By James Wells
BRISBANE: Members of the appliance industry have offered tributes to Queensland retailer, Ron Handley, who was farewelled at a funeral service attended by several members of the industry last Friday.
Handley, who last year sold his three Retravision stores located at Indooroopilly, Brisbane CBD and Toowong to three men including his son David, started in the electrical industry 20 years ago with Lismore Chandlers.
Handley then joined Vox stores – initially as area manager and later Western Australia operations manager and ultimately national retail operations manager, where he worked with close friend and current Retravision Queensland chairman, Dave Knudsen.
When he left Vox, Handley opened Indooroopilly Retravision which was a 500 square metre stores and he later relocated to a larger store of 1000 square metres.
“He was one of the gentlemen of the industry,” said Retravision Queensland CEO, Philip Scarff.
“He was one of those people in business where his word was his pact.”
According to Knudsen, Handley’s strengths were his relationships with suppliers, staff and Retravision members and “was somebody that was very much looked up to in the industry”.