer Ltd.

He is a board bank member for The Arts in Business, the national arts organization.

He is on the board of the Scottish Poetry Library. He was for two years one of the judges in the SRC’s National Retail Awards. Gordon regularly comments on retail matters on the BBC. 

Gordon Macpherson: Director of Operations South

Senior Consultant: Retail Operations

Gordon is a highly experienced operator with experience of large and small space formats with exceptional leadership and operational skills used at board level to deliver results within a very demanding and constantly changing environment at House of Fraser, Jenners, Beatties and more recently as Interim Retail Director with Jessops.

He has extensive change management experience including store openings, closures and transfers successfully operating across all functions.

As head of a retail acquisition team he held accountability for Jenners, Edinburgh (including airport and visitor centre sites) and James Beattie Ltd (12 stores) with full P&L responsibility.

He is expert in planning and executing restructuring programmes and integrating best practice.

Gordon has a strong commercial focus, instigating significant cost saving initiatives which deliver increased profits, in turnaround and steady state environments. His experience encompasses all product areas.

He has strong leadership skills leading the start up team for a new store opening in Ireland and is skilled at sourcing, building and developing strong collaborative teams.
He also has experience as Trustee Director of a substantial pension fund in a take-over situation.

The Team:

David Adams: Senior Consultant:  Tourisim and Destination Locations  

DAVID is a Fellow of the Institute of Hospitality and has spent his entire career in Tourism & Hospitality marketing and management.  Having trained in the events, travel trade and marketing departments of Grand Metropolitan Hotels, London he went on to become a key member of the strategic team that turned “Gleneagles” from a seasonal railway hotel into a successful 5 star resort.  As the Director of International Sales he was responsible for developing the principal overseas markets in North America, Europe and Japan.    For ten years he owned and ran his own award winning Inn and Restaurant where he gained considerable “hand on” experience. 

Since then he has managed two, high profile 5 star Visitor Attractions, Dundas and Glamis Castles where he devised and delivered, highly successful commercial business plans and strategies.

Steve has worked at board level in supply chain and logistics operational roles, and led multi-disciplined change programs, delivering multi-million pound benefit improvements.

He was previously Solutions Director for the Reality Group, a division of the Argos Retail Group. An accountant by profession, Steve spent three years in performance improvement consultancy, prior to joining GUS Home Shopping in April 1991, rising to the position of Executive Director for Merchandise Planning in October 1999.

Justine has an impressive track record of successfully re-positioning major brands through the disciplines of Visual Merchandising, Design, Print Marketing and Brand Development.

As head of brand design at Marks & Spencer she led her team in creating the unique sub brand family that now underpin the headline M&S brand.

At Littlewoods Shop Direct she successfully re-positioned the £1.4billion turnover Littlewoods catalogue from a downmarket and antiquainted book to a vibrant brand led virtual store.
Justine specialises in Retail Interior Design and Brand Marketing and is currently helping a number of mid cap retailers to re-position their brands for future growth.

Duncan Martin: Senior Consultant: Sports and Stadia

  Duncan has over 30 years experience in Sports retailing and for the past 17 years he has completely overhauled the retail operations at two English Premier League Football Clubs. He has extensive knowledge and expertise in range building, product licensing and match day commercialisation.

During the past 6 years he has also become a leading expert in the use of smart card technology at sports stadiums, and how best to use this technology to increase revenue as well as improve the stadium experience.

Recently he worked on the industry ward winning integrated Fortress pre-paid debit/season card project with MasterCard and MBNA.

Duncan also gained an Open University diploma in change management.

Lynda Murray: Senior Consultant :Visual Merchandising

Lynda is an innovative and multi-disciplined retailer with over 20 years retail experience in Visual Merchandising in premium department stores and High Street multiples. Formerly “Director of Visual Merchandising” at House of Fraser, Lynda is passionate about design and nurturing creative talent within the industry.

Over the years Lynda has designed many store concepts including full department store and specific brand concepts across all product categories. The Linea brand concept she designed in 2007 for HOF included the shop fit design, branding, packaging and displays. She has won many design awards for her schemes and was a judge at the RVM awards in 2008.

She has vast experience in retail project management with over 20 House of Fraser new store openings and refurbishments under her belt.

Through her company International Visual she has completed major visual projects for retailers and developers all around the world and runs creative training events for both retail and creative teams. Her clients include John lewis, Fenwicks, Boots, LK Bennett and the V&A Museum.

Sarah-Jane O'Brian: Senior Consultant: HR/Employee Relations

Sarah-Jane has a comprehensive background at senior management level in Human Resources, having worked within the Not-for-Profit sector and a range of private sectors organisations.  These include retail / service sector, hospitality, telecommunications, finance and the oil industry, with international operational experience in the Nordics, Continental Europe, United States and Western Africa.

She has worked with such retailing organisations as Bhs, The Burton Group, Sears and Lloyds Chemist plc.

She has extensive experience in all areas of HRM, including Recruitment & Selection; Compensation & Benefits; Employee & Industrial Relations; Occupational Health; Performance Management; Training & Management Development; Project and Change Management; Termination arrangements, including TUPE.  She has a reputation for developing HR functions and for developing professional HR teams that make a positive contribute to the business’s bottom line.   

Sarah-Jane has a BSc (Hons) in Psychology; is a graduate member of the British Psychology Society (BPS) Occupational Psychology Division, and a Diploma in Coaching.   She is a member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development (CIPD), and holds BPS Level A Psychometric testing and Level B Personality Profile.     Recently, she has set up Total HR, an HR consultancy based in Yorkshire.  

Archie has a comprehensive background at senior director level, working throughout the Americas, Caribbean and Middle East.He provides extensive experience in all aspects of online activity, clearly demonstrating an ability to deliver strategic objectives.

Recent successes include; strategic planning and subsequent restructuring of all digital activities for the ATP World Tour, resulting in an increase of web traffic to in excess of two million uniques a month and a 300% increase in related revenues.

Not only does he bring top level online skills and experience but an objective lead clarity to corporate strategies and their implementation.

Adrian Pinnock : Senior Consultant : Retail Operations

Adrian is a hugely experienced multi-site retailer with a strong pedigree of retail brands in his resume.

He has held senior Operations Director roles at Debenhams and Allders Department Stores and recently spearheaded the Tescos store role out program in Poland, The Czech republic and Slovakia.

He has vast experience in Department Store operations including Visual Merchandising, Space Management, Sales and Promotions, Management Development, Real Estate Planning and Operating expense control.

He specializes in advising Independent Department Store retailers on all aspects of trading and growth strategies.

Stephan is a highly motivated professional Manager in the Hospitality Industry with international experience.

He started his hotel career in 1979 (Kempinski Hotels Munich and Frankfurt) and subsequently went to France to learn the language (Relais des Gourmet in Caen and Ritz Hotel in Paris). Stephan then did a masters degree in Hospitality Management at IMHI (program of USA based Cornell University and ESSEC an elite French business school)

From there he was recruited by Hyatt International and worked in the USA, Germany, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Yugoslavia and Tahiti in various positions including hotel construction project manager (DM 120 Million) and executive assistant manager (200+ rooms). He managed Scandic and Lindner Hotels as General Manager in Germany before moving to Scotland.

Stephan has worked in many areas of the hospitality industry including individual or company operated hotels (£10 + Million turnover), visitor attractions and catering businesses. Stephan provides hands-on operational advice and assistance which includes interim management, health and safety management, quality assurance management and general business development management. His long standing ambition is to develop a wellness hotel in Scotland using renewable and alternative energy systems as part of an innovative project.

Liz Steer: Senior Consultant : Merchandising Systems

Liz has more than 25 years' industry experience in a range of product and markets.           

Core fashion merchandising - Burton Retail (part of the Arcadia group)  

 Top-end branded fashion, food and hospitality - Harvey Nichols  

 Home accessories and furniture - Heal's

Her key areas of expertise are. Core merchandising planning and forecasting of sales, stocks, margins and densities. IT developments and business processes store developments, new stores and existing footprints distribution & logistics - in house and third party and human resource assessments and change management

Alison Stubbs :  Senior Consultant : Training & Development    

Alison has had over 25 years experience of developing leaders to maximize individual, team and business performance.

Her earlier career spanned operations, sales, HR and learning and development in large, multi site retail and service organisations such as Grandmet, Thorn EMI and House of Fraser. She has worked at a senior leadership level, with accountability for group wide talent and succession planning, leadership development and has managed significant organisational and cultural change programmes.

Senior Consultant: Finance/Accounting

Darren has a strong financial background in a variety of retail & leisure organisations over the last 20 years – including large blue-chip retailers such as The Body Shop, Sears & Harveys Furnishing, as well as other small multi-site brands. He has operated at Director level for over 10 years, within the corporate & Private Equity environments, both on a permanent & interim management basis.

Darren adds professional expertise in Business Process Re-engineering, P & L Planning, Cash management strategy, Commercial leveraging, Re-structures, Equity Capital and Capital Spend Management.

Adrian is a detailed Retail Operations Executive expert in all Operational processes including EPOS system implementation, Operating Procedures Manuals, Retail Communications Systems and Productivity processes.

Adrian has a wealth of experience in major UK retail organisations including Sears Group, Arcadia and Alliance Boots where he has just completed a major integration process for the newly established Alliance Boots merger.

Clare Wade,  Senior Consultant: Consumer Research

Clare is a senior Research Consultant specialising in qualitative research.  She has worked for top London advertising agencies including TBWA, CDP and BBH as an account planner, key accounts including Thorntons and Sony.  She moved into qualitative research as a senior exec with HPI International, and then to Hall Advertising in Edinburgh as Planning Director and to set up an in-house research centre for the agency.

From Halls she established an independent research consultancy specialising in qualitative research, with particular emphasis on marketing and communications. 

Paul’s experience includes senior management positions in high quality department stores – Selfridges in London and Jenners in Edinburgh. 

With a background combining operational, planning and buying roles, he brings an all-encompassing and practical perspective to projects.  He has consistently delivered bottom line growth through a combination of clear-headed analysis, creative thinking and strong team leadership.

Yifan Wu: Senior Consultant :China :Manufacturing/Product Sourcing

Click image for a map of the operational centers of The Retailer