Breville Australia has undertaken a self-described ‘reshaping’ of its sales structure, making several adjustments to its state and territory offices in order to best serve its retail customers with merchandising and demonstrations, according to general manager Jeremy Sargeant.

In addition to its eponymous brand, Breville Australia also owns the Kambrook brand and distributes selected Philips products, as well as being a Nespresso Australia machine partner.

With small appliance suppliers currently hosting retailers to provide an overview of their Christmas range, in advance of the most important sales period of the year, the new Breville sales system is expected to provide the necessary focus for the trade for the next six months and beyond.

“Reshaping means providing more support where it’s required to meet our customers’ needs from both an in-store and head office point of view,” Sargeant said.

“To try and provide a more coordinated and focused approach to in-store demonstration needs, we removed the role of consultant coordinators and have given our state managers the responsibility of managing the entire field force of territory managers and consultant demonstrators.

“We also consolidated three territories in Western Australia, Victoria and New South Wales with the removal of three territory manager roles and are looking to strengthen our demonstration program through the coming year.”

Sargeant said in the modern appliance retailing environment, there is a greater concentration of effort towards head offices, and that this demands action from a supplier.

“With the need for more retailer head office representation, we have focused our senior team of national account managers and state managers on supporting those needs,” he said.

In his recent contribution to Appliance Retailer’s Influencers series, Sargeant said strong communication of features and benefits is needed to attract consumers to spend money in the appliance industry.

“The electrical industry has the opportunity to win the hearts and minds of consumers with real innovation and engaging communication,” he said. “As an industry we are well placed to prosper in a market competing for the discretionary spend. If we focus on product education, training and providing real service to the consumers the rewards should follow.”

One of the major focuses for Breville this Christmas will be its groundbreaking new ‘superblender’, the Boss (BBL910, RRP $999), which received the Good Design Selection accolade at the 2014 Good Design Awards.

“Able to create superfine textured smoothies, soups, sorbets and dips, the Boss is designed with one-touch functionality, including the world’s first Green Smoothie pre-programmed setting. This high velocity machine can replace a mortar and pestle to make flour, process nut butters, blend silky smooth green and whole fruit smoothies and protein shakes. The Boss can also prepare soups from cold to hot with a pre-programmed 6-minute setting.”

In further encouraging news for Breville ahead of the Christmas sell-in, the brand was named Australia’s Most Trusted Coffee Machine and Small Appliance brand for 2014.

This author is on Twitter: @Patrickavenell