Brighthouse Are Getting Better
Radio Rentals conjures images of mutton-chop sideburns, Ford Cortinas and episodes of The Sweeney on ailing television sets. Irrespective of this, one of its direct descendants BrightHouse is beginning to win back the place it lost on the high street through the rise of the likes of Currys, Dixons and Comet and the reduction in the price of TVs.
BrightHouse was created out of Thorn-EMI, the owner of Radio Rentals, by Terra Firma, Guy Hands’s private equity group. It gained infamy for exorbitant APRs and costly mandatory extra cover. Todaythe chain is on the front foot, attempting to clean up both its branches and its reputation as it embarks on a very ambitious growth programme. It plans to open 21 outlets next year and calculates that there is room for at least 600.
Only a dozen of BrightHouse 178 brances are in within the M25, but, as Leo McKee, the straight-talking chief executive of the group, enjoys saying the high street turns into a very different place when you leave the borders of London behind.
Its clients, almost exclusively from the lower socioeconomic groups are having problems to get credit – if they ever could – as lenders cut their risk profiles.
“We are targeting areas that [Lloyds] TSB are moving away from,” Mr McKee explained. The idea of BrightHouse stepping in to give credit to our most deprived areas will not make everyone happy. Nevertheless Mr. McKee believes that this is an outdated perception.
“When I “started in my job [in 2004], we “commissioned “external “study to examine “the proposition asking: ‘Is it sufficient?’ and: ‘Does it have longevity?’ he explained.
“The results came back: your name on the high street is garbage; you’re seen as a rip-off merchant; the prices were high, the stores shabby.
“The first thing I did was to change all the prices to match the high street, on the day I found out [the results].”
The old approach was that as far as customers could afford the installment, they would not care about the final price. And this thinking had side effects right through the business.
That is what Brighthouse are now trying to sort out so their image gets better amongst the general public.
