Retail diversity in the South

On the African continent, DIY stores or similar trade structures have so far only gained a foothold on a large scale in one country: South Africa shows by far the highest number of such stores - also in terms of the population. Otherwise there are similar structures, although with very much weaker penetration, in the countries neighbouring South Africa as well as in the north-east and north-west of the continent: in Egypt and Morocco.
The statistics department of Dähne Verlag, the German publishing house specialised in global DIY retail, has gather­ed together the available and verifiable data on home improvement stores especially for this edition of DIY International; unfortunately it is currently not possible to gain information on retail spaces at the required level of accuracy and comparability. However the available statistical data still provide a picture of the current situation: the North and in particular the South are the focus areas of home improvement retail in Africa.
But the table published here also shows: the modern trading structures are expanding away from these two poles, such expansion is evident in the northern part in particular. For this reason, the table deliberately also lists those countries for which such expansion plans are already known.But first some comments on the major market of South Africa and Southern Africa. As many as five companies are active here, each with three-digit location figures (respective data inventory: see table): Build it has 324 stores in South Africa, Cashbuild together with the sales channel P&L Hardware has 284 stores (see also the report and the interview with CEO Werner de Jager in this edition), the various Builders sales channels by the Walmart subsidiary Massmart have a total of 113 stores, Mica 135 stores and Essential Hardware are with more than 300, however these are more small-scale stores.
In order to get an idea of the size scale in which the sales figures we are talking about are moving: the Massbuild division of the Massmart group made sales of ZAR 13.7561 bn (EUR 860 mio) in the year 2018 and thus 5.9 per cent more than in the previous year. Comparable sales have risen by 3.4 per cent. For the first half of the year 2019, Massbuild reported sales of ZAR 6.7 bn (EUR 419 mio), an increase of 5.0 per cent compared to the same period last year, comparable sales rose by 1.8 per cent. In addition, the half year report mentions that: "Contractor sales remain under pressure and were below the…