The place to be

The number of female participants dropped slightly (18 per cent), but women were well represented in the programme: both the presentations at the start and end of the 4th Global DIY Summit were held by women, each quite remarkable in their own way. The organisers were once again able to win Véronique Laury as first keynote speaker of this world summit for the DIY and garden industry. While a year ago in London the Frenchwoman at the head of the British Kingfisher corporation stirred up the line-up of suit-wearing bosses in a short pale red dress, this time she appeared in a black trouser suit and was commanding in a less spectacular way. Just like her slides: there was no Kingfisher orange, not even the Kingfisher logo, simply black and white lettering: "We want to create good homes by making home improvement accessible for everyone." Well, yes. The list of changes happening within Kingfisher's leadership was more interesting: "Changing the organisation - leadership under one vision", "Changing the way we measure and reward performance, we look at our customers, we interact with our formats" were her points. And: "What is not changing: being purpose led." A day and a half later Victoria Neuhofer took to the stage; she represents the twelfth generation of FN Neuhofer Holz, the Austrian manufacturer of skirting boards. She brilliantly mastered the difficult task of having to make the farewell speech. She told all the experienced and decades older DIY store managers what their mistakes are when dealing with her generation, the so-called digital natives, who fear only two things in life: they don't have any network and their Smartphone battery is dead. Between these two presentations lay a summit of superlatives: Stockholm was the place to be for the completely international DIY and garden industry. Around 800 participants, traders from all continents and relevant countries way beyond Europe and North America, came together for two days at the start of June.The team from the international retail and manufacturer associations Edra/Ghin and Fediyma, who held the event and are well rehearsed in task sharing, worked together as never before. Their groundwork was excellent: the programme included a whole range of greater and smaller highlights and many current references, always with an often forced view to the main theme of the summit: "A disruptive world - New trends in home improvement."For example the second presentation was highly topical. John Gillam…