FarehamPeople's interview with Debenhams Store Manager, Andy Birt

It had been expected to open in 2009 but a legal battle over leases with Fareham Shopping Centre owners put it on hold for over two years until 16th June 2011 when Debenhams Fareham opened its doors for the first time.

"It was so exciting," Store Manager Andy Birt told me. "I've worked for Debenhams all my life in many different roles, and was even involved with the opening of the Weymouth store in 1999, but I'd never opened a store as 'Store Manager' before."

"I knew that in the current climate it would be more difficult than before, but I wanted that challenge."

Andy began his working career with Debenhams in 1992 at the age of 18 as a Sales Assistant at the Gloucester store. He'd completed an NVQ in business studies and wanted to do some work before making a final career choice, but found that once employed by Debenhams the opportunities within the company were limitless.

"One great thing about Debenhams is that everyone gets a chance to work in all areas of the business if they want to. I was able to do every job in the Store! I started in Gloucester and moved to Torquay, Salisbury, Bristol then Weymouth where I held a Regional Marketing role. I became a Department Manager in the Oxford store and 'held' the store in Uxbridge before I went to work for Head Office in London for a while. I've held 16 different roles in the business."

"It was a huge surprise when we first advertised for 50 jobs and had more than two and a half thousand people apply. The calibre was so high. We chose to employ mainly people who hadn't previously worked for Debenhams before so we could get lots of fresh ideas. We needed people who could flip between the traditional Sales Assistant role and selling using the Multichannel Internet Kiosks. And we found them - enthusiasm is really seventy percent of the battle."

Although at 25,000sq feet the Store is larger than the originally planned 'Desire' store, Fareham's Debenhams is in fact 'The Largest Debenhams in the World' as it has 5 Internet Kiosks where a shopper can purchase anything in the Debenhams Catalogue directly from the Warehouse with free delivery.

"The Kiosks were being trialled here and at the much larger Manchester store. They are doing so well now that they're being rolled out in other stores in the Country, including Debenhams in Southampton and Portsmouth. They'll be updated in September, and in January we'll get Chip and Pin."

Although a department store, the new Debenhams does have an 'old fashioned', friendly atmosphere.

"We're a large store with a small store concept that compliments the market here in Fareham. A big store would destroy other local businesses and ultimately be bad for everyone – including us. It's also really important that we engage as much as possible with the local community - hence our links with Fareham Leisure Centre and sponsorship of The Rainbow Centre. We want to work with the community. We let people advertise in our store and we've got lots of events planned - at some point this will involve me waxing my chest I expect!"

I asked Andy if there have been any teething troubles or surprises in the last 6 weeks.

"I think the only real surprise is that we're still doing so well! We've exceeded all expectations. We've had to give additional hours to the Teams to keep up and now we're looking to recruit 9 more Sales Assistants. I'm very happy."

To find out more about the Team in the store have a look at my Gallery here.

If you're interested in applying for one of the Sales Assistant roles you can find out more on the Debenhams website here.

Have you been into Debenhams yet? What do you think? Leave your comments here or, better yet, why not leave a review for Debenhams on the FarehamPeople website.