‘It’s amazing what you can do with numbers’
Adrienne leads all our research work. No one is more interested in what makes people tick. She is good at listening, likes exploring ‘what ifs’ and keeps going back to ask more questions. Dry, data collection and impact analysis are not for her. ‘Too many retail developers do research just to say that they’ve done it. If you’re not going to use it, don’t bother doing it,’ she says. She sets up the right systems so that on Monday she can see the impact of an event two days before. She knows when an increase in footfall led to more sales and where it didn’t. So she knows where to put the marketing effort. ‘There are always things we can improve.’ Tenants quickly realise her value.
Before joining Milligan, Adrienne was an associate partner at Jones Lang LaSalle. She worked with retailers to test new concepts for shopping centres; she spotted gaps in the market and looked at different tenant mix strategies. Her career also includes consumer research for Mars and Black & Decker, and retail management for Sainsbury’s.
Email: Adrienne@milliganretail.com