Kingfisher announced on Monday that it aims to increase pre-tax profits by £500 million within five years.
The company, which trades as B&Q and Screwfix in the UK and Castorama and Brico Depot in France, also plans a capital return of £600 million over the next three years, in addition to the annual ordinary dividend.
The strategy involves Kingfisher spending approximately £800 million on boosting operational and online capabilities. This is expected to hit pre-exceptional reported profit, net of operational efficiency benefits, by approximately £50m in the first year and £70-100m in the second year.
Véronique Laury, Kingfisher Chief Executive Officer, said:
“Following an in depth review of Kingfisher’s business last year alongside in depth studies of our customers’ home improvement needs, the leadership team announced the ‘ONE’ Kingfisher plan. This plan will leverage the scale of the business by becoming a single, unified company where those customer needs always come first.
“We are excited to now reveal our new strategy and our focus over the next five years based on the three key pillars of creating a unified, unique and leading home improvement offer, driving our digital capability and optimising our operational efficiency.
“With a clear roadmap now in place alongside clear long term targets, the size of the five year opportunity is significant. We do acknowledge the challenges ahead, however having already made good progress since March last year, and with 80,000 committed colleagues, we feel confident about our plan and look forward to moving on to the first year of our transformation.”
The news comes following last week’s announcement that Australian retail giant Westfarmers agreed to acquire Homebase from rival business Home Retail Group.
