“Bogof” – or buy one get one free, is back in the DIY vocabulary. The impact of the recession on retail sales has left stores with no other option than to bring back the old favourites. In fact there are a few new ones as well. Focus has come up with the toe-curling strap line of ‘deals to DIY for’ and, as if that wasn’t enough, they’re cutting items like garden furniture by 50%.
Of course it’s always hard, when you see 50% cuts, to stop yourself wondering just how much profit they were making in the first place! However much it was, those days are gone now. It’s always been true that DIY enthusiasts have got stuck in over Bank Holiday weekends and reports indicate that the Easter break was no exception. The industry certainly needed it and had prepared with many similar offers to the ones just outlined. The news on the street is that it has paid off.
Homeowners who were feeling the credit crunch popped down to their local DIY store and got shopping, enticed by all these deals no doubt. Reports indicate that like for like sales went up as compared with Easter weekend last year and a cautious optimism is creeping back into the market. For a long time pundits have said that the recession will mean that people improve rather than move. In fact a lot of very annoyed builders are wishing they hadn’t believed the puff. A lot of people are neither moving nor improving. They’re sitting tight, holding on to any money they have, and hoping to keep their jobs for another week.
Nonetheless at the edges of the market there do appear to be some signs of life. In the admittedly fairly posh area around Wallington in Buckinghamshire, Woodcote Green Garden Centre and Nurseries had a fantastic few days, with sales up across the board. General manager Phil Barnden said: “The weekend was very good for us. Saturday was a bit disappointing because of the weather but Monday was great – really busy. No one sector has really outperformed the others – everything has been selling well.”
He added: “April has been very strong. We’re currently running about 80% up on last year. It’s not surprising, as we didn’t have great weather in March and April last year, but still good news.”
Now there are several things to consider here. The first is that Buckinghamshire is not Birmingham. You could assume that people living here are more likely to spend than others. The other thing is that it was glorious weather. When it comes to DIY – and especially when it comes to outdoor DIY jobs – the weather is everything.
Abbott’s DIY, from Devon, sounded a note of caution when they said that, although Easter had gone better than expected, customers didn’t seem to be carrying out big decorating projects. Most of their sales were of fertilizer, weed killer and other garden essentials. For the canny DIY enthusiast it’s a good time to watch and learn from the market, therefore. If you want paint, make sure you look at who’s slashed their prices (B&Q at the time of writing). After years of having to pay whatever the big companies dreamt up, the shoe is now on the other foot.