National Lottery operator Allwyn’s current Local Retail Champions - Natalie and Martin Lightfoot (pictured), who own Londis Solo Convenience in Glasgow – have completed the first stage of their Social Value store makeover by installing colleague headsets to help with security.
The husband-and-wife shopkeepers were awarded £5,000 and a Social Value store makeover worth up to £20,000 when they won at Allwyn’s first-ever Local Retail Champions award in December.
The pair had been nominated for the award by their customers for a host of community-focused work, such as organising charity fundraising events and litter-picking activities, as well as providing a home delivery service for the needy.
Natalie and Martin have now begun the makeover – which is due to take a number of months – by installing six new colleague headsets to improve security. These enhance communication, increasing safety for both customers and staff and enabling colleagues to respond quickly to assistance requests.
The next stage will see the installation of new CCTV, replacing the current 15-year-old system. As well as protecting the store, the CCTV currently helps keeps the community safer, with cameras located outside having been used successfully in the past to help with investigations.
The final stage of the makeover will include installation of retail AI technology, with initial plans currently being looked at by Natalie and Martin.
Natalie said: “We’re really grateful to Allwyn for what the money is helping us do with security in the store. The headsets have been a godsend. The store has thick walls, making it difficult to hear each other in different areas, so they allow us all to communicate and respond to things quickly as a team.
“The new CCTV will provide clearer pictures as the current system is quite pixelated and very dated. We wouldn’t have been able to get any of this new equipment without the Local Retail Champions makeover money - not for a long while anyway.”
The Local Retail Champions initiative is paid for with money from Allwyn’s dedicated Social Value Fund, an annual £1 million that the company has committed to using to support operating The National Lottery in an environmentally and socially responsible way.
Last year, Allwyn used a portion of the funds to reward and recognise the important role its retail partners play in every community across the UK and Isle of Man. Arrangements for this year’s programme will become available over the coming months, it says.
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