Who is Hammonds?

Hammonds is a century-old UK furniture company with a passion for creating organised living spaces for their customers. To fuel their ambitious growth plans and maintain their high standards of customer service, they sought to attract and retain top-performing sales recruitment candidates, managing every aspect of the customer journey, from initial enquiry to installation, offering a complete 360-degree service.

The Challenge:

Hammonds’ Sales Director initially approached Citrus Connect to address the challenges of attracting high-quality sales recruitment candidates. While we initially supported them with geographically specific recruitment needs, a new challenge arose post-COVID: retention. With ambitious sales targets, Hammonds needed to not only retain their existing Sales Designers but also increase their headcount significantly.

Our Solution:

Recognising that effective recruitment is a skill, Hammonds engaged Citrus Connect to deliver a comprehensive Citrus Framework workshop to all Divisional Managers. This workshop covered key areas:  

Process Optimisation: We analysed their recruitment process, identifying areas for improvement to enhance efficiency, reduce time-to-hire, and improve the candidate experience.

Recruitment & Retention: We emphasised the link between recruitment practices and employee retention, highlighting the importance of attracting the right candidates from the start.

Candidate Profiling: We helped Hammonds refine their candidate profiles to focus on essential competencies and motivations, ensuring they were selecting Sales Designers who were the right fit for the role and company culture.  

The Results:

By implementing the Citrus Framework, Hammonds achieved impressive results:

Enhanced Retention: Retention rates are steadily improving year-on-year. With ongoing support from Citrus Connect, Hammonds continues to focus on the Sales Designer journey and onboarding process to further boost retention.

Increased Headcount: They successfully grew their sales team to 280 Sales Designers, enabling them to meet and exceed their sales targets.

Improved Offer Rates: The focused recruitment process resulted in a 90% offer rate from interviews and a 60% offer-to-start rate.

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When we asked Audrey, what she liked about working with Citrus Connect Recruitment, her response was:

I am so pleased with how you and your amazing team have helped us at Hammonds

Audrey - Hammonds