The winners of Toolbank's perennial competition have been announced.

Started in 1986, Toolbank’s Real Deals for You campaign is a regular feature of the industry festive calendar. This years’ promotion was given the theme: ‘Where the Magic is Made’ and featured 89 products.

The competition featured three categories with the introduction of a new one this year for marketing initiatives.

A team of guest judges chosen from the industry was invited to sift through over 250 customers submissions to finally declare the winners.

The judges were Chris Hayward (MD of NMBS), Colin Petty (Industry Consultant), Steve Collinge (Insight DIY) and Lucy Anne Matthews (Builders' Merchant News) and Simon Bicknell of Toolbank.

The criteria for selection included: making the best use of space available, creating a high impact, attractive displays using the 2019 Real Deals for You products, free point of sale kit and/or digital assets plus a little ingenuity.

This year's winners and runners-up are as follows:

Best in store display

1st prize= Tamar Trading – Bodmin (Exeter)

2nd prize = E.H.Smith - Leicester (Halesowen)

3rd prize = Homeleigh Timber & Building Supplies - High Halden (Dartford)

Best window display

1st prize= Blanchards Home Hardware – Bideford (Exeter) - Picture

2nd prize = Kings Diy – Tadley (Southampton)

3rd prize = Watsons Home Hardware – Sutton-On-Sea (Norwich)

Best marketing initiative

1st prize = Toolfix – Peterborough (Norwich), marketing campaign including “pick of the week”, recyclable displays, digital promotions, staff and product sales monitors.

2nd prize = E.H.Smith (group) - Solihull (Halesowen), in-house display competition and mailshots, staff sales monitors and prizes.

3rd prize = Roger W Jones – Rhyl (Widnes), extra PoS plus a special mountain bike consumer prize.

Prizes include an Apple iPad for first place, Nespresso CitiZ & Milk for second place and a Google Home Mini for third place.

Simon Bicknell commented “This has been the largest number of entries we’ve ever had and definitely the best quality of displays and marketing – we are so grateful to our customers for not only supporting the campaign but really getting behind it.”

“We are already working on ideas and ways we can improve the campaign for 2020 and will shortly be writing to all participating customers for their feedback which has been so influential in the development of Real Deals for You over the years”.