DIY stores always on form

Information from Unibal, the French manufacturers' association, shows that the French DIY market (including the DIY stores' garden segment) experienced growth of 5.2 per cent over the previous year for a total of € 20.14 bn, in spite of a difficult start to the year 2006. Pascal Malfoy, president of the French DIY retail association FMB (Fédération des Magasins de Bricolage), draws attention to the fact that "the DIY market is basically developing by means of expanding the retail space". In 2006 the DIY retailers expanded their combined sales area over the previous year's figure by 218 000 m², or 4 per cent, to 6.650 mio m², and the number of DIY stores rose by 55 to 2 467.
DIY stores claim 70 per cent market share
There is no doubt that the big winners in 2006 were the DIY stores. They increased their share of the market's total turnover by 7.9 per cent to 68.6 per cent (€ 13.81 bn). They also improved their sales/m2 by 3.7 per cent to € 2 665. "The sales increase recorded by the DIY stores is exactly twice the size of the growth of retail area at 3.8 per cent. But beware: if new outlets continue to open it could lead to the cannibalisation of the existing stores and sales/m2 for some units will go drastically down instead of up," warns Rémy Dassant, who is in charge of market surveys at Unibal. "Though you mustn't forget that DIYers shop at three outlets on average. And any stores that no longer live up to their expectations run the risk of being left behind in favour of new concepts like the "magasins passion" for all who are looking for ideas, advice and design, and "dépôt" stores for the price-conscious."Consumers do their shopping for DIY products within a radius of 40 km on average. The appeal of DIY stores over 6 000 m2 in size and depot outlets is obvious: customers are prepared to make  a 30-minute trip by car to the first outlet, and to drive as much as 45 minutes to the second one. By contrast, it is possible to reach a store below 3 000 m² in size in no more than 15 to 20 minutes. This means that, because these are positioned as neighbourhood suppliers and because of the network density (there are 1 607 DIY stores below 2 500 m² in size), long trips to find one are not in fact necessary.New depot stores have opened since the last report. At the end of 2006 there were 80 Brico Dépôt outlets (Kingfisher) as well as 21 Bricoman stores (Adeo), 11 Batkors (Bricorama), 13 Entrepôt du Bricolage (Samse) and two Brico Entrepôts (Bricomarché). Brico…