Hornbach Centrala cut its loss by 70% last year to RON4.3 million (almost EUR1 million) and ended the year with about 650 employees.
Its sales have been on the rise in the past five years, hitting the EUR100 million milestone at the end of 2013. The retailer saw like-for-like sales growth in 2013 and 2014, as its latest store opened three years ago.
Hornbach embraced a slow expansion policy in Romania where it introduced a very large format store concept. It opened its first two stores in Bucharest in Berceni (south of the city, 2007) and Militari (west of the city, 2008), and then expanded to Brasov (2009) and Balotesti-Ilfov (near Bucharest, 2010). Its fifth store was inaugurated in Timisoara in 2012, following a EUR30 million investment.
Last October it bought an about three-hectare plot and the space where a store of rival Obi used to operate in Sibiu, which left the Romanian market. As announced by the company, the Sibiu store should have reopened in the first half of this year.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)