Kirkel/Munich. July 10, 2009. The future “flagship” of Praktiker Bau- und Heimwerkermärkte AG in Munich is taking shape. The topping-out ceremony was celebrated at the site of the new store on Wasserburger Landstraße in Munich Trudering in the presence of lord mayor Christian Ude on July 10. Work has been progressing according to plan since the revocation of a temporary stop of work in February and no further delays are expected so that the new shopping paradise for craftspeople and do-it-yourselfers is scheduled to open its gates some time in November 2009 – 18 months after breaking the ground.

The store opening would mark the grand finale of a project managed by the Munich-based ARGENTA Group that took around nine years from the first planning steps to completion. With this new store and another one under construction at the Pasing rail junction and due for handover in early 2010, Praktiker’s presence in Munich is reaching a new dimension. Although the DIY and home improvement store operator headquartered in Kirkel (Saarland) has already been represented in the metropolis on the Isar since 1979, where it soon sported as many as four stores of which the three locations now remaining in the city are in some cases so old and small that they can barely meet the growing customer demands. It is therefore high time to react to the rising competition and offer customers in this city, which has the highest purchasing power in Germany, an adequate range of goods, services and shopping convenience.

With the two new stores Praktiker is not only strengthening its quantitative presence but also its qualitative offer since they are ach intended as a replacement for smaller DIY stores that are no longer up to date and can then be closed. In this process the new store in Trudering will supersede the oldest Praktiker store in Munich on Lyonel-Feiniger-Straße. The latter will be given up to make space for further construction in the framework of the Parkstadt Schwabing project. With its relocation, Praktiker thus also contributes to one of the most sophisticated city development projects in Munich. And, at the new location in the South East of the city, Praktiker is creating a modern and attractive center for professional and amateur craftsmen. Compared with the old store, the selling space will more than double: Instead of 4,300 square meters in future more than 10,000 square meters (gross) will be available of which around 3,500 square meters are taken up by a large garden center. Trudering will thus be the home of the second-largest Bavarian Praktiker store ever.

On this selling space, customers will be able to choose from a total of 45,000 different articles from the areas of building and renovation, workshops, homes, gardens or leisure time, plus spacious areas for special product presentations from the fields of household items, sanitary and home decoration, for example, as well as specific service areas such as a large area for wood cutting and a powerful paint mixing system. In addition, an in-store bakery with cafeteria invites customers to shop and take a short rest.

Despite the large assortment and the size of the building itself, the outstanding features of the new Praktiker store will be orderliness and orientation. This is attributable to the fact that this store will be designed according to the Easy-to-Shop principle developed in 2006. For the customers, Easy-to-Shop means that they do not only get good value for money but can also shop fast, easily and conveniently. This is achieved with a whole series of measures that are based on the latest findings of consumer research. Hence, most assortment areas will be consistently structured by brand and price categories. Add to this a highly structured store layout with a wide center aisle and clearly marked promotion areas, plausible guidance systems and a largely self-explaining merchandise presentation. A special technical highlight will be implemented at this store right from the start: This will be the first German DIY store to be equipped with an electronic price labeling system. With this system, every price change from the merchandise management system can be transmitted to the LCD displays on the shelves in real time using infrared signal. Since the price labels no longer have to be exchanged, this does not only save time but also helps avoid mistakes.

The new Praktiker store also sets new standards in ecological terms: The lessor and the lessee of the premises have committed themselves to a so-called “green space compensation” of two square meters per person for each staff member. And a new and species-appropriate home with an area of 44,000 square meters will be created for an as yet unknown number of green toads who had settled in the area of the store location.

The relocation of the Praktiker store will also benefit the labor market in Munich. On the distinctly larger selling space not only the existing staff of the old store in Schwabing will be working but also an additional number of 40 new jobs will be created. In total, around 110 employees led by store manager Werner Illichmann will cater to the customers’ needs.

Munich Trudering is one of a total of some 260 Praktiker stores in Germany and one of 32 in the federal state of Bavaria. Add to this the 76 stores of the premium brand Max Bahr, which was taken over in February 2007. At the international level, the Praktiker Group, which ranks among the four largest DIY store chains in Europe, operates more than 100 stores. In 2009 a total of 29,000 employees generated (net) sales of 3.9 million euros.