Sales Director – Draper Tools
Excellent Opportunity to join a family-owned supplier of quality trade, professional and DIY tools!
Sales Director – Draper Tools
Draper Tools is a 4th-generation, family-owned supplier of quality trade, professional and DIY tools. Established in 1919, the business continues to thrive with over 300 staff, a modern 255,000 sq. ft distribution centre, and more than 11,000 products, both own brand and select leading brands.
The Sales Director will play a pivotal role in the next phase of growth, leading Draper’s commercial strategy across the UK & Ireland. Reporting to MD Matt Sheen, you will:
- Shape and deliver the UK & Ireland sales strategy
- Lead, coach and inspire national sales and key account teams
- Build strong partnerships with key distributors, merchants and retailers
- Drive growth across established accounts while unlocking new routes to market
- Bring insight and rigour to forecasting, margin, and performance management
- Introduce new ways of working and new technology to support the sales strategy whilst leading and developing the teams.
We’re seeking a proven sales leader with experience in tools, hardware, building products, or related sectors. You’ll be commercially astute, data-driven, customer-focused, and able to combine strategic thinking with hands-on leadership, working with senior colleagues and their teams to align sales and product launches.
Ideally, you'll have worked in companies with large product ranges across numerous categories and multiple routes to market. Hence, you'll have the experience and intellectual capacity to cope with the complexity while minimising channel conflict.
Candidates should live in the South of the country to allow easy access to the Draper HQ and Distribution Centre in Southampton for meetings and collaboration. Naturally, the role will require regular national travel throughout the UK and Ireland (approximately once a quarter).
This is a rare chance to join a respected heritage brand that has retained its family culture – a can-do attitude, passion, and energy – while investing ambitiously for the future.
Send your CV to ethan@wilsonbrook.com at our retained consultants Wilson Brook.
To apply send your CV to ethan@wilsonbrook.com
Norman Piette - Head of Operations – Guernsey
An excellent opportunity to join the leading builders' merchant in Guernsey!
Norman Piette - Head of Operations – Guernsey
- A competitive salary (in a low tax environment!) + bonus & benefits, including relocation support
- A growing economy – there’s construction taking place all over the island
- A secure and growing business with career development opportunities
This is an excellent opportunity to join the leading builders' merchant in Guernsey and one of the leading private sector employers outside of the finance industry. A long-established and successful business. A powerhouse of a builders' merchants, with a large turnover and 100 employees! Norman Piette is part of a family-owned group with numerous business interests. They have a strong balance sheet and are happy to invest. They are long-term owners who are rightfully proud of the role their business plays in the wider island community.
Operating in a buoyant market as the dominant player, the company benefits from a great site, breadth of product across all categories of building material, supported by hire, project sales and kitchen and bathroom design.
The Head of Operations role will be pivotal in delivering operational excellence, strengthening customer service, and supporting further growth.
We welcome applications from candidates with the following background and experience:
- An experienced large builders merchant branch manager. c£10m+. Perhaps some kind of regional flagship?
- Or a multi site manager who wants to step back into a single site role
- Clearly happy, willing and able to relocate to Guernsey
- Proven track record of success: growing and improving a business, helping take it through a cultural change
- Ideally will have had multiple departments: plumbing and heating, a showroom, a hire department and a timber mill operation
- A positive, engaging leadership style. Humble, no ego. A track record of developing department managers into potential successors, role modelling the right behaviours, coaching and mentoring employees
- Ideally will have worked for more than one company, including an independent family-owned business
- Capable of stepping up into a bigger role in the future
- Combination of hands on and strategic
- Combination of operations and sales. Basically, everything that happens in a large, busy Builders Merchant, including stock control, transport, health & safety, with multiple managers and their teams reporting in
- Happy to be customer facing, engaging with the island community, business groups and local politicians
Why Guernsey?
- High Quality of Life: Guernsey offers a picturesque setting with beautiful beaches, countryside, and a charming town centre and villages
- Strong Sense of Community: Residents often highlight the welcoming and friendly atmosphere, with numerous community events and opportunities to connect with others.
- Stunning Natural Beauty: From coastal cliffs to sandy beaches, Guernsey provides ample opportunities to enjoy the outdoors and connect with nature.
- Hardly any crime. Leave your car and house unlocked. Even when you go on holiday
- Low tax!! Yes, you get to keep and spend more of your hard-earned money. Guernsey has no capital gains tax, inheritance tax, or VAT, and offers a low personal income tax rate with tax capping options for high-income earners.
- A warmer, sunnier climate (but not too hot)
- A wealth of water sports. In fact, a fantastic active lifestyle all year round
- A much better work life balance. Actually finish work at 5pm. Then enjoy life
- A very buoyant construction industry
- A fantastic restaurant scene with loads of fresh fish and seafood
- A great education for all, with schools aligned with UK standards
- Excellent healthcare for all. You can actually get a doctor's appointment!!
- Same currency
- Same time zone
- A short flight or slightly longer ferry trip from the UK.
The future is very bright for this business. This could be an opportunity to really change your life for the better. Come and be a part of it.
To apply send your CV to our retained consultants Wilson Brook to either MD Neil Holloway, neil@wilsonbrook.com or Senior Consultant Imogen Pearson: imogen@wilsonbrook.com
Head of E-Commerce (supplier of design-led products)
An Excellent Opportunity to join a leading supplier of innovative, design-led products!
Head of E-Commerce
- Leading supplier of innovative, design-led products
- Significant growth opportunities in this market, building upon their success in other channels
- Head Office based in the North, but candidates can pretty much live anywhere and WFH
- Successful, growing UK privately-owned business
Do you have experience running an e-commerce business/channel within FMCG/DIY/Home related products?
Our client is a fast-growing supplier of innovative, technology-leading design-led products into multiple sectors. They have an established e-commerce platform.
They just need an experienced Head of E-Commerce to lead this channel, develop and deliver a successful strategy to grow their market share and maximise ROI.
We're open on specific product experience, as long as it’s high volume/high SKU.
Suitable candidates should have a successful track record in a similar Head of E-commerce type role.
Key Skills and Attributes
- Proven experience in e-commerce management, specifically within the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector.
- Strong background in paid media campaigns and familiarity with digital marketing tools and platforms.
- Extensive experience in optimising Return on Ad Spend (RoAS) and conversion at the product and category level.
- Demonstrated ability to manage net profit and financial performance in an e-commerce context.
- Must have a deep understanding of the 4P's of marketing — Price, Product, Placement, and Promotion — and can demonstrate how this knowledge has been applied effectively from paid media strategies through on-site commercial execution to drive profitability.
- Must have deep understanding of Google Analytics 4 (GA4) to effectively analyse and leverage data insights for business decisions.
- Excellent leadership and communication skills, with the ability to manage and inspire a team.
- Proficient in using Shopify and integrating various e-commerce tools and systems.
To apply send your CV to jonny@wilsonbrook.com
Category Management Recruitment
Excellent opportunity to join a well-established and highly regarded supplier of design-led products
Category Management Recruitment
Fast-growing business with established brands and great product across kitchens and bathrooms and associated categories
Supply via several routes to market: merchants, independent retail, DIY
Open on level of experience, could be more senior or junior – attitude and ability are more important!
South West Midlands based
This is an excellent opportunity to join a well-established and highly regarded supplier of design-led products. They have grown successfully and have exciting plans to triple the size of their business over the next five years via multiple product categories.
The business has a great culture with strong values, which is apparent through everything they do.
As a result of their growth and plans for the future, they need to strengthen their product & innovation strategy across all aspects of category and product management, sourcing and commercial.
Suitable candidates should have a successful track record in a similar category management role in a similar environment. Hence, you should ideally have a good understanding of design led products (such as kitchens, bathrooms, paint, tiles, flooring, home furnishings, contract furniture, something style and trend driven with a medium to long term product development road-map), professionally developing a category from end to end: NPI/NPD, market and competitor analysis, sourcing, and product management, pricing and marketing. A good understanding of manufacturers and the target markets is naturally beneficial.
This ideally should include experience within a business that owns and develops its own products and brands, as opposed to just distributing products on behalf of companies that own the brand and the IP.
We’re honestly not looking for a unicorn here! We’re flexible with the depth and breadth of experience. On the one hand we could recruit more senior and experienced candidates, but equally we’re open to those with less experience, but the right attitude. Indeed, personal characteristics around drive, enthusiasm, desire, ability, intellectual capability, cultural fit, energy are more important.
This is an office-based role, with some travel to suppliers, trade shows and exhibitions. Hence you should be comfortable commuting to their South West Midlands location, or happy, willing and able to relocate to a delightful rural location. Living within Shropshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire or surrounding areas would be ideal. It’s even commutable from Mid or South Wales.
The future is very bright for this business. Come and play a key part in it.
To apply send your CV to ethan@wilsonbrook.com
Head of Sales – Building Materials
An exciting opportunity to join a new venture in the building materials sector !
Head of Sales – Building Materials
Sales leadership and business growth
South-East based
This is a unique and exciting opportunity to join a new venture in the building materials sector. With strong backing, the business is entering the UK market with a new facility strategically located in the South-East. Backed by experienced operators and significant investment, the company is well placed to become a serious challenger in one of the industry’s most competitive markets.
We are now looking to recruit a Head of Sales to drive early market penetration, build a loyal customer base, and establish long-term commercial success. This is a rare opportunity to take a senior sales leadership role at the very start of a business journey – shaping strategy, delivering results, and growing with the company.
The Role
- Lead the sales effort to secure new customers, with a focus on independent concrete product manufacturers and ready-mix concrete companies within approx. 70–100 miles of the South-East base.
- Build and execute a sales plan with clear short-, medium- and long-term targets.
- Develop and manage a robust pipeline, converting opportunities into firm supply agreements.
- Define pricing strategy and negotiate commercially successful deals.
- Be the face of the business in the market – customer visits, trade associations, and industry events.
- Provide market insight and competitor intelligence to inform strategic decisions.
- Collaborate with operations and logistics to ensure sales promises are delivered in practice.
- Develop and lead the future commercial team as the business grows.
The Person
- Proven track record in sales leadership within building materials, ideally cement, concrete, or aggregates.
- Strong network and credibility with target customer groups.
- Entrepreneurial and hands-on: thrives in a lean, high-pressure, start-up style environment.
- Excellent negotiator and relationship builder with strong commercial acumen.
- Strategic thinker who can also execute at pace.
- Energetic, resilient, and motivated by results.
- Based within a commutable distance of South London/Kent/East Sussex
This is a once-in-a-career opportunity to shape and grow a new business in the building materials market – leading from the front and setting the sales culture from day one.
To apply send your CV to jonny@wilsonbrook.com
Managing Director – Merchant
An excellent opportunity to join a long-established South East-based independent merchant!
Managing Director – Merchant
South East HQ with travel throughout the branch network
This is an excellent opportunity to join a long-established South East-based independent merchant. They trade successfully from multiple locations and offer a broad range of products, from building to plumbing.
They are now looking to recruit a new Managing Director to help take the business forward. Potential candidates should have:
- A successful track record of profitably running and growing an SME, multi-site distribution business in a senior capacity
- Experience in such a role within the builder’s or plumbers merchant sector is highly preferred and beneficial as is experience with showrooms
- Sales/Commercial bias preferred as opposed to operational/financial
- Not just day-to-day sales & business leadership & trading. Broader commercial experience: procurement, pricing, category management and marketing
- Successful track record of growing a business: Sales, market share, margin; delivered via remote teams
- Can successfully operate in such an environment without the support structures of a larger corporate and can cope with the pressure of needing to achieve results
- A proactive, inquisitive, common-sense approach
- Naturally strong communication skills – across all levels of the business
- Willingness to roll up sleeves and always looking for opportunities to improve the business
- To be customer-facing and enjoy doing this
- Also interact with and attend meetings at industry trade associations, events and buying groups as required
- Based within a commutable distance of the South East (or willing and able to relocate within a reasonable timeframe), with regular travel throughout the branch network as part of the role – this is not an ivory tower/purely office-based job
- Fit in with and positively develop the culture within the organisation, ensuring respect for all within the business
- A self-starter who can operate at pace – no procrastination here, please!
- Energetic and creative, resilient and tenacious
- Can deliver the right level of information up and down the structure as required
- Leadership of the highest calibre: inspire, lead, motivate, engage with people throughout the business.
This is an excellent opportunity to contribute to the next chapter in this business's long and successful history.
To apply please send a CV to ethan@wilsonbrook.com
Area Director – London
An excellent opportunity with a market-leading specialist merchant!
Area Director – London
Market-leading specialist merchant
This is an excellent opportunity with a market-leading specialist merchant. They are well-established with an exciting growth plan for the future.
They have an excellent reputation for customer service and a culture of loyalty, autonomy and no bureaucracy!
As Area Director, you will have full responsibility for the trading performance of their branches throughout London supporting the local branch managers and their teams. We're looking for someone entrepreneurial and innovative whilst also being able to work within an informal and down-to-earth environment. You will have strong commercial acumen, excellent leadership, influencing and motivation skills, combining a strategic approach with the ability to get hands-on and tactical when required.
Prospective candidates should have experience in a similar multi-site management role in some form of trade distribution. This could be builders merchanting, electrical wholesale, plumbers merchanting or something similar, even including DIY Retail. Exact product & customer knowledge is not required. You should live somewhere within London, or just outside. You should understand the different levers that can be applied to increase turnover and profitability whilst ensuring excellent customer service, good branch standards and stock control.
This is an autonomous role with the support of a well-defined structure and an experienced Managing Director. This is a growing business adapting to the challenges and opportunities the sector faces, opening new branches and investing in new product categories and routes to market. It’s an exciting time to join!
To apply send your CV to ethan@wilsonbrook.com
Sales Director: building products distribution
Exceptional opportunity to join a respected and high-performing organisation!
Sales Director: building products distribution
- Growth via a combination of increasing market share via their current & new trade counters, product diversification, e-commerce and national distribution.
- Strategic and analytical approach required.
- Candidates living along the M5/M4 corridors are preferred for ease of access to the HQ, but there will be national travel as the business expands.
This is an exceptional opportunity for a commercially astute Sales Director to join a respected and high-performing organisation at a transformative stage in its journey. With over 30 years of industry heritage, our client is a well-established leader in the building products sector, known for its high-quality exterior and interior solutions and a reputation built on reliability, service, and lasting customer relationships.
Currently operating from a small number of trade counters, the business is embarking on a dynamic and ambitious phase of UK-wide expansion. This includes the development of a national distribution network and the rollout of its unique, trademarked product range across new territories. Significant investment is being made in infrastructure, systems, and—crucially—people as the business scales to meet growing demand and unlock new markets.
The Sales Director will be central in shaping and executing the commercial strategy, driving growth through existing channels and new business development. This is a rare chance to have true commercial influence within a nimble and ambitious leadership team along with potential succession planning and equity opportunities.
This is more than a job—it's a chance to be part of something special. The business prides itself on its supportive, close-knit culture, underpinned by a strong emphasis on employee well-being, development, and progression. If you're a sales leader ready to make a real impact, with the vision and drive to help shape the next chapter of a growing success story, this role offers the platform—and the rewards—to do just that.
Potential candidates should have a successful track record in a similar role within building products distribution across multiple routes to market.
To apply send your CV to matt@wilsonbrook.com
Managing Director – Merchant
Excellent opportunity to join a long-established Midlands-based independent builders' merchant!
Managing Director – Merchant
Midlands HQ with travel throughout the branch network
This is an excellent opportunity to join a long-established Midlands-based independent builders’ merchant. They trade successfully from multiple locations and offer a broad range of products, from timber to heavy building to plumbing. They supply customers across the Midlands and nationally via their e-commerce business.
The business has benefited from numerous investments over recent years: refurbished and relocated branches, IT and warehouse equipment. There is a committed branch leadership team. They are in a strong financial position.
They are now looking to recruit a new Managing Director to help take the business forward. Potential candidates should have:
- A successful track record of profitably running and growing an SME, multi-site distribution business in a senior capacity.
- Experience in such a role within the builder’s merchant sector is highly preferred and beneficial as is reasonable knowledge of timber and associated products, including milling and processing equipment
- Sales/Commercial bias preferred as opposed to operational/financial.
- Not just day-to-day sales & business leadership & trading. Broader commercial experience: procurement, pricing, category management and marketing.
- Successful track record of growing a business: Sales, market share, margin; delivered via remote teams
- Can successfully operate in such an environment without the support structures of a larger corporate and can cope with the pressure of needing to achieve results.
- A proactive, inquisitive, common-sense approach.
- Naturally strong communication skills – across all levels of the business.
- Willingness to roll up sleeves and always looking for opportunities to improve the business.
- To be customer-facing and enjoy doing this
- Also interact with and attend meetings at industry trade associations, events and buying groups as required
- Based within a commutable distance of the Midlands (or willing and able to relocate within a reasonable timeframe), with regular travel throughout the branch network as part of the role – this is not an ivory tower/purely office-based job.
- Fit in with and positively develop the culture within the organisation, ensuring respect for all within the business.
- A self-starter who can operate at pace – no procrastination here, please!
- Energetic and creative, resilient and tenacious.
- Can deliver the right level of information up and down the structure as required.
- Leadership of the highest calibre: inspire, lead, motivate, engage with people throughout the business.
This is an excellent opportunity to contribute to the next chapter in this business's long and successful history.
To apply please send a CV to nick@wilsonbrook.com
