Metro Connect 2024 – Connecting, Co-operating, Celebrating
RMS hosted its 19th Annual Seminar on Thursday 27th June, with in excess of 120 guests attending. Held in the grounds of RMS’ offices, a beautiful period property set on the site of King Rufus’ hunting lodge, Castle Malwood is the highest point in The New Forest National Park and boasts far reaching views across open heathland, The Solent and The Isle of Wight.
With a packed audience, Rob Morgan, Sales & Marketing Director at RMS, welcomed everyone to the day before moving on to the day’s agenda – all provided digitally within the new Metro Comms App which everyone had downloaded as they registered that morning – here they would find the agenda, speaker biographies and an outline of each session.
Welcome complete, Karen Dyke, CEO of RMS provided some reflections on the past 12 months before handing over to our first guest speaker of the day, Hannah Ostroumoff from MRI Software.
Keynote Speakers:
Hannah Ostroumoff
Account Executive,
MRI Software
Each month, MRI OnLocation delivers insights on retail performance for UK retail destinations. Hannah’s presentation will share the latest insight into what is really happening on the high street.
As Account Executive at MRI Software, their OnLocation suite (formerly Springboard) provides Hannah with unparalleled insight into what is happening on our high streets and across retail as a whole.
OnLocation excels in providing performance data services across the entire range of customer-generating environments: Retail, High Streets, Shopping Centres, and Retail Parks and is the leading provider of retail performance intelligence and insights working across the UK, Europe, and the US. Find out more at www.mrisoftware.com
Andrew Xeni
Founder and CEO of Fabacus, Founder and Chairman of Nobody’s Child, and Founder and Chairman of Soreto
Andrew Xeni is a visionary technology and retail entrepreneur. After building a successful manufacturing business supplying the UK high street, he went on to create eco-conscious brand, Nobody’s Child. Merging both retail and technology, Andrew founded award-winning retail tech companies Fabacus and Soreto.
As CEO of Fabacus, he has launched a Digital Product Passport solution driven by compliant product catalogues in preparation for developing legislation around the world set to shake up the retail landscape. Andrew’s presentation discussed how this technology is poised to innovate and evolve the current retail landscape, and showcasing the opportunities possible for brands through the use of Digital Product Passport technology. Click the link to find out more about Fabacus, Nobody’s Child and Soreto
Customer Speakers:
Halfords
After a busy first year launching The Grid, to digitise its store processes and efficiently manage communication, task management, and compliance across its store estate Halfords returned to the stage as Nick Chapman, Group Operations Communications Manager, and Sam Fok, Group Operations Communications Coordinator, took guests through Halfords use of Activity Planner.
Card Factory
Mark Klieve (Head of Business Improvement) and Cobi Davis (Business Improvement Manager) joined Kate Robins (Snr Account Manager at RMS) to share how Metro Workforce Management has helped their business optimise their store teams and discussed the benefits that they have achieved.
Customer Panels:
Activity Planner
Karen Dyke and Sarah Snow (Account Manager) hosted a panel discussion with Nick Chapman & Sam Fok (Halfords), Nicola Raynor (H&B ) and Jodi Horton (Boots) to discuss all things Activity Planner.
Helpdesk Panel
Giles Pedlar (Head of Customer Experience) and Jane Wright (Product Manager) are joined by Emma Gardner (New Look), Jason Green (Robert Dyas) and Julia Farrell (Schuh) for an informal discussion around all things Helpdesk related and how it is helping their businesses.
In Conversation with Schuh
The return of an audience favourite from 2023, Giles Pedlar sits down with Wayne Lucas, Retail Operations Manager at Schuh, to discuss the impact of Metro Comms as it rolls out across their business.
RMS Presentations:
Metro Apps
Four members of ‘Team Metro’ – Jane Wright, Kate Robins, Sarah Snow and Tyrese Gaston-Brown (Account Manager) – took guests through a headline tour of Metro’s Audit, Time, Comms and Teams app along with the key benefits they can bring to your business.
The Power Of Design
Does the perfect homepage exist? In this homepage workshop, with more than a little bit of audience engagement, Giles Pedlar, Amy Ward (Account Manager) and Rob Morgan look to answer that very question.
Metro Version 4
Chris Ferns, Product Manager for Unified Comms demonstrated some of the quality-of-life enhancements users can expect from V4, as well as some of the bigger changes to core functionality.
Helpdesk
During this presentation Jane Wright, Product Manager, took guests through the unique points of the Helpdesk module, how configurable it is to your business, and needs.
Making Communications Work
Jim Chapman, Chairman of RMS shared his thoughts and experiences of how to make communications work, along with a look at the business benefits RMS brings and the challenges Metro addresses.
Metro Top Tips
Emily Williams (Account Manager) and Aniella Saggers (Support Desk) provided a Welsh themed walkthrough of their favourite functionality within Metro, highlighting the benefits of setting users up on individual logins and the best bits of Redmine, to help get support tickets resolved as quickly as possible.
Breakout Sessions:
- Metro Comms/Teams: This session explored both the Metro Comms and Metro Teams apps and how they are enhancing the employee experience.
- Metro Audits: This session to a closer look at the Metro Audits app and how it is helping drive compliance and simplify the audit process, both online and offline.
- Metro Time: This session showed how users can clock in/out using the Metro Time app and view schedules, request absences, and change their availability.
- Trust Retail: Offering a technology stack that will save retailers time and keep customers coming back for more, this session explained how they are helping retailers transform their store operations and ensure an accurate stock file.
- MRI OnLocation: Helping you understand customer behaviour with actionable insights and benchmarks against market trends, this session explained how MRI OnLocation data can help boost performance.
- Fabacus: Andrew Xeni, answered questions from guests and explained the opportunities possible for brands through the use of Digital Product Passport technology, and how this will impact the future of retail supply chains.
- Metro Print/Date Checking/Activity Planner: This session provided a deep dive into the Metro Print and Date Checking modules along with an update on what’s new in Activity Planner.
- Metro Helpdesk/Process: This session took a closer look at the Metro Helpdesk, along with updates on other Process modules.
Recognition Awards:
As in previous years, RMS aimed to acknowledge and highlight how our valued customers innovate with our technology in their operations. While we could only recognise a select few in attendance, there were numerous noteworthy examples that caught our attention. We were truly impressed by the creative and effective ways our clients have integrated Metro into their business processes, often pushing the boundaries of what we thought possible with our software – Your continued support, feedback, and innovative use of our technology have been instrumental in shaping Metro into the robust and versatile platform it is today, and we are grateful for your ongoing partnership.
Thank You!
As the sun set on Metro Connect 2024, Karen Dyke expressed her heartfelt gratitude to all who contributed to the day’s success – to both those in and out of the spotlight. Speaking for the entire RMS team, she conveyed sincere appreciation to each person who attended, making it truly memorable.
We will be holding Metro Connect 2025 on Thursday 26th June. Register here to secure your place today!
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