Newsletter
Shop
Login
Menü
Subscribe now
- Retailers and suppliers: exclusive insights
- Market analyses and country reports
- Trends in the DIY and garden market
- Latest news and archive
Sometimes it’s what you don’t see that counts. In this article about the Belgian DIY store operator Brico, for example, there is no photo of the Brico boss. Patrick Vandenbogaerde politely but firmly declined.
This is important because it sheds a very telling light on him and how he runs this company. Vandenbogaerde is not shy, but says: „I wasn’t always CEO here, and I won’t always be. It’s not me who has made this company great, but all the people who work here.“ He says that he always sees the positive side of every person. „I block out the negative.“
With this basic attitude in mind, he spends a lot of time talking to people on the sales area, goes to a store once a week with a colleague from the management team and deals with the specific concerns that are brought to him there. And if the store manager does not get back to him after an agreed deadline to report whether the problem has been solved, Vandenbogaerde calls him. Which, if the worst comes to the worst, could put the store manager in need of an explanation.
Check for the environment
In Belgium, employers can issue state-subsidized Écochèques, which can be spent on the purchase of products with an energy-efficient or environmentally friendly effect. This can also apply to entire product groups, such as insulation materials. Every year, the government issues checks worth EUR 280 mio. Of this, EUR 60 mio go to DIY retailers – half of it to Brico.
What sounds a bit like a family business may not quite make clear the dimensions involved here. Brico is the DIY market leader in Belgium and has a market share of 48 per cent with a turnover of EUR 842.4 mio (2023) and 150 locations. The parent company is the Dutch Maxeda DIY Group, which reports turnover of EUR 1.452 bn in 2023/2024.
However, Patrick Vandenbogaerde says the confusing sentence: „Brico doesn’t exist.“ What he means is that Brico has developed five formats in five sizes, partly different product ranges and different price levels. Only the largest and smallest of these also have their own brand name: Brico Planit is the large-scale project DIY store with drive-in and a share of professional customers of up to 60 percent and sales areas of up to 18,000 m². The sales division currently has 14 locations, including all six stores that the French chain Leroy Merlin sold when it left Belgium in 2003.
The smallest Brico concept, Brico City, is the local convenience store concept for city center locations with sales areas…
Newsletter