Furniture Village Gender Pay Gap Report 2024

Introduction

At Furniture Village we know that people are our greatest strength and we are fortunate to have a hugely talented and committed workforce, with equal opportunity given to everyone, both in joining our business and prospering thereafter.

Indeed, being able to share in the success of one’s efforts underpins the ethos of the company, and through a program of development, training, recognition, and reward, we strive to ensure that every employee has an opportunity to reach their full potential.

We are absolutely unequivocal in both welcoming diversity of gender into every area and level of our business and ensuring that male and female employees always receive equal pay for equal roles.

Proportion of Male and Female Employees

Our data this year is based on 1,185 employees as of April 2024. Our business continues to encompass a wide range of roles, with our 2024 employee base 71% male and 29% female. This ratio is typical within the furniture retail sector and is in part due to a male bias towards our highly skilled Retail Sales Team, with these positions offering the opportunity to earn large performance related remuneration and these employees often occupying places amongst the top earners within the company.

Whilst these positions have been traditionally biased towards males, in part due to weekend working hours, we have many very successful females in these roles and are actively seeking to understand how we can attract more females into these positions.

In addition, we run our own Warehouse, Distribution and Logistics operation, with this also tending towards a male bias, again influencing the ratios between male and female employees, with 87% of our employee base working in Retail Sales and Distribution roles.

Across our Group functions, more typically known as ‘Head Office’, we have over 56% female representation, which is an increase of 2% on the previous financial year. The most senior positions have a 41/59% split between female and male roles, an 8% increase of females within these positions.

For the reasons highlighted above, when our employees are ranked in order of total pay and segmented into four groups of an equal number, our male to female ratios are biased towards males.

	Male 2021	Female 2021	Male 2022	Female 2022	Male 2023	Female 2023	Male 2024	Female 2024
Upper Quartile	83%	17%	82%	18%	82%	18%	80%	20%
Upper Middle Quartile	80%	20%	69%	31%	67%	33%	68%	32%
Lower Middle Quartile	49%	51%	62%	38%	72%	28%	72%	28%
Lower Quartile	71%	29%	74%	26%	64%	36%	62%	38%
Overall	71%	29%	71%	29%	71%	29%	71%	29%

The Gender Pay Gap

It is important to know that the Gender Pay Gap is not the same as Equal Pay.

As mentioned above, we are absolutely unequivocal in both welcoming diversity of gender into every area and level of our business and ensuring that male and female employees always receive equal pay for equal roles.

In terms of Gender Pay Gap statistics, the mean pay is the average total pay, expressed as an hourly rate, and the median pay is the pay of the middle person if employees are ranked in order of total pay.

Given a higher proportion of males in the top quartiles than in the lower quartiles, the average total pay for males naturally follows this, with the mean company pay 9.3% lower for females than males which is an increase on the 11.9% mean difference in 2023. Due to a high proportion of male retail roles at the mid-point range, the total pay of the middle or median female is 13.1% lower than the male median.

Bonus and Commission Pay

Of our 1,185 employees, all of them have the opportunity to receive a performance related bonus or commission, the latter relating to Sales Consultant roles. 2024 saw us introduce a profit share payment, known as our Family Partnership, which offers all our people that were employed during the qualifying period the opportunity to share in the profits generated during the previous year. We are incredibly proud to report that 100% of females earned a bonus during the year, slightly ahead of males at 99.7

As mentioned earlier, there is a male bias towards the Retail Sales Team, with these positions offering the opportunity to earn large performance related remuneration, though alongside lower basic salaries. As such, the mean or average bonus paid, which includes sales commissions, was 31% lower for females compared to 35.4% last year, with the median 41% lower, compared to 52.4% lower in 2023. It is also important to note that this is purely reflective of the higher proportion of males in the Retail Sales Team, partly due to weekend working hours. Potential commission and bonus earnings are always based on job roles, with equal earnings potential for males and females alike.

Moving forward

We continue to review our recruitment practices and training, and this has resulted in attracting and retaining more females within our business, as we look to offer more flexible working conditions. We also continue to offer both guidance and support to females wishing to progress their career.

Our policy of ‘Retention over Recruitment’ combined with our our ethos of ‘Growing Our Own’, is a commitment to all of our employees, regardless of gender, that they will have the opportunity to be ‘the best they can be’ and reach their full potential.

This will ensure we can continue to offer the highest levels of remuneration at every level in the business and in doing so continue to attract the best talent in the industry.

Nick Hipkiss

Commercial Director
On Behalf of Furniture Village