B&Q reports 2.4% rise in Q3 LFL sales

Kingfisher PLC has reported on third quarter trading for the thirteen weeks ended 31 October 2015.

A summary of key points can be found below and the full publication is available on our Industry Articles pages.

UK & IRELAND

- Total sales up 5.5% (+4.6% LFL) reflecting a stronger economy

- B&Q UK & Ireland’s sales up 1.2% (+2.4% LFL). Sales of outdoor seasonal and building products up 6.3%. Sales of indoor products, excluding showroom up 1.8%. Sales of showroom products up 0.4%

- Screwfix sales up 23.4% (+13.3% LFL) driven by its leading omnichannel trade sales capability, new and extended trade ranges and 13 new outlets

- UK gross margins down 120 basis points reflecting mix effects from strong growth in Screwfix and higher sales of seasonal categories in B&Q. This was however offset by on-going cost initiatives at B&Q and the strong overall performance at Screwfix

Véronique Laury, Chief Executive Officer, said: “Q3 trading conditions have followed a similar trend to the first half of the year, reflecting the more encouraging macroeconomic backdrop in the UK offset by a softer market in France. “In the meantime, we continue to make good progress with our ‘ONE’ Kingfisher plan. The unified IT system, a key enabler of this journey, continues to progress well. In addition we have secured a further five agreements on the B&Q stores already planned for closure, taking the total to 31. I am very encouraged by development work on the first wave of the unified ‘core essential’ ranges, which will land in stores from next year. We now look forward to updating you on the detail of our long term strategy in early 2016.”

Connor Campbell, senior market analyst at www.spreadex.com told Insight DIY:

"It was a tale of two cities (well, sort of) for B&Q owner Kingfisher; a stellar performance in the UK was countered by a soft showing in France (the site of the company’s failed Mr Bricolage bid earlier in the year) and currency hits in Poland and Russia, leaving a worse than expected 6.6% fall in Q3 profit to £223 million and a 2.5% fall in total sales to £2.5 billion." 

Source : Kingfisher
www.kingfisher.com