Wholesale's recruitment crisis

A thriving commercial business with fast-track career opportunities is not how the average young person perceives the UK’s wholesale sector, instead seeing only the unsociable working hours and outdoor market environment.

Put off by these initial obstacles, they do not know wholesale as the thriving commercial business-place it can be, buoyed as it is by a rocketing foodservice scene and in several cases, ambitious market refurbishments.

A further problem is a draining away of one of wholesale’s traditional recruitment pools – the children of existing traders. Increasingly looking away from the markets for more comfortable careers, and not dissuaded in this by their parents, the loss of wholesalers’ offspring to family market businesses is escalating an already-challenging recruitment problem.

Recruiter Guy Moreton of MorePeople says: “Like in many industries, the children of wholesalers used to automatically go into the family business, but now often they don’t want to and what’s more, their parents don’t always want them to either.

“Which begs the question: where do you get the next generation from to go into the sector if it’s not from the traditional route? Can you make it at all attractive without adapting to current lifestyles and aspirations?”

Debates around changing trading hours to become more sociable have been bandied around for years, but other options include refurbishing the markets to provide a better working environment; embracing technology; and spotting talent in lower-grade jobs on the market and bringing people through.

“It’s also important to modernise – markets now need to have a café, have digital order systems, offer delivery, and focus on convenience for customers,” adds Moreton.

It’s a view echoed by one wholesale insider, who prefers to remain anonymous, and says some of the UK’s markets are “uninspiring, ageing and basic”.

“When faced with any kind of choice, would you opt to work in a wholesale market setting over the modern warehouse or office?” the source asks, before noting that some recent refurbishments, such as those at Birmingham or New Covent Garden, should go some way to addressing these concerns.

The wholesale sector also has a reputation for being male-dominated, the source continues, and there is a job to be done in encouraging more women onto the markets, as well as recruiting more generally.

Salesman at NCGM firm P&I Side Salads, Nick Padley, believes changing to daytime trading is not the answer. “What we could do is go 24 hours and then have two shifts,” he says, stressing that this wouldn’t be possible in current conditions.

“You could be 24 hours if you wanted, but it’s not busy enough to trade all day at the moment,” he says. “Maybe if we had a larger retail element with the new market and you had some kind of split stand, longer trading hours would work.”

Padley agrees it is the hours that put young people off entering wholesale, and says even his own dad tried to dissuade him from joining the market. “It is hard to get young people into this trade. The problem is the hours – you can make a good living, but unless they’ve been brought up to do it, it isn’t that appealing.”

Several larger firms are now bringing through young buyers and salesmen who have good career prospects, says Padley, who sees the biggest problem as recruiting for lower-paid roles such as loading staff or drivers. The majority of these workers now live outside of London and commute, a poor work-life balance on lower wages that leads to a high staff turnover, he explains.

Total Produce’s HR director for wholesale, Karen Sharples, says historically the company has recruited sales talent via word of mouth on the markets or recruiting family members. “This approach is still prevalent but less so, especially in markets where the number of individual businesses operating has declined,” she says, adding that trialling Saturday rotas to become more flexible has been a success at some sites.

“In our business we have recently invested in apprentices who were able to spend time working in different parts of our business,” says Total Produce regional director Nick Matthews. “We are also putting more emphasis on training our staff across the board regardless of age and experience as a commitment to continual improvement. We recently had as many as 48 colleagues taking part in different skills training sessions in Bristol through Element Skills Training.”

Matthews believes changing opening hours is a viable option, helped by the ongoing movement from traditional city centre markets to new distribution hubs, which he says “could see more of us choosing our own opening times”. “I don’t see why it should not be viable,” he says. “If you think about the activity in wholesale markets, more and more of the produce we are selling today is either being collected or delivered today for tomorrow’s use. I see no reason why longer term we shouldn’t be open for collection at more sociable hours and delivering to customers later in the day ready for the next day’s order pick. It will take a huge change in mindset but it’s not impossible to achieve.”

For Moreton, technology will continue to offer the wholesale sector new opportunities, and he reflects on how the markets could even develop ‘virtual buying’. He says: “Perhaps there is also a future in making buying and ordering easier and building on the popularity of Twitter, social media and e-commerce in promoting new arrivals on the market, and asking how do you buy without leaving your bed, home or desk? Surely that’s the future.”

There are growing concerns about who will run the wholesale businesses of the future, but investment, technology and an undeniably thriving foodservice sector all suggest this isn’t a sector on its knees just yet. —