Home improvement retailer B&Q has reported a decline in third quarter sales as overall UK and Ireland revenues rose.
According to the latest Kingfisher, parent company of B&Q, trading update for the three months ended 31 October 2024, total group sales fell 0.6% to £3.2bn.
UK & Ireland sales increased 1.2% to £1.6bn, although B&Q revenues fell 1.1% to £936m.
“Despite the weaker market in October, overall sales in Q3 improved across all categories compared to Q2, with positive LFL sales in core and seasonal categories including tools & hardware, building & joinery and outdoor,” the group said on B&Q.
“As expected, performance in ‘big-ticket’ categories remained soft. B&Q’s total e-commerce sales increased by 14.3% YoY, with overall e-commerce sales penetration increasing to 14.6% (Q3 23/24: 12.9%).
“The business is making good progress onboarding international sellers to its marketplace, and scaling its retail media proposition.”
The group said that Big-ticket overall, which represents 16% of sales, were down on LFL -4.0% with improved trends at B&Q, Brico Dépôt France and Castorama Poland, supported by new ranges.
Full year profit guidance range has “tightened”, with the group expecting adjusted PBT of c.£510m to £540m (previously c.£510m to £550m).
Thierry Garnier, Chief Executive Officer, said: “Overall trading in the third quarter was resilient. Improved performance in August and September was offset by the impact of increased consumer uncertainty in the UK and France in October, related to government budgets in both countries. All our banners in the UK, France and Poland performed in line or ahead of their respective markets, with particularly strong market share gains at Screwfix. We continued to see improved volume trends in our core categories, supported by repairs, maintenance and existing home renovation. As expected, sales of our ‘big-ticket’ categories remained soft, although we are seeing early signs of improvement.
“We continue to deliver rapid progress against our strategic and operational objectives. E-commerce sales penetration increased by 1.3%pts to 18.8% in Q3, supported by the continued strong growth of our marketplaces. In Q3 our trade sales penetration reached 16.5% across the Group excluding Screwfix, up nearly 3%pts from the start of the year, as we continued to develop our trade proposition, including the launch of TradePoint’s first mobile app last month. We are also making strong progress with our plan to restructure and modernise Castorama France’s lowest performing stores, having selected partners for our first two franchised stores.
“Looking towards next year, recent political and macroeconomic developments have layered incremental uncertainty onto the near-term outlook in our markets. And so we continue to focus our energy on what we can control – delivering further market share gains through our key strategic priorities, and managing our retail prices, costs and cash effectively. As a Group, we are strongly positioned to benefit from the inflection to come within home improvement.”
