The Homebase store at St Albans will close for a re-fit later this month and re-open with an expanded gardening department in February as the UK’s first Bunnings Warehouse.

Bunnings UK & Ireland (BUKI), part of the Australian Wesfarmers Group, which bought Homebase from Home Retail Group earlier this year, says the St Albans pilot scheme will be the first of up to 10 stores to be re-branded during 2017. The re-fit will involve removing the mezzanine floor and expanding the covered plant sales area.

The store format, with a greater emphasis on DIY, timber and home maintenance, will be refined in line with customer feedback, before being rolled out to the remaining outlets, currently numbering 265. The Homebase name will then be dropped altogether.

BUKI’s MD, PJ Davis, told a meeting of the British Home Enhancement Trade Association (BHETA) on Thursday that gardening was one of the key strengths of the Homebase brand and “we don’t want to lose that”.



Davis revealed that some of the largest Homebase stores could be closed, to be replaced by smaller new ones, and the business would probably require more outlets overall, which could be new-builds or conversions. The group has £500m to spend overall on the UK & Ireland project.

Unlike the brand’s Australian website, which is purely about pre-shop information and know-how (with 760 ‘how to’ videos) the Bunnings UK online version will also be fully transactional.

Davis said his buyers would be encouraged to “work out how to sell more” and not to develop innovation, which the group was “hopeless” at. The UK’s ageing housing stock was one of the attractions of the UK market for Bunnings.

He implied that training to improve staff confidence would become a priority for the business, with 300 already engaged in leadership training programmes and 120 having already visited the parent group’s operation in Australia.