Interview - Headlam MD John Clark on supporting retailers to meet today's challenges

Earlier this year, John Clark became Managing Director of Regional Distribution at Headlam. In his new role, he is managing and assisting Headlam’s General Managers in supporting independent retail customers across the UK. 

Headlam has been successfully implementing its strategy of broadening its customer base, including the expansion of trade counters and enhanced relationships with larger customers and house-builders. However, John talks to us about how independent retailers remain Headlam’s biggest customer group, and his team will continue to invest in improving service and quality for his customers.

Q: Conquering the cost-of-living crisis

“We are focused on providing value for money. Our recent customer survey showed the impact of the cost-of-living crisis, as consumers have less disposable income. To deliver on this, we are refocusing on our Lifestyle and Everyroom brands to ensure they meet all the needs of our customers from a range, price, and merchandising perspective.

Q: Service is central to success

“Retailers choose us because of our nationwide distribution network, stock availability, next-day delivery, and customer service. We offer the widest range of products with the deepest range of stock to ensure product availability. We have a national distribution network that provides next-day delivery on orders, and we have a network of trade counters that our retail customers can use as a collection point.

“I am incredibly proud of our most recent customer survey scores, which show how important our sales and customer service teams are to our customers. We will continue to focus on these teams as we know how valuable they are to the industry.

“Service and quality are also focus areas of ours, and we currently have projects aimed at improving our delivery service. We are making it easier for retailer customers to buy from us through their preferred channel by investing in our digital platforms. We launched our new website (www.headlamgroup.com) recently to highlight our product and service offering and our online trade portals are also being refreshed.

“We are also opening more trade counters and refitting older sites. Our trade counters are not open to the public and provide a local service to the flooring industry. By opening more trade counters, we can provide more collection, storage, and stock-holding services for retailers.

John Clark joined Headlam in 1992 when it acquired Alvin Morris
in Leeds. In February 2024, he became Managing Director of Regional Distribution, and before this current role, he was Mercado’s General Manager for over five years.

“The flooring industry is important to me,” says John.
“I have been in it for over 30 years and my son is a floor layer,
so you could say that flooring runs in the family.”

Q: What are the most popular ranges?

“Tomkinson Twist from Tomkinson, one of our exclusive brands, is a popular product with our independent retail customers. It is a stylish carpet for the home, made from an 80/20 wool twist composition and is available in five weights, in 24 colours, and four and five-metre widths. 

Similarly, the Pebble Beach range from our Lifestyle brand is also popular among retailers and offers great value for money. We also offer a broad range of exclusive brands, including Everyroom, Lifestyle and Crucial Trading, to meet the needs of all our customers.

Q: Sustainability is rising up the agenda

“Sustainability is another challenge, with retailers telling us that their customers are increasingly asking for products made from recycled materials. Our Breathing Space range from Tomkinson is a sustainable, retailer-focused product.  

“It is a polyester carpet made from recycled plastic bottles that have been converted into yarn for carpet. The yarn is called ResilonX, and every square metre contains 25 500ml recycled bottles. We have also launched sustainable ranges including JHS Colour Foundation, Highfields, and Ocean Drift.

“We also hired John Grant as our Head of ESG who is leading several projects to meet customer needs. 

Q: Future-proofing the business

“Retailers will remain a key focus area of our business and are our largest customer group. To ensure we continue to be the market-leading flooring distributor for retailers, we are training and developing our teams to provide the best service to our customers. And we will continue to invest in logistics, quality and service and we have a number of projects to improve these areas.

“Carpet remains the most popular product and we do not predict this will change significantly. This means we will continue to focus on our carpet ranges to deliver the best offer to our retail customers.



“We expect further growth in hard flooring, so we will be working hard on our retailer product offering across LVT, vinyl and wood over the coming months.”