The 2023 industry statistics released by BHB at its annual press conference in early March were not surprising. It wasn't all that great, but word was already spreading.
Germany's DIY trade ended 2023 with a 3.1% decline in sales. Add inflation to this and real sales would have fallen by about 9%. Franz Peter Tepas, spokesperson for the BHB Executive Board and member of the Obi Executive Board, summed up the situation by saying, “General uncertainty among consumers is putting a brake on consumption.” explained. The situation was made worse by weather delays in the gardening season, leading to poor harvests.
As a result, industry sales amounted to 21.24 billion euros. Sales at German home improvement stores fell by 3.4% in real terms.
Consumers have become very cautious about investments and seasonal products in 2023. For example, Tile was down 11.0% and the Leisure/Seasonal Commodity Group was down 11.2%.
In contrast, household goods (5.5%) and automobiles (3.9%) rose. The sector recorded the highest growth in horticultural chemicals/soil/seeds, increasing by 8.8%. However, bad spring weather took a toll on the entire important horticulture business.
Looking at the overall trend, Tepaß noted that “the growth in DIY in 2020 means that demand has been brought forward by at least two years.” It was found that the situation was “starting to normalize to some extent.” The average annual growth rate from 2020 to 2023 was 2.2%. From 2017 to 2019, it was 2.3%.
In other words, the industry was stable in the long run. Against this background, the confidence that the head of the association conveyed to journalists was palpable. After all, salespeople have always been “pretty optimistic, but also realists.” He said: “As an industry, we tend to think of the glass as half full rather than half empty.” He said he saw signs of that in the first few months of the year, with 29 days added in February. As a result, sales in the industry increased by approximately 6% compared to the same period last year. Last month.
Managing director Peter Wust also expressed optimism, backing it up with concrete data from annual statistics on areas such as online transactions, which were once feared. DIY core product turnover fell by 4.9% to €5,289 million, but DIY stores fared much better…