Eating places with three Michelin stars symbolize the head of tremendous eating.
Within the UK, The Fats Duck by Heston Blumenthal, Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester, Core by Clare Smyth and The Waterside Inn in Bray are among the many institutions in that illustrious bracket. And subsequent up: the wellness services retailer, Holland & Barrett.
Not for its eating expertise, in fact. However as a metaphor for a way the corporate’s know-how staff is run.
Holland & Barrett’s chief information officer (CDO), Dobo Radichkov, says it’s a technique the tech staff discusses and shapes technique. Though not eager to take credit score for the unique analogy – considered one of his colleagues was the primary to convey it into inside discussions – Radichkov says his division fashions itself on a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
“The inspiration is the kitchen behind the restaurant the place you put together and supply – it’s the uncooked information,” he explains.
“The information warehouse is the place you cook dinner the information, make a meal, make it consumable and do one thing helpful with it. However even if you happen to try this, it’s not helpful except it’s served to you – that’s the job of the analyst.”
It’s that “entrance of home” analyst space the place the CDO says he has centered most of his time in 2025, recruiting new faces and bringing the information technique to life at Holland & Barrett. It marks an vital stage on the digital transformation journey the retailer has been on for the previous six years, the final 4 of which with Radichkov on the helm.
Recipe for fulfillment
The CDO oversees the central information and analytics organisations inside Holland & Barrett, with the duty of supporting the enterprise to develop into extra data-driven.
The staff is cut up into 4 key areas: these engaged on the information foundations, together with information engineering, information warehousing and information lake; a synthetic intelligence (AI) and analytics unit comprising analysts embedded into the assorted enterprise features; the information science staff offering assist with machine studying, deep studying, statistical modelling, econometrics and provide chain optimisation-type work; and people rising synthetic intelligence (AI) and automation alternatives.
“We work throughout all of the totally different departments and our mission is to make information the beating coronary heart and centre of all of the decision-making,” Radichkov explains.
“We work throughout all of the totally different departments and our mission is to make information the beating coronary heart and centre of all of the decision-making”
Dobo Radichkov, Holland & Barrett
“I can’t understate how essential it’s to spend the primary few years of a metamorphosis constructing these foundations – the information lake and information warehousing basis is extraordinarily vital as a result of with out it, you’ll be able to’t do AI or analytics.”
The primary year-and-a-half of his time at Holland & Barrett was spent doing simply that, then final 12 months was about scaling and embedding these capabilities into the enterprise. “The present part is leveraging the muse and constructing on the size to ship worth to the enterprise,” he provides.
How precisely does that look in apply? Like all retailer critical about embedding tech technique into wider enterprise technique, and as we now have illustrated in latest interviews with Currys chief data officer Andy Gamble and the then vice-president of know-how at Notonthehighstreet Dan Lake, a framework should be established.
Radichkov says there are 4 pillars of information technique within the present part.
“We’re seeking to empower the enterprise with AI to drive productiveness and effectivity, but additionally to enhance the standard of outputs and encourage innovation,” he notes.
“Second, it’s analytics. Round 80% of my time this 12 months has been centered on scaling analytics functionality, seeking to set up a staff of 60-plus analysts and getting them embedded within the enterprise features akin to product, digital, business, provide chain, operations, advertising and so forth.”
The journey to ongoing success on the enterprise, he argues, is in “driving information literacy, information centricity and data-enabled decision-making”.
Pillars three and 4 are round information governance and buyer information activation, which, respectively, contain establishing “the way you set the methods of working and guarantee issues don’t crumble a couple of years later”, and utilising the client behavioural information to create “related and enriching” purchasing experiences.
Technique bearing fruit
The wheels had been in movement for Holland & Barrett’s digital transformation within the late 2010s, however issues bought much more critical for the enterprise when the coronavirus pandemic hit in 2020, in accordance with Radichkov.
Legacy programs in place on the time had been “the one most limiting consider our means to scale this enterprise”, he says, and because the world stayed inside and digital commerce turned the primary alternative for customers, it become “a enterprise continuity threat as a result of the platform was falling aside”.
“When Covid occurred, we couldn’t scale digital effectively and there was downtime and [other] incidents,” he explains.
Radichkov mentions cloud internet hosting powerhouse Amazon Net Providers, enterprise intelligence software Metabase, and growth platform Retool as key companions at the moment, however Holland & Barrett prefers to construct quite than purchase in software program, to offer it extra management over its future roadmap.
Holland & Barrett is a uncommon retailer in that it has constructed its personal level of sale software program for its shops. It additionally developed its H&B&Me cellular app and loyalty platform. It’s not afraid to work with third events when wanted, although, and in 2025, it reaches the midway stage of a three-year tie-up with THG Fulfil, which includes utilizing the tech agency’s e-commerce infrastructure whereas it builds its personal automated distribution centre (DC) in Burton.
As soon as accomplished, the Burton DC will embody AutoStore know-how built-in in partnership with Bastian Options, a Toyota Automated Logistics firm. This tech shops and retrieves merchandise, in unison with superior forklifts, order pickers and an clever warehouse management system to streamline the method – and it’s being embedded to assist the corporate ship speedier and extra dependable on-line orders.
Extra intently associated to Radichkov’s remit, ChatGPT Enterprise has been rolled out to the retailer’s workers, serving to groups work “extra effectively each day”, whereas the CDO says AI-powered personalisation is already evident in suggestion algorithms used to tailor communications with customers.
The info staff is creating its personal AI fashions for every part from growing pricing methods to forecasting and stock administration, which helps enhance product sell-through. The staff can also be engaged on generative AI-powered chatbots to reply on-line questions and supply extra related suggestions to customers.
Golden job
On the time of writing, solely the retail shops division had extra vacant jobs marketed on Holland & Barrett’s profession pages than the information staff, giving additional indication of the organisation’s focus in 2025. And nearly all of these roles had been for analysts.
“A superb analyst is price their weight in gold,” the CDO explains.
To extract worth out of information, you want the analytics experience – it’s a job that may be a bridge between having the information and delivering the worth within the enterprise Dobo Radichkov, Holland & Barrett
“We would like full-stack analysts – these with technical and storytelling abilities, but additionally with area experience. We need to set up circa 12 squads in analytics – specialising in provide chain, digital, class administration, business and buyer progress – and every function can be a enterprise associate to the perform the place they’re delivering worth.”
Radichkov claims the staff has accomplished a “good job” in establishing a single buyer view, however “awakening the information” to speak to customers in the way in which that brings worth for each retailer and shopper alike is a precedence for the 12 months forward.
“To extract worth out of information, you want the analytics experience – it’s a job that may be a bridge between having the information and delivering the worth within the enterprise,” he argues.
There’s already a big tech, engineering, product and information safety perform at Holland & Barrett, however extra experience is at all times welcome on the enterprise – particularly for an organization that likes to construct quite than depend on third-party software program suppliers.
“By proudly owning the tech, you’ll be able to present a lot greater worth to prospects with regards to the expertise in retailer, on-line, personalisation, search, checkout and so forth,” Radichkov states.
“In the end, it’s about unlocking aggressive benefit; it’s not often about price since you’d most likely make investments related quantities if you happen to outsourced. For those who’re critical about tech and digital transformation, inevitably you’d want to construct as a lot in-house as attainable.”
Again in 2019, Laptop Weekly recorded feedback from then Holland & Barrett chief know-how officer (CTO) George Goley, who had spoken at that summer season’s Etail Europe occasion in London.
Goley mentioned he most popular to construct in-house groups of tech specialists, builders and engineers, quite than work with third-party suppliers. It was at the moment the seeds had been sown for Holland & Barrett’s digital transformation, which has in the end concerned shifting from a enterprise that purchased in 80-90% of its tech options and programs to at least one that Radichkov says now builds 80-90% of its tech stack.
Goley, the previous CTO at Argos and ex-vice-president of know-how at Amazon who left Holland & Barrett in 2021, clearly influenced what’s seen at the moment on the wellness retailer.
He mentioned in 2021 that the DNA of each firm ought to be “subtle with individuals who perceive what information is and know methods to use it, and are obsessed by it”. His idea was that organisations closest to attaining this mannequin are these that may succeed.
Within the newest monetary outcomes launched by the retailer, for the 12 months ending 30 September 2024, Holland & Barrett reported 10% year-on-year gross sales progress with income rising from £806.1m to £884.5m. Gross revenue jumped to £524.2m, from £475.7m one 12 months earlier than, with the tech transformation technique cited as a key enabler alongside a modernisation of the shop property and a common model refresh.
Utilizing AI to assist workers self-serve extra effectively is a spotlight space for the 12 months forward, as is constructing agentic AI workflows and information apps to convey course of automation “into the twenty first century”. In accordance with Radichkov, the organisation can have full cloud infrastructure by the tip of 2025, too, with rather more information and tech funding to come back.
“We don’t examine ourselves to different retailers, we like to check ourselves to extra digitally native, cloud companies, akin to marketplaces or tech-first shopper organisations,” he notes.
“We’re constructing for digital scale that may get us to ‘100 instances’ the place we’re at the moment – so we construct for the long run.”
