The kbbreview Interview: Vince Gunn, Harvey Jones CEO

Harvey Jones is one of the biggest names in UK premium kitchen retail but it’s seen its share of turmoil after a series of ownership changes ended in a pre-pack rescue early last year. For CEO Vince Gunn, it’s time to move forward with a new strategy and purpose… 

by Andrew Davies08 January, 2025

Puffin the whippet is happily trotting around the feet of assorted guests at the official launch of Harvey Jones’ concession in historic London furniture store Heals. While the obligatory nibbles that accompany such an event are tantalisingly within reach, Puffin is clearly trusted by watching owner, and Heals CEO, Hamish Mansbridge.

The partnership with the Tottenham Court Road store is somewhat of a coup for Harvey Jones, effectively replacing the previous kitchen offering from Brookmans by Smallbone, and is indicative of the brand’s new focus on the future as it rebuilds after a turbulent few years.

The value of the collaboration is not lost on those designing the displays, as an integrated dog bed proudly has Puffin’s name carved both into the cabinet and embroidered on the soft, fluffy blanket lying inside…

The Heals opening follows the unveiling of a new flagship Harvey Jones showroom in Chester – a revitalised design that unquestionably injects some new life into the brand’s approach (see Showroom Of The Month, in the January 2025 issue of kbbreview Magazine).

These impressive new concepts are, according to CEO Vince Gunn, just the first in a realistic series of steps designed to bring Harvey Jones back to the forefront of premium English-style kitchen design and retail.

It’s fair to say though that Harvey Jones has had its share of strategic changes since it started in 1977. In 2007, founder Roy Griffiths sold the business in a management buyout backed by private equity firm YFM. Then, in 2017, YFM exited in a secondary buyout funded by Allied Irish Bank. In 2022, it changed hands again in another management buyout backed by private equity firm Coniston Capital.

Gunn joined as CEO in early 2023 from Snug.com where he’d spent two years as MD but just a year later in February 2024 the company was rescued in a last-minute prepack deal funded by RBC BlueBay Asset Management – a division of Royal Bank of Canada.

For Gunn, it’s time to steady the ship and he is tasked with returning Harvey Jones to the front of a very competitive segment of the market. “The brand,” he says. “has to evolve into something that customers fall in love with…” 

What’s the strategic thinking behind the partnership with Heals?

We had several things we wanted to achieve before the end of 2024. One was a flagship in the North – which is our refurbishment of the Chester showroom – and another is to be inside a high-profile store like Heals. Heal’s is all about your home so I think Harvey Jones is a congruent fit and a really good match in the brands. It’s a fantastic opportunity for us.

It’s a clear statement of intent after the turmoil of the pre-pack sale. When the dust settled, what direction did you want to take it in?

When I took over I knew some of the strategy really needed to be redefined, I could see that the brand had to evolve into something that customers fall in love with. If we have that then the rest should take care of itself. We also had to make some decisions about where we wanted our sweet spot to be. Is it design, retailing and branding? Or is it manufacturing? How are we going to lay our stall out? So I knew what I wanted to do before I started but obviously what I then embraced was quite a different set of circumstances to put right. I had to take my plan and go from first gear to fourth gear immediately. We’re very fortunate that our new owners have been really supportive.

The new showrooms look great but there’s also an expectation of premium service at this level of the market. How are you approaching that?

You’re absolutely right, if you’re going to make a £40,000+ purchase you’re going to expect a number of things and, quite frankly, we weren’t meeting some of those areas well enough. I have huge respect for many other brands in the sector who set that benchmark so, quite frankly, I knew we had a lot of work to do to get our own house in order. I grew up in a family business and I learnt that you must always put customers first and aim to delight them. So, we do take the value of service incredibly seriously because it’s the new currency of the 21st century. When I was growing up it was more word of mouth, but now that takes the form of social media and you must earn that respect and trust. 

When you’ve gone through a pre-pack process, how do you rebuild trust with suppliers and customers? 

It’s important to say that not a single customer was left out of pocket and every single delivery was made. But yes, you’re right, you’ve effectively got to rebuild a whole operating model very quickly. In these situations, it’s highly intense, it’s highly compressed, and you’ve got to build that trust fast. So, you start at the very highest level by saying that an organisation with a market capitalisation of $150bn (£119bn), the eighth biggest bank in the world, has said, ‘we quite like this strategy’. You’ve got to get the management team and the sales designers – the people at the frontline – to buy into it and then see how you’re going to look after customers and suppliers as engineering that trust is critical. I don’t want to be disparaging about what I inherited because, at the end of the day, they built a great brand over 45 years but if you build a brand and create a real estate, you must invest in it. You’ve got to decide if the brand is worth it. It has to mean something, you have to have a reason to believe and, quite frankly, you have to fall in love with it. 

You’ve got the biggest chain of premium showrooms in a very competitive sector but at that level you’ve got to keep service levels and product quality incredibly high, is there a size where you can’t sustain that?

The market for that type of premium kitchen is really competitive. Tom Howley has done a phenomenal job and I’ve also got great respect for what DeVol is doing too so those brands are much further down the line than we are. But we have to ask ourselves ‘where are we going to compete?’ Because you’re right about scalability. There’s only so many people who can afford a £40,000 kitchen and I think the difference, which you can see with our new showroom developments, is the upsell possibilities and where this brand could go next. People almost stumble across our boot rooms, utility rooms or media rooms at the moment as we haven’t done a great job explaining them or helping our sales designers to present them as an offer. So there’ll be a real evolution of the brand in that sense but, first things first, we need to design, build and install a beautiful kitchen that does everything you expect it to do. The reality is we could and should have been doing that a lot better. We’re doing that now but we’re under no illusions, it’s very challenging out there. 

How is business at the moment for Harvey Jones? You’re rebuilding in what is a very difficult market but does that give you a more realistic view of what needs to be done?  

I think for us, if you look at post-transaction, we’re actually positive year-on-year. It’s low single digits, but it’s positive. If you benchmark that against the publicly listed figures of some of the bigger, more established, and, frankly, really good players in the market, it’s probably not bad. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not where I want to be but this is a small business with limited resources so we’ve got to be quite creative about how we prioritise and where we go next. What can we do to get broader brand awareness faster? That’s why partnerships and collaborations like Heals are really important. Fundamentally, not enough people know who Harvey Jones are but for those that have bought from us, they really, really love what we do. 

Given that the strength of brand is clearly something you’re working on, would you ever consider a franchise model?

It’s a subject very close to my heart because I had nearly 10 years in the Body Shop and obviously that whole business was built on franchising. It’s a fabulous way to grow and franchisees are buying a brand and methodology but the flip side is that you’ve then got lots of independent business owners to manage and, by definition, they’re entrepreneurs and that has its own challenges. But if you can put those building blocks in place, why not? Harvey Jones has had a franchise model in its distant past so I’m quite open-minded about it, but again, we need the right foundations. We need to make sure that what we’re doing at Heals and what we’re trying to finesse with our next showroom is building a very robust and consistent method and service because then that’s all about scalability.

So where are you going to be in a year? What’s your goal?

Well, a year in Harvey Jones is like dog years, isn’t it!? All joking aside, we have a pretty intense pace and so for us the next 12 months is about accelerating the formula that we’re trying to create, then working out the right portfolio and formats within it. Then it’s about turning attention to what we do online. So we’re looking at the development of both our physical and omnichannel footprints but, quite frankly, it all comes back to product. We’re pretty focused on making sure that the collection is exceptional value for money and, for anyone spending £40,000 on that product, a genuine aspiration for us is to say there’s nothing to touch it.