The U.K.’s Entertainment Retailers Assn. (ERA) has elected Zavvi managing director Simon Douglas as its chairman for the next year.
The unanimous vote was announced at the ERA AGM in London Sept. 17. Ben Drury, managing director of digital download store 7digital, will continue for a second year as deputy chairman. Graham Lambdon of distributor EUK remains treasurer.
Douglas led the management buyout of Virgin Megastores, rebranding the chain as Zavvi in Sept. 2007. Zavvi this week announced it had increased like-for-like sales by 10.2% across its 115-store chain in the past year, although music sales fell 18%.
“There are more entertainment products on the market than ever before,” said Douglas in an ERA statement. “Consumer demand for entertainment products is greater than ever before. This means that the need for trusted intermediaries who sit between the producers of entertainment and those who want to buy it is greater than ever.”
Douglas said ERA has recently championed the interests of consumers by lobbying for a single High Definition DVD format (won by Blu-ray), backing the MP3 format for downloads and arguing the case for a single rating system for computer games.
ERA represents U.K. retailers and wholesalers of recorded music, video, DVDs and games and its 200 members operate around 5,000 stores.
