South Africa’s construction products retailer, Builders Superstore, is expanding into East Africa as it is set to invest 500 million Kenyan shillings (R78.4m) on its first retail shop in that country.
Builders Superstore is a Massbuild brand and will have its first store in the region located next to Nairobi’s upmarket area Karen Waterfront Mall.
This is according to a company statement issued recently.
Covering almost 10 000m², the store will sell a range of DIY, home improvement and building materials products and services. The latest opening brings to 9 the sores operated by Builders. Others stores are located in Botswana, Mozambique and Zambia.
Builders’ new Kenya store would create employment opportunities for around 400 individuals during the construction phase, and around 145 local staff once the store was trading.
Traditional hardware store goods would be supported by value-added services, including airtime from Safaricom, Airtel and Orange; electricity purchases from Kenya Power; bill payments for DSTV, GOTV, Nairobi Water, Startimes and Kwese; and trade credit.
Builders move to expand to Kenya comes at a time when Retail companies are facing pressure from a constrained economy especially with the escalating COVID-19 pandemic.
Early this month Massbuild selected SAP Marketing Cloud to enable its marketing team of five users to reach and engage up to 224,000 customers per day via measurable, trackable email campaigns.
Consequently, stated Massbuild, a strong business case for the project was developed upfront to ensure maximum return on investment. Buy-in was secured from key stakeholders, and a project sponsor drove the process from an executive management team to all levels of the organisation.
“We wanted to improve the way we manage our customer communication and become more efficient, professional and reliable in our marketing engagements,” said Massbuild spokesperson.
Massbuild operates four complementary brands: Builders Warehouse, Builders Superstore, Builders Trade Depot and Builders Express.