If you have been passed the Penge West Homebase you can't fail to see the 'CLOSING DOWN - ALL STOCK MUST GO - BUT ONLY THIS LOCATION' posters. - and a crowded car park!
I knew that Hombase had been sold by the owners of Argos to an Australian company and they were going to rebrand as Bunnings. Indeed I've seen some Homebases transformed into Bunnings. But clearly there were going to be rationalisations and it looked like Penge had taken the bullet.
So when getting some half price stuff last night I sympathised with the staff losing their jobs. Oh no - they said. We will be re-opening as Bunnings in February.
We shall see. Meantime you may want to get in quick as SE26 & SE20's finest vultures are already hard at work
I think you will find this is just a re-branding - Wesfarmers bought Homebase from Home Retail last year , its obviously taken a while to work the new name through the branches, although it might be interesting to see if the BBQ range improves.
They are closing on the 5th Jan. Staff are having 1 months training at other Bunnings branches and will work at other stores until it re opens in April as Bunnings.
No staff are expected to lose their jobs as a result of the changes
That is great to hear staff not losing jobs .
I don't know if it's just a coincidence but we went in to see if there was a standard lamp going cheap and I noticed they had a wide range of wall fixings . I don't usually use that place for any DIY stuff but last time I ventured in , one evening after proper DIY shops had closed , they had only low quality own-brand fixings - no Rawlplug , Plasplug, hollow wall anchors etc . I must say their nuts and bolts section looked better , though would always go to Sydenham DIY ( or Penge DIY if it's a Sunday morning as they open ) .
I'd heard it was going to become a supermarket: obviously mistaken information. But I've never heard of Bunnings, and nor, I suspect, has your average Brit.
Well, adverts at local bus stops indicate that Bunnings will be opening soon - in fact, one I've seen says it's already open, but that's not borne out by the ad in the News Shopper this week. Just in time for the Easter DIY rush, I'd guess.
Went to Bunnings (Penge Homebase) on Saturday morning. Really please - they seem to have utilised more of the outdoor space than HB did, the garden area was full of really decent quality and affordable plants - the HB ones always looked like they were on their last legs. Friendly chirpy staff. Plus, they were selling sausage sizzles outside (any aussies will know what these are - just a sausage in a piece of plain white bread!) Perfect!
It opened last Wed or Thur, even though the signs outside said "will open soon"! I went on Thur afternoon.
There is no upstairs now, so now beds, sofas etc. Lots of interesting things, and of course lots of things for outdoors and barbies, as it is an Aussie firm. The outdoor area is large. And I was amazed at a big section of knobs and handles etc!
A Bunning's flyer (the newspaper magazine sort) was delivered to houses here this week and it does look like B&Q type of goods. Lots on gardening as you'd expect at this time of the year, and paint, although I imagine there'll be paint bargains aplenty with bank hols upcoming on the calendar.
Well, went up to Bunnings today - with what seemed like half of Penge! - looked good, with comprehensive stock going up towards the ceiling (higher shelves accessible by Bunnings employees only), so will see what happens when I actually go in there looking for something specific.
I went into Bunnings this morning and I had a plan b as I thought I might be able to get what I went in there for. I think it is a real improvement on the old Homebase. The staff were really helpful (and it felt genuine) and the range is great. A lot of it is towards the value end but they also stock Craig and Rose paint which is my favourite brand and quite hard to find.I came out with all sorts of things I didn't go in there for so it gets my vote.
I worked on Focus DIY years ago on their packaging and branding, but they struggled to sell the old stock from the stores they took over (Great Mills, Do It All, Focus branded stuff was still in stores years later, then they changed their branding twice more, once through another agency then through use, and those legacy designs stayed in store too). It is incredibly difficult to integrate stores, more so for DIY than food as the stock sells so much more slowly. Bunnings didn't stay the course or give it much time, the whole thing sounded like a mess, poorly thought through.
I was at a conference yesterday at Googles HQ about the future of brands, retail, ethics etc. Huge changes are coming and high streets and retailers are going to have to cope with it. Some good, some not so good. Niche, specialised, personalised, different, gap fillers will do well. Mid-market, please everything, 'meh' brands will fail, which we are already seeing. The low end and high end of the markets will thrive. Technology and experience is key to success. Just selling 'stuff' isn't enough any more.
So this must be a world record - Bunnings opened on March 7th and is set, according to a staff member, to close for good on June 14th. Bargains galore for sure but very sad for the workforce, the site and the moral of that end of Penge High Street.
Having sold the whole chain for a pound, the buyer might be able to revert to the Homebase brand, and salvage it. This seems a good site and hopefully it will carry on somehow. Homebase didn't have an image problem, it was rebranded as a vanity exercise by an ill-informed buyer who wanted to make a splash.
This is a huge shame: I actually really like the new Bunnings, and the amount and variety of stock they hold, compared with Homebase. I hope the store somehow manages to keep going.
