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Michael McLarney, President & Editor mike@hardlines.ca Beverly Allen, Publisher bev@hardlines.ca John Caulfield, Contributing Editor Phone: 416-489-3396 |
| November 3, 2008, Vol. xiv, #41 | |
| In This Issue | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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“ Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time. ” —E.B. White (American writer and essayist, 1899-1985) |
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| Industry heavyweights weigh in at Hardlines Conference | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
TORONTO — The strength of the independent emerged as one of the themes of the latest Hardlines Conference, held here Oct. 23-24. While their ability to tailor their businesses to a unique local market gives them a competitive edge, their viability long term resides in their collective strength.
Yves Gagnon, president and CEO of BMR le groupe, which serves some 180 independently owned points of sale in Eastern Canada, mapped out how BMR has evolved to serve its members, and rely on their loyalty in return, to make BMR a strong group. BMR has, through the years, added logistic services to make the group as self-reliant as possible. It now has full distribution facilities, with two warehouses for building materials — in Longueuil and Quebec City, and a hardware DC in Longueuil.
Greg Dinsdale’s company, LBMX, helps buying groups communicate better with their vendors and members electronically. He offered up examples of how the independent, with a passion and spirit that will go unmatched by the “corporates”, nevertheless needs not leave the sophistication of systems to those large companies. Many buying groups in other sectors around the world, he pointed out, provide billing and real-time rebates to their members in a fashion that still eludes this industry. Ace Hardware is now shipping Canadian dealers — along with other Ace dealers in countries around the world, from a distribution
centre in Shanghai. Murray Armstrong, president of Ace International, explained that even independents can order small container loads online from this facility. Vendors, as well, are taking advantage of the new DC: many of them, with production of their own in China, are able to fill it directly from their own factories, saving them having to ship it all the way to Ace in the U.S., only to have to ship it back to other countries.
The 13th Annual Hardlines Conference drew some 150 industry leaders from the US, Canada, Germany and Australia to hear a range of industry leaders and economic experts outline the trends and challenges facing home improvement retailing.
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| TruServ trims staff following ERP installation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| WINNIPEG — A number of layoffs at TruServ Canada, the retail hardlines distributor, have sparked concerns about the company’s fortunes among the vendor community. However, says CEO Bill Morrison, the cuts “will largely affect our administration.” He also notes that about 80% of the people affected accepted voluntary buyouts.“We completed our planning for 2009 last week,” he says. “Although we feel good in most cases, we have some concerns in some areas. So we’re taking a hard look at our systems.” The major change to systems actually dates back to January 2007, when a new ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system was initiated. Morrison “it took a little bit longer to get the efficiencies out of these new technologies. Things are going well now.” As a result the 16 people — about 4%-5% of TruServ’s workforce, were all from the administration and logistics side of the business. “These positions have been largely automated.” “We’re being proactive, not reactive, in assessing our business going into 2009. But it’s business as usual.” | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reno market will weather the economic storm, as starts fall | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
TORONTO — Don’t expect renovation spending to be hit too hard by the current downturn in Canada’s economy, says a leading analyst for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. Ted Tsiakopoulos, the top Ontario economist for CMHC, told an audience of vendors and retailers from the home improvement industry that economic growth will continue to drop in 2009, but expects consumer confidence to begin rebounding in the U.S. in the latter half of next year, which will be good news for the Canadian economy. Speaking at the 13th Annual Hardlines Conference, Tsiakopoulos said that falling housing starts are an important indicator, but pointed out that reno spending is not likely to be impacted as severely by the current downturn. “There’s a three-year lag in renovations following new-home purchases and the buoyant sales in recent years will continue to drive reno spending for three more years.” He added that, following the frenzy of home buying in Canada, “people are not as passionate about buying that new home. They want to stay put and invest in the one they’ve got.”
And despite the falling dollar, job growth will stay strong in the West. “The new Alberta is, of course, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. These are the regions,” he said, “that will continue to grow. In Atlantic Canada, Newfoundland’s economy will also stay hot, fueled by natural resource production.
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| AFA purchases Breton Distributors | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HALIFAX — AFA Forest Products has made another move to consolidate the forest products industry in Atlantic Canada with the acquisition of Breton Distributors Ltd. This move, along with AFA’s acquisition of Lighthouse Lumber Wholesalers in early 2007, with branches in Moncton, Halifax, and St. John’s, gives AFA a dominant presence in the Atlantic market. The latest acquisition will significantly enhance its ability to serve the Cape Breton and Western Newfoundland regions.As part of the purchase, Jim Stewart has been appointed manager of the Breton branch. A 20-year veteran of the industry, most recently as Cape Breton Branch manager for Acadia Drywall, he reports to AFA’s general manager for the Atlantic Region, John Morrissey. AFA, based in Bolton, Ont., has been in business since 1974 and is a Canadian-owned independent distributor of commodities and allied products to building supply dealers. It has 14 branches across Canada and in the U.S. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Who are Canada’s top home improvement retailers and buying groups? Find them all in our latest Hardlines Quarterly Report Click here for more info. — Beverly |
| COMPANIES IN THE NEWS |
| BARRIE, Ont. - Lowe's Canada will host a job fair today through Saturday to recruit staff for its new store here, which is scheduled to open sometime before the end of this year or early next year. A week later, it will have a job fair for its store slated to open in Whitby, Ont. Two more openings are scheduled for Lowe’s 2008 fiscal year, in Belleville and Windsor, Ont. Lowe’s already has seven stores in Canada, all of them in Southern Ontario.TORONTO — Canadian Tire is considering the addition of foods to the shelves of two of its stores in Ontario, beginning next month. The move marks another counter-offensive by Canada’s largest hard goods retailer as Wal-Mart continues to expand its home enhancement departments. Another Canadian retailer, Loblaw, has, in recent years, been expanding in the other direction — adding general merchandise and apparel to its core grocery business. BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Brighter, easier-to-navigate stores, a new retail concept geared for Hispanics, and greater emphasis on growth in Third-World markets are among the strategies being deployed by Wal-Mart to become even more successful during the economic crunch facing its customers. The company has implemented cost cutting, which includes a cutback on new-store openings in favour of refurbishing existing stores and focusing on new-store expansion in emerging markets. The company expects growth of 8% this year, and 5%-7% next year. TALYOR, Mich. — Masco Corp., one of the largest suppliers of home-related products and services in North America, saw profits plummet by nearly 84%, to $33 million, in the quarter ended Sept. 30. During that period, the company’s revenue fell 15.9% to $2.528 billion. Through the first nine months of its fiscal year, Masco’s sales were off 14.1% to $7.621 billion, and its profit dropped 78.2% to $117 million. MISSISSAUGA , Ont. — The Bargain! Shop is opening 65 stores across Canada between now and Christmas. This will bring the number of these “extreme-value” stores, operated by the former Woolworth’s division, to just over 250. “In spite of the difficult economy, or perhaps because of it, this is the best of times for extreme-value retailers like TB!S, said Michael Roellinghoff, president and CEO, in a prepared release. The Bargain! Shop recently completed the acquisition of a number of former SAAN leases, as well as buying their intellectual property, including the SAAN name, but they will operate all of the stores under the “The Bargain! Shop” banner. A typical 11,000-sq.ft. store carries a selection of products for the home (including electronics, housewares and home textiles), as well as mens’, ladies’ and kids apparel. CHICAGO — W.W. Grainger, the industrial distributor, has established a global supply chain function under newly appointed senior vice-president D.G. Macpherson. This new function will provide global planning, coordination and specialized expertise to the supply chain organizations in all of Grainger's business units. The initial focus will be on global supply chain architecture, procurement and supply chain talent management. Joseph J. Stachowicz, president of Grainger Global Sourcing, reports to Macpherson in his new role. MINNEAPOLIS – Zareba Systems has sold substantially all of the assets of its professional series automatic gate operator product line to Amazing Gates of America, LLC for $739,000, plus the assumption of certain outstanding inventory purchase obligations. The purchase price was payable in cash of $200,000 at the closing, with the balance to be paid through a series of payments through December 2010. Zareba will now focus exclusively on sales and support of its Zareba Systems do-it-yourself brand of automatic gate openers through existing retail channels. Zareba is a manufacturer of electronic perimeter fence systems for animal and access control. |
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ECONOMIC INDICATORS |
| New-home sales in the U.S. rose in September by 2.7% over August, to an annualized rate of 464,000 units. That unit count was 33.1% below the sales figure for September 2007. And there’s still 10.4 months worth of unsold new homes on the market, at the current sales rate. Prices continue to soften and the median sales price for new homes fell by 0.9%, to $218,400, in September, representing a four-year low. |
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Resumés |
| Sales professional - established relationships with key clients in the hardware, building materials, and paint industries, team player, superior business development skills, competitive, enjoys challenges. |
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Hardlines Products |
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