RIP Wickes

[EricP]

Focus sold to US hedge fund Cerberus for £1.00

I wonder if Wickes will survive yet again?

[Adrian C]

Wickes was sold off by Focus in 2005 to Travis Perkins

-- Adrian C

[EricP]

Thanks for that. :))

That has made me very happy. I like my local Wickes.

Sorry to have made a bad post though.

[Andy Hall]

Wickes is now owned by Travis Perkins, although it's demise would be no great loss.

As to Focus, it's no great surprise that it's a failing business. The stores are full of little bits of this and that and very little worthwhile. Adding pets and crafts sections was a big mistake because the stores now fall short on both these and DIY goods. Once one includes the surly staff with bad attitude and the double glazing franchises accosting people on the way in, I think that their fate is probably sealed.

The three largest and most successful DIY stores worldwide are Home Depot, Lowes and Kingfisher (B&Q, Castorama, etc.) The latter two have copied the first... Overall the formula is pretty simple. Large place where you can buy everything or almost everything that you need to complete a DIY project.

Focus lacks what their name suggests.

Perhaps there is at least scope for a good old fashioned asset strip.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Didn't know that. Wonder who owns them? (can't access wikipedia at the moment)

[:Jerry:]

Indeed, skip the stock, auction off the transport fleet and sit on the property / land. The only thing is, will that give Cerberus a return on their £225m 'investment'?...

[The Natural Philosopher]

Probably..

[Andy Cap]

The only mystery is how they survived so long. You often had our local Focus to yourself !

Andy

[Andy Hall]

It might and would depend on whether they have the freehold on any/ enough the store sites.

Nowadays, people are pretty aware of asset stripping in this context. Less so in the era of the acquisition of Gamages department store, which also had an unlikely purchaser. Nobody could figure out the connection until they closed the operation down.

I am quite sure that Cerfberus wouldn't have purchased Focus without seeing a good route for return on investment, although it's clear that major surgery will be needed to make it a going concern.

Not impossible - consider what Stuart Rose has achieved at Marks and Spencer - 82% rise in share price over the past couple of years is not at all bad.

However, Focus does not have anything like the brand value so whoever takes that on is going to struggle.

There probably is space in the market for three major chains of DIY retailers. The other two have carved out their approaches. Focus would need to do something radically different to them, and certainly something radically different to what they are doing today.

[JoeJoe]

• taking on debt of £255m...

[Huge]

My local Focus makes more money renting parking spaces (it's next to the main railway station) than it does from DIY. I've been expecting it to be demolished and replaced with a multi-storey car park for years.

[Huge]

Their shareholders. It's FTSE 100 listed.

[tony sayer]

In article , :Jerry: writes

Yep the local Focus in Cambridge is a bit of a morgue which is a shame really as its the only one over this side of town.. Still the land on which they are will be worth silly money, right next to the railway station!....

[Dave Plowman (News)]

I don't agree. In many places it's the only competition to the B&Q/Homebase duopoly (sp?). Round my way those two compete on prices only where they are close together. Which with Homebase means different prices for the same article at different stores. For basic stuff Wicks is often the cheapest.

[tim.....]

What's wrong with Wicks?

ISTM that you get trade stuff without the (snotty) 'you're not in the trade' attitude of the other places.

tim

[tim.....]

Surely the 'Houndsditch' died economically as soon as it wasn't the only game in town on a Sunday.

tim

[Stephen Howard]

...and that often includes the 'staff'.

Regards,

[Tony Bryer]

OT but can you expand? I presume you mean that the buyer bought it for the site and promptly closed the business down. I guess the same also happened to Houndsditch Warehouse, the other destination of the annual London Christmas shopping trips of my childhood.

[Tony Bryer]

You're assuming that they own the site and building, which is unlikely. If the value of the sites was more than the going concern value I would have expected the current owner to have closed down loss-making stores and sold off the site themselves rather than selling the whole lot on.

[:Jerry:]

But they would need be able to clear all their debts by doing so and within a set period of time that is outside their control, the new owners (having cleared the debts) can now do what they like in what ever time scale they like.