DIY store density with north-south divide

The Covid-19 pandemic has also had an effect on the dynamics of new openings of DIY stores in Italy. Because, of course, no new projects were continued during this time.However, the structure of the Italian market was not fundamentally altered by the impact of the pandemic. Therefore, for this "regional report Italy", it is worth putting the Covid-19 aspect to one side for a moment and analysing the current figures. The number of locations of the individual DIY store groups originate from the Monitoraggio GDS Giugno 2020 and have been provided by our Italian colleague Giulia Arrigoni, who continually reports on the market on her online platform "10 minutes DIY and garden"; the remaining figures have been researched and compiled by the statistics department of the Dähne Verlag publishing house and the editorial team of DIY International using the specified sources.The significant north-south divide in the country in terms of the economic strengths of the regions is often mentioned. The spread of GDP per capita is striking: in Calabria, at the "toe" of the Italian boot, the EUR 17 300 figure doesn't even reach half of the EUR 43 100 in the Trentino region; and that is an average of the two provinces. The richer of the two, the autonomous Bolzano province (which is the west of former South Tyrol), reaches EUR 47 700 per head - a full EUR 18 000 more than the national average of EUR 29 700 GDP per capita.However, the distribution of DIY stores here, which we are particularly interested in here, does not consistently follow the pattern of the north-south divide; because the highest DIY store density - i.e. the lowest value in the ratio of inhabitants per DIY store location - prevails in the middle of the country with an average of almost 64 500 inhabitants per store. In contrast, there are 71 400 in the wealthy north; so statistically speaking, there's room for a few more DIY stores.
Yet when we look at the figures in the column containing inhabitants per m² sales area, the picture of the north-south divide is more or less confirmed. The previously mentioned region Trentino shows one of the lowest values with an average of 19.8 inhabitants per m² - thus, the best coverage of DIY store retail space in the whole country. Even more retail space for every customer (which this value means in reverse) is only available in Piedmont and in Friuli-Venezia Giulia. By the way, the fourth place is already held by Lombardy with a value of 23.2. This region, with its capital…