A very happy new year. I wanted to take this opportunity to write and introduce myself as the incoming Chair of the Society for Location Analysis, taking over from Peter Sleight who, as many of you will know, retired last year. I’d like to express my appreciation to Peter for his tremendous work for SLA; we were able to thank him in person late last year with a tankard which, I understand, he is already putting to good use!
Peter’s enthusiasm for the SLA since its inception and his tireless energy and wisdom (not to mention persuasive powers) in delivering a schedule of events and speakers for the Society over the years have been enormously impressive.
And it seems that you all agreed: last year, all our events scored over 90% good or very good for both relevance of subjects and quality of speakers.
So Peter has set the bar high for 2015!
2015 event schedule
Over the next few weeks, the society’s advisory group will be finalising the 2015 schedule. We’re already grateful to many of you for the suggestions you have made for activities and events you would like to see included. Amongst these will be some “All You Need to Know About…” sessions, a new public sector event, some more joint events with the SPR, as well as benefiting from the research undertaken by the new ESRC Consumer Data Research Centre http://cdrc.ac.uk.
Awards
We’ll also be running an award for the best undergraduate thesis on location analysis – to encourage the best students to think about careers in the sector.
Have your say
We’d like to hear from you about particular topics you would like us to cover as well as anyone who think they may be able to host a meeting. As you know, we are also reliant on the goodwill of some member organisations to provide venues in London and elsewhere. Please email me on jonathan.reynolds@sbs.ox.ac.uk, or any other member of the group, with your ideas or if you are able to help. Members include: Jack Streenstra jack.steenstra@zen.co.uk, Steve Scholey Steve@scholeyspace.fsnet.co.uk, Andy Metherell andymeth@hotmail.com and Anthony Hunt Antony.Hunt@co-operative.coop.
We need more members
We have over 350 members in the UK and internationally. But there’s always room for more: if there are new colleagues in your departments or units who you think would benefit from joining, then do let them know about the benefits of membership: https://thesla.org/about. Also, if you’ve moved – please let us know!
Job adverts
Ruth Holroyd remains our Administrator info@thesla.org and takes care of all our events, the website and job advertising service. The price of our job advertising service remains the same as it has been now for many years – and at £495 it’s very reasonable but still makes a significant contribution to covering some of our costs. Are you looking for staff? Do consider our vacancy service; other customers have had very good responses. To find out what companies who have used the service say visit: http://www.thesla..org/job-advert-testimonials/
Member benefits
We’re are also able to offer individual members 10% off the annual 3-day Retail Location Analysis course run at Oxford University, which this year is scheduled for 27-29 April 2015. More details here: http://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/programmes/execed/rla
With all good wishes for 2015.
Kind regards
Jonathan Reynolds
Chairman
The Society for Location Analysis