Rochdale Online Department Store endorsed by Mary Portas CEO David Wood

The Rochdale Online Department Store has been endorsed by Mary Portas Brand CEO, David Wood

The Rochdale Online Department Store has received support and endorsement from David Wood, the Chief Executive Officer of Brand Mary – the Mary Portas brand.

David described the initiative as “fantastic”. Speaking to Rochdale Online, he said: “It is a fantastic idea and it is great to see it working.

“The High Street is changing and retailers need to be able to embrace that change and this platform allows them to do that.

"We are all better off working together because it is hard for retailers to get significant traffic to their own website. With something like this, by working with a website [Rochdale Online] that has that traffic, the retailers can utilise that platform for their sales.”

Mary Portas is an English retail consultant and broadcaster. She is known for her retail and business related television shows as well as her appointment by the Prime Minister, David Cameron to lead a review into the future of Britain’s high streets.

It is understood that Mary has been discussing working on similar ideas to the Rochdale Online Department Store for other towns.

The Rochdale Online Department Store launched two months ago, with financial backing from Rochdale Council, and already has over 30 retailers using the store with over 1,500 products listed.

Rochdale Online Managing Director Pauline Journeaux said: "Mary Portas is probably the UK’s foremost authority on retail and brand communication and so I am delighted that David, the CEO of 'Brand Mary', has endorsed the Rochdale Online Department Store.

Mrs Journeaux said it took 12 months of research, planning and development, and a significant financial investment, to bring the idea to fruition but has been well worth it, adding: "The store has been extremely well received, exceeding even our optimistic expectations, though no doubt the ability to market the store to Rochdale Online's massive readership has played a significant part.

"We are now hoping to roll out this idea to other towns, which will help us to create more jobs in Rochdale."

David shared his praise for the Rochdale Online Department Store on Twitter to his and Mary Portas’ followers.

David, who is from Rochdale, added: “It is nice to see this idea come from Rochdale. I left the town over 30 years ago but my mother still lives there so I often visit and every time I go back I see the town getting smaller. This is a good way for retailers to keep their presence in the town.”

David is now due to sit down with Mary to discuss the idea further.

http://store.rochdaleonline.co.uk