If you need a sofa in Southampton, a wardrobe in Wolverhampton, or a table in Tyneside, Mark Waters is the man to sort it out for you.

As Buckingham Interiors Warehouse and Transport Supervisor, Mark is responsible for making sure we have all the stock we need for customer orders, that the right combination is put on the van for delivery, and that our pool of experienced logistics staff know where they are going and when.

Mark explained: “When someone receives a furniture delivery, they need to know they are getting the right items, on the right day and that the installation process will be simple and quick – it’s my job to make sure all of that happens and there’s a lot of organisation that goes into the process.”

Mark uses bespoke software to optimise the workload assigned to each vehicle on each day and also works with route planning software to plan the daily routes. Sending out full vans on the most sensible route means we can fulfil more orders every day and make efficiency savings that we can pass on to our customers and continue to offer the very best value for money.

“We work with a wide range of furniture suppliers which means we can offer a great product range for our customers and we always have at least two suppliers of any one product to make sure there is never a delay in getting the stock we need.

Mark continues: “This does mean we have lots of deliveries coming into the warehouse every day with everything from sofas and floor coverings, white goods and wardrobes but we have a fantastic warehouse team who keep on top of it all, taking in deliveries and then picking the items needed for each order ready to go out to customers.”

Of course sometimes things go wrong – for example when a customer has to delay the delivery of a large order – but Mark takes everything in his stride and more importantly, has the processes in place to take care of it.

“We recently had a huge order ready to deliver to a customer with a new build extra care scheme but delays with the contractor meant they weren’t ready for the furniture to be installed. My warehouse team worked hard to find room to store the order until the customer was ready to accept it – all at no extra cost to them.

“Our experience means we understand that issues can arise so we are prepared for every eventuality and always go the extra mile.

“A few weeks ago we had a customer in the south of England who required an emergency delivery for a vulnerable tenant. All of our vans were already out but we knew the delivery was urgent. We all leapt into action and the warehouse ended up driving down in a hire van and dashing to the rescue while I held the fort back at base.

“We know that sometimes our customers are put on the spot and so are we but we have a fantastic team who will do whatever it takes to fulfil our customers requirements and ensure we help tenants who are in need.

“Our logistics teams always do their best to deliver to our customers and their tenants, whether that’s delivering beds through first floor windows or delivering washing machines in the back of cars due to access restrictions, we have done it. To some people Friday afternoons are spent looking forward to a night out, but we don’t clock off until we know our customers are set for the weekend.”