Dobbies appoints new CMO

Garden centre retailer Dobbies has announced that Phil Thomas has joined the group as chief marketing officer. 

Thomas, who has been CMO for Costa Coffee for the last three years, brings to Dobbies over 30 years of wide-ranging marketing experience in both retail and consumer goods. 

Before serving as CMO of Costa he was CMO at Greene King, and prior to that held numerous marketing roles in Reckitt Benckiser and Procter and Gamble, both in the UK and internationally.

As CMO, he will be responsible for all of Dobbies’ customer and marketing activity. He will leverage the company’s renewed brand purpose and values to create engaging communication and customer experiences, and bring an increased focus on customer insight and data analytics.

He will lead the teams responsible for all marketing activity and brand innovation, for developing the instore and digital customer experience, as well as ongoing seasonal campaigns and events. He will also lead all communications including internal and external stakeholder engagement, corporate communications, ESG and consumer media relations.

In addition, he will have responsibility for supercharging Dobbies Club, which has over 1.3 million members, increasing its appeal to both existing and new members.

His appointment comes as customer director Louise Niven steps down from her role to go on maternity leave.

Regarding his appointment, Thomas said: “Dobbies is a wonderful brand with an amazing 159-year heritage of helping people enjoy their gardens, and an equally great future ahead. 

“I’m excited to be joining, and look forward to working with David, the leadership team and all Dobbies’ colleagues to help grow the business by building the brand and further enhancing our customer experience – and so delight more and more customers every day.”

David Robinson, CEO of Dobbies, added: “We are building an incredibly strong senior leadership team and recruiting Phil is another positive step in achieving our ambitions. Phil is a very experienced marketing operator who will drive our goal of communicating our focus on garden living through all of our marketing. Phil’s extensive knowledge of UK retail and product marketing will be invaluable to delivering on our strategy.

“I’d like to thank Louise for her ten years at Dobbies, including six years at the helm of the marketing team, building our brand; delivering award-winning campaigns, positive PR and community engagement; and outstanding growth of our loyalty scheme to more than 1.3 million members. Everyone at Dobbies wishes her all the very best for the future.”