Weaker growth

The 30 major garden centre operators (excluding Sagaflor and Egesa, since no complete figures are available for either company's retail area) had a combined total of 2 277 stores in July 2006. One year previously there were 2 271 garden centres, or six fewer.
These are the first figures on new openings by garden centres and DIY retailers, cooperative and franchise organisations to be evaluated by Dähne publishers for the period from the end of July 2005 until July 2006. Both national and international garden centres have been included in the survey.
The Top 30 companies have succeeded in gaining an extra 130 152 m² of retail space altogether since last year, which is calculated from growth of 196 752 m² minus a reduction of 66 600 m². This reveals that the growth of floorspace during the period under consideration was around only half the increase experienced in 2004/ 2005. Only the future will tell whether this is a consequence of what happened in the garden economy during 2005/2006, or just a short breather interrupting the growth trend. The fact is that this figure last year showed an increase of 165 per cent over the result from the previous year, 2003/2004.
The Top 10 of the 30 largest operators accounted for 81 per cent of the 2 277 stores and 79 per cent of the retail space of 4.6 mio m². If you compare the overall retail areas with the previous year's figures, Baywa was able to achieve the greatest percentage space growth among the Top 10. Obi, Dehner and Bauhaus also recorded gains of at least five per cent. Dehner takes second place in terms of overall retail area with 99 garden centres. Market leader Obi achieves almost double the amount of retail area, with 473 DIY stores with a garden centre.
Consequently Obi remains number one among the German garden centre groups with a combined retail area of 933 000 m². Dehner follows at a great distance (514 000 m²), having supplanted Zeus in second place.
Baywa, still down in eleventh place at the end of July 2005, has pushed past Blumen Risse and Globus into the Top 10 and is now number nine. However, the increase of retail area here is down to a revaluation of the company's outlets. According to the latest data collected, Baywa has 83 wholly-owned stores with garden centres boasting a retail area in excess of 400 m². It has also been established that there are 18 franchise stores with garden centres in excess of 400 m² as well. In addition the company has more than 31 stores with garden centres in…