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In This Issue:

From the Secretary
General
FROM THE IHA SECRETARY GENERAL
IHA to Meet at the Cologne International Hardware
Fair
Dear Industry Colleagues:

News from the U.K.
The Cologne Hardware Fair, to be held March 9-12, 2014,
will again be the place where representatives of various IHA
member associations meet to hold their annual Council

News from Sweden
meeting and host several networking events in cooperation
with other organizations from around the world.
News from the U.S.

During their annual Council meeting, members of the
Council will review IHA’s current financial health, share
association best practices and plan for their 2015 meeting

Industry News
Upcoming Events
International Hardware Fair
9-12, March, 2014
Koelnmesse, Cologne
www.eisenwarenmesse.com
Nordbygg 2014
1-4, April, 2014
Stockholm, Sweden
request more information
National Hardware Show
6-8, May, 2014
Las Vegas, USA
www.nationalhardwareshow.com
in Paris, during Batimat.
IHA has also joined with other associations to host two
networking events, designed to bring industry executives
together from around the world.
On Monday, March 10, from 6:00 – 7:30 p.m., an
International Networking Reception will be hosted
jointly by IHA, EDRA and NRHA. This event will allow
members of these associations to network and share what
they have seen at the show with each other. The event will
be held at Koelnmesse, North Foyer, Congress-Centre East,
4th Level.
On Tuesday, March 11, from 12:00 – 1:30 p.m., the
IHA, EDRA and NRHA will host a Networking
Luncheon. During this Luncheon, Mr. John Herbert,
Managing Director of EDRA, will give us his views on the
State of the Worldwide Home Improvement Market. This
event will also be held at the Congress-Centre. Room TBD.
IHA Members
If you are interested in attending either of these events,
Australia
please contact Bill Lee, IHA Secretary-General, at
Hardware Federation
blee@nrha.org.
of Australia
For more information about the Cologne International
Brian Lee, President
Hardware Fair, go to www.eisenwarenmesse.com.
contact by e-mail
Carly Faragher, Secretary
contact by e-mail
China
NEWS FROM THE U.K.
Submitted by the British Independent Retailers Association
China National Hardware
(bira)
Motts Family to Give Annual Retailer Address
Association
The Motts family from Thorns of Norwich is going to present
Zhang Dongli, President
the annual retailer address at bira’s High Street Conference.
Shi Senglan,
The conference is to be held at Four Pillars Hotel, Cotswold
Standing Vice President
Water Park, on May 15.
Jin Lixin, Secretary General
As the theme of the 2014 High Street Conference is ‘Rich
+86 10 84379122
Heritage, Bright Future’, the Motts and Thorns DIY are a
contact by e-mail
great choice. They are expected to give a fascinating insight
www.chinahardware.org.cn
into the history, present operation and future plans of this
Finland
successful, family-run retailer.
Finnish Hardware Association
The business was established in 1835 by a London
Kari Kulmala, Director
merchant named Robert Elliot Thorns who came to own
+358 9 4315 6480
many properties within Norwich and noticed there was an
contact by e-mail
opening in the market for an ironmonger. As his sons were
France
not interested in joining the business and chose to answer
Confédération Française de la
the call of God as missionaries in Africa instead, Robert was
Quincaillerie
joined by Charles Fisher Ishbill and Thomas Paston Sr. The
Jean-Francois Dubost, President
business has remained with the Paston family right up to
Marie-Christine Delarbre,
the present day and, in 1973, Thomas Paston Jr., was
Secretary General
joined by his son-in-law Peter Motts and in 1995 by Peter's
contact by email
daughter Miriam. In 2011 they were joined by Peter's
Nicolas Berthet, Treasurer
second daughter Emily, the current holder of the British
+33 1 04 78 77 06 55
Hardware Federation Young Retailer of the Year award. All
contact by e-mail
three members of the Motts family will be on stage to give
www.france-quincaillerie.com
the address.
Germany
Peter Motts, Thorns’ owner says, “We’re delighted to be
Zentralverband Hartwarenhandel
making the annual retailer address at this year’s High
e.V.
Street Conference. Thorns is a unique independent DIY
Thomas Dammann, Director
store on so many levels and to be given an opportunity to
Dr. Paul Kellerwessel, President
present our shop to other bira members is a huge honor
+49 211 470 50 11
and achievement for us; not only to be recognized by our
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customers but within the retail industry.”
www.zhh.de
For more details about other speakers, to keep up to date
Great Britain
and book your place at the event visit:
British Independent
www.thehighstreetconference.co.uk.
Martha Closes Award-Winning Cookshop
Retailers Association (bira)
Caroline Gordon,
bira National President
Alan K. Hawkins,
Chief Executive Officer
Richard Rowlatt, BHF Chairman
Sarah Wood, CHA Chairman
Chris Patterson, IHA Chairman
+44 121 446 6688
contact by e-mail
www.bira.co.uk
Italy
Assofermet
Dr. Maurisimo Ferrario, Managing
Director
+390 2 76008 807
contact by e-mail
www.assofermet.it
Japan
Multi-award-winning cookshop owner Martha Ferguson has
closed her store.
As the end of the rental period approached, Martha decided
to shut the doors of Papylon in Winchmore Hill, North
London, to pursue a career as a buyer.
Martha, who opened the shop three years ago when she
was 26, told Cookshop magazine: “I do believe it is a
positive decision in terms of my own career and future. I
feel I still have a lot to learn and I miss buying and product
development terribly so I want to return to this role and
hopefully climb the career ladder a little higher. As of yet I
have not secured a job but I am in discussions with a
couple of companies. I am focusing on closing the shop for
the next two weeks and then will get my head down in
terms of job hunting at the beginning of February.”
During the three years in the industry, Martha has won a
string of awards, including CHA and bira Young Retailer of
the Year in 2013 and Housewares Magazine's Rising Star
Japan DIY Industry Association
2012.
Record Christmas for ProCook
Naoya Otsu, Secretary General
Cookware company, ProCook, has reported record sales
+81 3 3256 4475
over the Christmas period. Over the four weeks to January
contact by e-mail
5, ProCook saw a 22% lift in total sales and a 17% lift in
www.diy.or.jp
like-for-like sales.
Netherlands
Its shops and its website both performed well. Retail like-
Vertaz
for-like grew 6%, with only three of its 22 stores not
E. L. W. M. Zwager, President
achieving positive sales increase. These results come after
070 349 07 49
two store openings and four re-fits in 2013.
contact by e-mail
Web sales saw a 67% like-for-like increase during the
www.vertaz.nl
period. This was before the redesigned website went live.
Pakistan
Commenting on the results, managing director Daniel
Pakistan Hardware
O’Neill says, “We were a little nervous in the lead-up to
Merchants Association
Christmas, seeing low footfall in stores, but we were
Sh Ahmad Dawood, Chariman
confident that things would improve in the post-Christmas
Usman Ghani, Secretary General
+92 42 7631182
period.”
Forest Garden Buys M&M Timber
contact by e-mail
Forest Garden Group purchased M&M Timber. Both
Spain
businesses are based in Worcestershire.
FEDAFE
Guy Grainger, group chief executive of Forest Garden, says,
Enrique Gil, President
“The opportunities this brings, not just to M&M but to us
+34 952 22 88 44 Phone
collectively, are significant. All of our customer channels will
+34 952 22 88 92 Fax
feel the benefit of this acquisition, from a wider product and
contact by e-mail
service offer to new innovations from the timber technology
asociaconesenred.com/fedafe
now available to the group.”
Screwfix Expands Beyond the United Kingdom
Gremi de Comerciants de
Ferreteria de Catalunya
Hardware Guild of
Catalonia/Barcelona
President: Mr. Juan Alarcon
Assistant: Ms. Julia Gutierrez
contact by email
Sweden
Sveriges Bygg-och
Jarnhandlareforbund
Ulf S Gustavsson, Director
Goran Sundstrom, IHA Managing
Committee Member
+46 8 762 76 50
contact by e-mail
www.byggjarnhandlarna.se
Switzerland
Verband des Schweizerschen
Eisenwaren-und
Haushaltartikelhandles (VSE)
Screwfix is a Kingfisher division that originally generated all
its business in the United Kingdom, but which now is
capturing business from nearly two dozen European
countries.
The company, despite the limiting name, is far more than a
fastener outlet. It sells a wide range of tools and other
hardlines products, concentrating on industrial and
commercial accounts rather than concentrating on
consumers.
The company offers customers visiting its website a range
of 16,000 products and power and hand tools are
particularly popular. Orders are delivered within five to
seven days and free delivery is provided for orders over
£100. High volumes of orders are being received from
France, Spain and Ireland and from as far away as Finland
and Latvia.
Members with sizeable volume going to industrial and
commercial accounts will want to check out Screwfix's
website for products and pricing.
Hanspeter Sahli, President
Christoph Rotermund, Secretary
NEWS FROM SWEDEN
General
Submitted by the Swedish Building Material and Hardware
+41 44 878 70 50
contact by e-mail
Association
Resumed Growth in the Industry
www.swissavant.ch
Sales increased by 6.3 percent (total) and 5.8 percent
USA & Canada
(comparable units) in the 4th quarter of 2013. For the full
North American Retail Hardware
year, 2013 landing sales growth was 1 percent (total) and
Association (NRHA)
0.9 percent (comparable units).
Nordic Construction Market on the Rise
Bill Lee, President & CEO
IHA Secretary General
+1 317 290 0338
contact by e-mail
www.nrha.org
Richard Thomas, IHA President
A report from the Swedish Construction Federation shows
that the overall Nordic construction market is improving
gradually. The picture is fragmented between countries
where Norway and Iceland are doing well while Finland has
struggled. Numbers from Sweden and Denmark are
and NRHA Representative to IHA
somewhere in between. The sluggish growth in the world
contact by e-mail
economy has made its mark in the Nordic countries. Thanks
Associate Members
AHMA
American Hardware
Manufacturers Association
Timothy S. Farrell
President and CEO
contact by e-mail
www.ahma.org
Ferroforma
International DIY Exhibition
Cristina Campo Monterrubio,
to the oil industry, Norway’s GDP fared the best in 2012 (up
2.9%), while Finland was the worst hit, down 0.8%.
New Information Supports the Industry
Boverket (The Swedish National Board of Housing, Building
and Planning) now offers an information packet about the
Construction Products Regulation. Boverket has developed
various types of information about the Construction
Products Regulation, which is available internally for staff,
for external customers and for personal development. The
board offers a brochure, a film and a PowerPoint
presentation for use in places such as staff meetings and
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client meetings.
Nordbygg Sustainable Days 2014 Welcomes German
Architect Elite
www.bilbaoexhibitioncentre.com
Nordbygg Sustainable Days 2014 is a top-level knowledge
Koelnmesse, Inc.
sharing arena. Swedish urban developers will come face to
Mette F. Petersen
face with some of the big names in German architecture
President and Managing Director
and structural engineering.
contact by e-mail
Sustainable Days is a new feature at Nordbygg 2014, which
www.koelnmessenafta.com
takes place at Stockholmsmässan on April 1-4, 2014. It’s a
Visitors' Area Manager
conference with an international flavor and a specific theme
held during the fair. The 2014 conference will focus on
Germany and is being organized in association with the
German-Swedish Chamber of Commerce. www.nordbygg.se
NEWS FROM THE U.S.
Submitted by the North American Retail Hardware
Association (NRHA)
Home Improvement Industry on Growth Track Again
NRHA, and its industry trade publication Hardware
Retailing, reported in its annual Market Measure issue that
the total home improvement industry will grow at an
compound annual growth rate of 5.1% during the 20122017 time period. Total sales volume for the industry is
predicted to hit $324 billion in 2014. These sales include all
independent hardware stores, home centers and
lumber/building material outlets; including Home Depot and
Lowe’s. This contrasts with the compound annual growth
rate of -0.5% from 2017-2012. Increasing consumer
confidence, a pickup in existing and new home sales and
increased remodeling activity will continue to buoy growth.
For more detailed information about the U.S. home
improvement industry, go to www.hardwareretailing.com;
and visit the digital edition of the December 2013 issue of
Hardware Retailing magazine.
NRHA Launches Successfull Management School
Students of the second class of the NRHA Retail
Management Certification Program met for the first time in
early February to begin work on developing their retail
management skills. This new management school is
designed to provide owners with a tool to develop the
leadership and management skills of key employees.
Whether it is for a son or daughter destined to lead their
operation; or a new manager needing exposure to key
management topics; the program is customized to meet
their needs. The program was developed, and is conducted,
in cooperation with the Butler University Graduate School of
Business; and is a college-level course of study.
National Hardware Show Offers Scholarships to NRHA
Students
Ed Several, Senior V.P. of the National Hardware Show, has
announced that the show will offer two $5,000 scholarships
to two of this year’s NRHA Young Retailers of the Year. The
scholarships are to be used to help defray the cost of tuition
to the NRHA Retail Management Certification Program. The
scholarships will be awarded during the Young Retailer
awards ceremony at the show. The scholarships are
intended to demonstrate to the industry the commitment of
the show to the success of the independent retailer.
The National Hardware Show is the largest hardware fair in
the U.S., held in early May each year in Las Vegas. In 2013,
more than 4,000 independent retailers attended the show,
making it the largest annual gathering of independent
retailers in the U.S.
Are You Honoring Your Young Retailers?
One of the North American Retail Hardware Association's
most successful and recognized programs is the one which
honors individual achievements by retailers 35 years and
younger. It has been in operation for eighteen years, and
achieves national and local for the association and the
honorees.
For the last several years as NRHA has become more
involved with the National Hardware Show in Las Vegas, the
presentations are made during that event, garnering even
more publicity. Awards are given to retailers based on their
sales volume—under $2 million and over $2 million and for
a retailer representing a multiple-store operation.
This may very well be a program other IHA associations will
want to develop.
INDUSTRY NEWS
Important Highlights of a Major Industry Conference
In June 2013, DIY chain executives from around the world,
but primarily from Europe, met with manufacturers
belonging to the Federation of DIY Manufacturers
(FEDIYMA) in Rome.
Here are some highlights which you might wish to include in
member communications:
With the explosion of Internet information and retailing,
consumers now expect well-known brands to show up in
some way on social media channels. The most media-savvy
customers are aged 26 and under, and retailers need to
hire youths like this to help them understand and reach
youthful consumers.
Online information is making consumers king. They are
asking for more products to be available; they want service
and help whenever and wherever they might be. Internet
retailing is going to make consumers far more priceconscious, especially of higher-ticket items. For example, a
speaker at the conference compared Amazon.com's price
for a Bosch cordless screwdriver (£29.99) with that of
B&Q's £39.98.
Garden Centers Beat DIY Chains
Snapshot research carried out by Which? Gardening
magazine shows that to get great advice on plants, one
should go to a garden center and avoid the UK’s largest DIY
chains. During April 2013, its secret shoppers visited
garden center chains and DIY stores posing as
inexperienced gardeners. Homebase and B&Q say that a lot
of their plant staff are trained in horticulture, but they gave
the poorest advice during the visits. The Garden Centre
Group came out top, with staff listening carefully to the
problem and giving thorough advice. No information was
provided regarding advice given by hardware retailers.
Smartphones are Impacting Email Marketing
The tremendous growth and acceptance of smartphones
around the world is having an impact on the effectiveness
of retailers' use of email marketing. According to a study of
2.85 million emails in the U. S. by Knotice Ltd., more than
half of consumers sort through emails on their mobile
devices before reading them on desktop computers. The
figures likely are similar in other parts of the world.
What is disturbing is that 70% immediately delete emails
that do not render well on mobile devices. It is something
to keep in mind when working on one's email marketing
program.
Are Our Members Fully Utilizing the Internet?
Earlier this year, we attended INTERNET RETAILER
magazine's Conference & Show in Chicago, where we
attended numerous seminars about email marketing and
web retailing.
We came away with one major conclusion: It was amazing
(and distressing) to hear web-only retailers doing so much,
often from their homes, garages or basements, when brickand-mortar retailers have so many more real advantages to
offer consumers, such as opportunities to examine and
compare different brands and price-points or to gain
product knowledge from a retailer's web site or in-store
employees.
Too many independent retailers apparently are using their
websites only as static advertisements about the store, its
hours, maybe a listing of products carried, and not for
aggressive sales efforts.
What can be done easily and effectively? You can change
product illustrations and descriptions by season, for
example. You can also use PayPal as a means of
encouraging web payments, as another simple example.
Maybe there is a role in which we, as associations, can be
more active and effective in helping our members combat
these web-only competitors.
Where Youngsters Predominate
According to an article in RETAIL ASIA, two-thirds of the
world's youthful population is to be found in Asia, with
China and India accounting for 1.2 billion young people.
Asian retailers, like retailers everywhere, need to
understand the mindset and desires of young customers,
which can differ markedly from those of older consumers.
One sentiment is that the youth market, though not loyal,
can be captured easily because of its penchant for variety.
One thing is for sure—reaching the youth market calls for a
blend of brick-and-mortar stores and a web presence, or
clicks-and-bricks. It is a consideration our members need to
bear in mind for future growth.
How are Tool Sales in Your Country?
Tool departments are one of the core departments for our
members, but are very sensitive to broad economic
conditions, such as housing starts or general construction
disruptions. Now the Internet becomes another important
factor. In some countries, it is now estimated that 20-25%
of tool sales are made via the Internet. Power tools are
especially vulnerable to Internet sources.
Employee Theft a Continuing Concern
Retailers everywhere realize that employee theft occurs, to
varying degrees, based on a number of factors, such as
country attributes, employer-employee relations, even store
size. A recent article in England's DIY WEEK reported that
64% of retailers surveyed thought they were suffering from
some employee theft. Thirty five percent felt it only a minor
problem, but 29% felt it was a major concern.
Associations can do much to help retailers improve theft
prevention by educating them as to effective loss
prevention techniques.
The IHA Global Retail Report is published by:
North American Retail Hardware Association
About IHA
The International Federation of Hardware and Housewares Associations (IHA) is a federation of
associations from around the world who share an interest in the global home improvement industry.
Its mission is to preserve, protect and promote the international standing of its national
associations and to provide opportunities to promote the commercial interests of their members and
channel partners. We always encourage new members to our organization; associate memberships
are available for allied businesses who share in the interests of IHA members.
For more information on joining:
Contact our Secretary General, Bill Lee, blee@nrha.org.
Contact us by Phone:
+011 317 275-9400
Forward this email to a friend.
Jesse Carleton, Editor — jcarleton@nrha.org
Bob Vereen, Contributing Editor — wdiyc@indy.rr.com
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