The bathroom specialist acquired competitor Victoria Plum in May for £22.5m and called it an “exciting strategic milestone” for the business.

Victorian Plumbing said it would continue the ongoing cost-cutting programme that was in place following its rival’s collapse into administration last September, with the intention of keeping both companies trading separately.

However, the bathroom specialist confirmed on Thursday (15 August) that it would close down Victoria Plum and had entered a consultation period for effected staff.

A Victorian Plumbing spokesperson told Retail Gazette: “Following the acquisition of AHK Designs Ltd, we are proposing a closure plan for VictoriaPlum.com. As a result we have entered into a consultation period with a number of VictoriaPlum.com colleagues and only when the period completes can we provide an update.

“We are committed to keeping all employees, suppliers and connected parties up to date as we progress with the consultation. This proposal does not impact Victorian Plumbing Ltd.”

Victoria Plum fell into administration almost a year ago and was first bought in a pre-pack deal by AHK Designs, a subsidiary of the firm that owns Beds.co.uk and Cox & Cox.

It was then snapped up by Victorian Plumbing six months later, which at the time expected the business to “broadly break even in the second half of 2024″.

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Restructuring advisers have revealed the terms for one of the two transactions that came after the collapse of the flooring giant last month, according to The Furnishing Report.

Carpetright was placed into administration in July, with Tapi snapping up its intellectual property, two warehouses and more than a fifth of stores. However, more than 1,000 jobs were lost.

Tapi previously said that saving the entire business was “unviable” as Carpetright had been materially loss making for a number of years and had racked up “significant debt”.

It added it had been mindful of how the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) would view a larger deal.

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Leading the venture is group AI director Mohsen Ghasempour and his rapidly growing team of 30 people, who “can make sure we deliver the end-to-end solution”.

The department is in growth mode and is working on “at least 20-plus” new AI initiatives this year alone, with Ghasempour explaining that a lot of the projects involve using “generative AI internally to improve our efficiency”.

“We are working on a lot of things, and I don’t see that slowing down anytime soon. Next year, especially, there is going to be a lot of new AI initiatives that we’re going to work on,” he shares.

Ghasempour explains his team’s efforts have been focused on creating initiatives that improve customer experience and internal operations – many of which have helped to boost sales under each of the group’s DIY banners.

Creating the framework

Kingfisher has opted to do all the work in-house, which enables it to “really fine tune” the technology to the DIY industry and make the sector more accessible to attract new customers.

Most of its AI developments are built on the company’s AI orchestration framework called Athena, which is named after the Greek goddess who is known for her ability to strategise and problem-solve.

To put it into perspective, Ghasempour explains that Athena brings all the company’s AI solutions together in one place – as if all the initiatives are different pieces of Lego, and Athena is the bigger, more complex structure.

The framework manages prompting and interaction across a range of large language models which, as well as the AI tools, are developed in-house.

This avoids the risk that ChatGPT-type applications hold when put in front of customers, as they can provide incorrect information or can be bias or inappropriate.

Kingfisher’s framework makes it “more secure” for customers as it is based on the product data or articles the DIY retailer already , says Ghasempour.

“That’s one of the big advantage of using Athena and the second one is it significantly reduces go-to-market time,” he adds.

Ghasempour says his team spent around three months building Athena but now has the general framework to deploy any application based on a large language model, which means that 80% of the job is already handled for new projects.

AI assistants and product recommendations

So how has Kingfisher used this AI?

One of the Ghasempour’s proudest projects is Hello Casto, the first AI-powered assistant in the home improvement sector that uses generative AI to help customers with their DIY projects.

Customers can use the online tool, which is currently available on its Castorama France banner, in their “natural language” to ask DIY related questions that they might typically ask a sales assistant in store.

“When you talk to Hello Casto, you explain your problem, ‘I want to remove my old wallpaper’, and then our agent will tell you ‘you need wallpaper remover, you need this part of product, you need this and you need that to do your project’.”

“It’s quite new and we have to educate both internally and people to use this technology, but it’s one that’s potentially going to have a very big impact on the younger generation, especially those getting into DIY because we’re providing that level of advice digitally to our consumer”, says Ghasempour.

He notes that thanks to Athena, “it was only a couple of weeks to get the first version [of Hello Casto] live on the website and that timeline is going to be even shorter when we want to talk about diy.com [B&Q’s website]”.

Ghasempour says the team is already working on launching an English version of the assistant for its B&Q and Screwfix banners.

Product recommendations are also a key area as Ghasempour notes “personalisation is definitely one of our big pillars”.

Last year, Kingfisher launched a suite of ‘best product’ solutions for its app and online, as well as in multiple formats such as ‘frequently bought together’ carousels, ‘substitute products’ or direct personalised offers based on customer shopping trends and preferences.

For B&Q, where the solutions have been in place the longest, more than 10% of its ecommerce sales had come from product recommendations.

On top of that, its own recommendation engine had driven a more than 100% increase in online sales from product recommendations compared to its previous third-party solution.

Ghasempour explains it use machine learning technology, which has been trained from the group’s product data and sales history, to deliver the right recommendations.

The algorithm can also spotlight a very similar product if the one it would typically recommend is out of stock – something its previous third-party solution was unable to do.

Powering the Kingfisher business

Much of Ghasempour’s job is launching new initiatives that “both internally impacts our operations, but also brings a better service to our customer”, he explains.

“At the moment, we are using a lot of different types of AI technology to improve the efficiency of our colleagues through different ways of identifying what they do day-to-day,” he says.

Ghasempour notes the potential to use AI in the supply chain is huge, as there is “so much manual effort going into that process”.

At the moment, Kingfisher uses AI for demand forecasting – predicting the quantity of products consumers will want – as well as working out how to clear stock in a more beneficial way for the business.

“About 12 to 18 months ago, we started a big project around mark down and promotions for B&Q [looking at] using technology to identify the best route to mark down a product,” he says.

“When you want to mark down or get rid of a product, it’s very important for you to understand discount you can put on the product and what period you have to leave it for.”

The pilot tested in the first half of last year delivered encouraging gross margin improvements, while also increasing the sell-through of seasonal stock and improving the efficiency of range changes.

“Similar technology is also being used for promotions, which combines demand forecasting and optimisation to “provide the best price for our customers”, says Ghasempour.

The AI tool, which was first tested at B&Q, will be introduced to Castorama France this year with Castorama Poland to follow.

Much of the projects Ghasempour and his team are working on are adapting the AI tools to be introduced across the rest of the Kingfisher banners.

Kingfisher is not only a DIY giant, it is quickly turning itself into an AI powerhouse too.

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Tesco

Tesco revealed at the start of the month it has more than doubled the size of its online marketplace less than two months after it launched.

The UK’s biggest grocer is now listing more than 20,000 products from third-party sellers across garden, DIY, homeware, toys, sports, baby, beauty and petcare – up from the 9,000 SKUs initially.

The supermarket giant launched the marketplace in June, claiming it would become “one-stop shop for everything customers need” once it reaches full scale.

It’s not the first time that the retailer has dabbled in marketplaces, having launched Tesco Direct in 2012.

However, the grocer shut down the venture six years later, when it described it as a “small, loss-making part of the business” which had “no route to profitability”.

B&Q

B&Q revealed earlier this year that it was targeting two million products available on its marketplace by the end of next year as it continues to expand its online offer.

The retailer’s head of marketplace Tristan Commecy told Retail Gazette the platform is “still very much in the high growth phase” almost two years after launching with 300,000 products from 400 sellers.

Now entering its third year, the marketplace has over 1.2m products available from more than 1,000 sellers and represents 41% of the B&Q’s total online sales – up from 13% in 2022.

Ann Summers

Ann Summers became the latest retailer to launch its own marketplace last month when it unveiled Knickerbox.com.

The lingerie retailer described the platform as the “ultimate house of underwear”, with customers able to shop from 15 brands such as Calvin Klein Underwear, Lemonade Dolls, Curvy Kate, and Nudea.

Ann Summers said the marketplace, which will not sell sex toys or accessories, was a solution to its online business being challenged by Safe Search restrictions, which “reduces the visibility of the Ann Summers website and results in a large number of our customers unable to find it”, due to its range of adult toys.

Debenhams

Debenhams become the UK’s largest marketplace across fashion, beauty, sport and homeware in 2021 when it launched its platform.

The retailer, which was snapped up by Boohoo Group out of administration earlier that year, launched with an offer of 70,000 products.

Earlier this year, Boohoo Group reported “strong growth” in the Debenhams marketplace, and heralded its “capital-light, stockless model” for driving high margin growth.

It said that to improve profitability in its non-core labels, it has been transitioning them to the Debenhams marketplace, which it said was starting to bear fruit.

The platform now sells from over 3,500 brands – more than double the 1,600 it sold from the year before and around a third of its target to offer over 10,000 brands by the end of this year.

It’s unsurprising that Boohoo Group is looking to emulate the success of the online department store’s marketplace for its own flagship brand, which is set to launch at the end of this month.

Superdrug

Superdrug’s online health and beauty marketplace launched in 2022 and now lists over 22,000 products.

The platform is integrated onto Superdrug.com where third-party marketplace items sit alongside products it has always stocked.

Superdrug ecommerce, customer, and marketing director Matt Walburn told Retail Gazette the percentage of sales that go through marketplace “is increasing all the time”.

He said the platform recorded its biggest ever week outside of Christmas in June and is “on track to hit our targets for this year which is great”.

Walburn says that the marketplace allows Superdrug to quickly move into new trend areas and categories that it can’t launch in its physical stores, like fashion and Halloween costumes.

“Halloween is a big event for Superdrug…but we’ve never been able to add outfits alongside [make-up]. This is just an example of where the marketplace comes into its own.”

The Range

The Range launched its online marketplace in the Autumn of 2020 after discovering that 30% of the products it sold online over the summer had come from third-party suppliers.

A year later, the platform featured around 3,000 products, spanning general merchandise categories including furniture, electronics, lighting and DIY.

Almost four years later and the discount platform’s marketplace has grown more than tenfold to over 340,000 products, covering clothing and fragrances from Gucci, Dior and Maison Francis Kurkdjian too.

Mountain Warehouse

Mountain Warehouse launched its own online marketplace back in 2022 as it sought to provide a one-stop-shop with access to a wider range of outdoor clothing and equipment.

While sellers are expected to handle customer returns, tracking, pricing and second-line customer care, Mountain Warehouse offers access to its customer base and support with onboarding, data and customer insights, marketing, first-line customer care and the processing of orders.

The outdoor retailer revealed last week it now stocks more than 320 brands via its marketplace and sales through its third-party labels have skyrocketed over 150% year on year.

Online sales for the business grew 2.2% over in the year to February 25, accounting for almost a third of revenue compared to just under a quarter it represented prior to the pandemic.

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Administrators at PwC were appointed on Friday and closed the business’ 34 John Lewis concessions, one stand-alone London store, and online operation “with immediate effect”, making the majority of employees redundant.

Certain head office staff have been retained for a short period to support the retailer’s winding down.

As a result of the administration, The Floor Room is unable to fulfil customer orders that have been placed.

The Floor Room, which sells carpets and flooring products, is a subsidiary of Nestware Holdings, which also owned Carpetright, on which it had “historically been operationally reliant upon”.

Carpetright was placed into administration in late July and arch-rival Tapi snapped up its intellectual property, two warehouses and more than a fifth of stores. However, more than 1,000 jobs were lost.

Prior to the administrators’ appointment, The Floor Room’s management team had “exhausted options to secure further funding or a potential sale of the business and assets”, PwC said.

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The bed specialist plans to start trading from the new units within the next few months and is proactively targeting ex-Carpetright colleagues to join its network of retail staff.

The acquistion forms part of Bensons’ physical expansion plans to open up to 40 new stores over the next few years.

The ex-Carpetright stores it has acquired are located in Aberdeen, Ashton, Belfast, Canterbury, Edmonton, Exeter, Irvine, Kettering, Old Kent Road, Oldbury, Portsmouth, Salisbury, Slough, Sutton, Torquay, Bath, Eastbourne, Gillingham and Solihull.

Bensons chief executive Nick Collard said: “Increasing the number of Bensons stores remains a key growth priority and we are excited about this opportunity to take on 19 store units.

“Today’s announcement supports our overall plan to expand our current 162 strong store estate to over 200 over the next few years.”

“Whilst market conditions for higher ticket purchases have remained very challenging, Bensons has continued to make real progress, by remaining focused on those things in our control.”

Collard added: “Since our return to profitability in 2023, we’ve continued to see significant market share gains across all our core categories, reflecting the hard work from all our colleagues across the organisation.

“This work, alongside the announcement today on the new stores, leaves us well placed when the wider market starts to recover, allowing us to realise the longer term ambitions for Bensons and its colleagues.”

Carpetright collapsed into administration in July blaming a “big reduction in consumer spending due to cost of living pressures, lower home sales and a debilitating cyber attack”, which it claimed pushed it over the edge.

The retailer’s biggest rival Tapi rescued its brand, two warehouses and 54 of its stores in a deal that resulted in 1,018 job losses across Carpetright’s head office in Purfleet and its remaining 218 branches in the UK.

An administrators report recently revealed the fallen retailer’s suppliers, customers and landlords have been left £213m out of pocket from the chain’s collapse.

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The Swedish furniture giant is testing out the collection method at three supermarkets, including its Peterborough Werrington store. Lockers in Dereham and Cambridge will launch later this month.

The trial means customers within 100km of the self-serve collection point can order a wide range of Ikea products, from small items like Knoppäng picture frames to larger flat pack favourites such as Billy bookcases or Pax wardrobes.

Orders placed before 6:30am will be available from the same day, while any purchases made after eligible for collection the following day.

Ikea UK country customer fulfilment manager Jakob Bertilsson said: “We’re continuously exploring new ways to connect with our customers across the UK and this trial marks a significant milestone in our ambition to become even closer to our customers.

“We’re excited to extend our successful partnership with Tesco to bring these next-generation lockers to our customers in the Peterborough area and provide a range of services that are affordable, accessible and provide the best possible experience.”

Tesco assets and estates director Simon Williams added: “We’re pleased to be building on our existing partnership with Ikea to trial innovative ways of improving the shopping experience for Tesco and Ikea customers.

“Our Ikea manned click-and-collect points are already widely used with almost 100 in operation right across the UK, and we hope that these convenient and forward-thinking new automated lockers are just as well received.”

Last month, the furniture giant revealed it planned to open 100 more click-and-collect points at Tesco stores across the UK, which will mean over 90% of customers are within 5 miles of a collection point.

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The home improvement retailer is piloting the delivery service in partnership with courier DPD, with a fleet of autonomous robots being used to bring smaller parcels directly to customers’ doors.

Shoppers will be informed in advance if their order is set to be delivered by robot and after confirming their availability, the robot will be disptached.

The deliveries can be tracked on a map, and shoppers are kept updated throughout the process. They recieve a code to release the robot’s compartment and grab their parcel. Once the compartment is closed the robot returns to the depot, Retail Week reported.

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B&Q supply and logistics director Amélie Gallichan-Todd wrote on LinkedIn: “I am really proud of the work we’re doing to improve our fulfilment services to give our customers more choice of when and how their B&Q purchases are delivered.

“We already offer different options including one-hour and 24-hour click and collect from our 300 stores, home delivery direct from 52 stores, and home delivery from our central distribution centres, as well as direct from drop-ship vendors.

“We’re already the second-biggest liquified natural gas fleet in the country and are adding electric vehicles to our home delivery fleet later this year.

“We’re also trialling alternative ways of delivering products to home, such as our trial in Milton Keynes with DPD UK to deliver customers’ orders to home using autonomous robots.”

This week B&Q also revealed it was teaming up with Deliveroo to offer a rapid delivery service for DIY products across London.

The initiative will be introduced across nine B&Q Local stores in Camden, Harrow, Palmers Green, Streatham, Sutton, Tooting, Wandsworth, Wood Green and Staines-Upon-Thames later this month.

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The initiative will be introduced across nine B&Q Local stores in Camden, Harrow, Palmers Green, Streatham, Sutton, Tooting, Wandsworth, Wood Green and Staines-Upon-Thames later this month.

Customers will be able to shop from over 600 of the retailer’s DIY items and have them delivered in as little as 25 minutes.

The tie-up forms part of the rapid-delivery app’s ‘Deliveroo Shopping’ expansion to add more non-grocery and food brands to its platform.

The delivery specialist has inked partnerships with retailers including The Perfume Shop, Ann Summers and Boots over the past year.

B&Q supply and logistics director Amelie Gallichan-Todd said: “We’re constantly looking at how we can help make home improvement projects easier.

“This includes helping customers to get their home improvement products in the most efficient, and convenient way possible, by meeting increasing consumer demand for speed, convenience, and mobile access.

“We’re delighted to be partnering with Deliveroo to test on-demand delivery for our customers served by nine of our B&Q Local high street stores in London.”

Deliveroo chief operating officer Eric French added: “There is a huge home improvement market in the UK and our data shows that customers want the convenience of being able to order everything from paint brushes and paint to tools for delivery in as little as 25 minutes.

“We are excited by the expansion of ‘Deliveroo Shopping’ and this latest collaboration shows we are not only transforming the way people eat but also the way people shop.”

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As a result, the retailer has upped its profit guidance for the full year and now expects to reach £980m, a 6.7% rise from last year.

In the second quarter ending 27 July, full price sales grew by 3.2%, exceeding forecasts by £42m. This strong showing was notable given the challenging comparison to last summer, which it called “exceptionally favourable for clothing retailers”.

Meawhile, UK retail sales edged up by 0.4% in the quarter, though the standout performer was its overseas online arm, which jumped 21.9%.

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Total group sales, which include subsidiaries such as FatFace and Reiss, rose by 8% in the first half, reflecting the positive impact of recent acquisitions.

Looking ahead, the business has maintained its guidance for full price sales to grow by 2.5% in the second half, reflecting cautious optimism in an uncertain retail environment.

“This might seem cautious when compared with the performance in the first half, which was up 4.4%,” said Next. “However, when compared to two years ago, growth in the first half and the forecast for the second half are almost identical.”

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