Communication is everything

Brico Day, which is organised annually by Brico Magazine, a trade publication, has developed into the most important event for the industry in Italy. Especially two trends in the Italian marketplace became evident at last September’s Brico Day: the strengthening of the cooperative organisations, which are currently experiencing the strongest growth, and the opening by the major chains of smaller-format stores less than 2 500 m² in size on inner-city locations. These neighbourhood stores (“di prossimità”) presented the best growth figures in the industry, with an increase of 17 per cent in the first six months of last year. All the speakers observed that consumers are in general paying more attention to the modern forms of DIY retailing, to the detriment of the traditional specialist hardware dealers. Though, admittedly, the successful sales outlets are those which, independent of the brand image, manage to offer a satisfactory range of products and services. A survey among the DIY retailers revealed that communication via the internet is playing an increasingly significant role – at any rate, 58 per cent of those questioned said so. But communication through traditional channels, TV (42 per cent), radio (25 per cent) and special interest magazines (22 per cent), will also grow in significance according to the survey. Communication was also the theme taken up by Jehan De Ponfilly, marketing director of Leroy Merlin Italia. Last year the French retailer turned for the first time to the “old” medium of television, promoting the company and its products in TV commercials under the claim “In caso di casa” (roughly “When it is a matter of the home”). Paolo Alemagna, a member of the board of Obi AG and interim head of Obi Italy, pointed out the importance of the big trends: digitalisation, homing, ecology, wellness, community and demography. At the same time it is increasingly true that “the customer is king” – and that this is a customer who gathers information, changes his tastes and opinions rapidly, develops requirements that are more and more heterogeneous – and for whom the shopping experience is fundamental. Among other things, Obi is reacting to this with increased investment in the Obi brand and with a “store format ready for the future”. According to figures from Ivano Garavaglia of the market research company GfK, in the first six months of 2011 the DIY stores in Italy reported sales in excess of € 1.5 bn, 3.2 per cent more than the same period…