The Ichiban Award is only bestowed on the top-performing retailers from across Europe, recognising those who have gone above and beyond to offer their customers the best possible service. John Roe Group Grimsby is celebrating winning its third Ichiban award in 2022.
The business has been Grimsby’s Toyota dealership since 1969 and has been managed by three generations of the same family. We spoke to Matthew Arliss, Group Operations Manager at John Roe Grimsby about what it takes to win the coveted Ichiban award and what he thinks makes truly great customer service.
Why do you think John Roe Grimsby won the Ichiban award? What efforts did you have to go to, to make it happen?
“Our Grimsby dealership has been on a big journey – we’d been in the wilderness and weren’t performing well. When I joined in January 2019 we were ranked 166 out of 182 dealers – very low in the ratings. I previously worked for a local family business also in the motor trade. The brief I got from Tom Roe and Steve Kelly was ‘you need to get us back on the map’. The company has four dealerships in the area including Lexus in Hull, which, run by Steve, has been ranked number one for customer service for 25 years. Steve’s mission was to ‘Lexusise’ that level of service and apply that across our Toyota centres.
“We didn’t go out to win an award – we didn’t even know what Ichiban was. We just brought our customer focus back. Some individuals in the group already ‘got’ customer service – they either understood it or they didn’t – and some didn’t – so they needed some help in understanding why customer service is such a priority for us. A real catalyst for us was when we brought in some new staff members – like Sally Smith our showroom host – she’s the personality of Grimsby – she changed the whole feel and dynamic of the showroom, she’s been absolutely crucial to customer service.
“We got the right people in, with the right mindset, driven by Steve Kelly. He’s the sort of individual who will go above…
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