Our strategy – Creating the Leader
Launched in March 2012, 'Creating the Leader' is the current phase of our growth plan, and follows the successful conclusion of 'Delivering Value'.
It will see us emerge as a world-class retailer, helping customers have better, more sustainable homes.
Ian Cheshire, Group Chief Executive explains Kingfisher's Preliminary Results 2012/13
Purpose
Our purpose is to make it easier for customers to have better and more sustainable homes. This approach will unlock more customer demand and grow our business to the benefit of all our stakeholders, creating a more valuable business for our shareholders, a better partner for our suppliers, a more secure and brighter future for our colleagues and a more sustainable business for our local communities.
Our unique contribution as a business to our customers is that we can harness our home improvement experience, our heritage as a leader in sustainability and our international scale to bring new, more sustainable and more affordable products to market. By also providing our customers with project advice and new shopping channels to complement our stores we will make it easier for them to adapt their homes to their evolving lifestyles. Our shorthand for describing this purpose is “Better Homes, Better Lives”.
'Creating the Leader' 2012/13 progress and milestones for 2013/14
In March 2012, we set out four areas (Easier, Common, Expand and One Team) with eight specific steps that make up Creating the Leader along with their associated key success measures and short term annual milestones. On the 26th March 2013 we updated on the progress we have made towards each of the 2012/13 milestones and set the milestones for 2013/14.
Progress update from the Group Chief Executive
26 March 2013
Ian Cheshire, Group Chief Executive, said:
“We have had a tough year, impacted by unfavourable foreign exchange, record adverse weather in the UK and declining underlying markets in each of our three key territories. Whilst we have been unable to fully offset these headwinds, the hard work of our teams and our firm focus on our established programme of self-help initiatives means we ended the year in good shape with net cash on the balance sheet, higher market share and having generated economic return for our shareholders.”
“During the course of the year, we have developed our wider management team, mostly through internal promotions, and we have made excellent progress with the first year of our self-help plan, 'Creating the Leader', a plan supporting both the short term whilst building the business for the longer term.
“Looking ahead, although we expect market conditions to remain challenging, we will continue to actively manage the business, optimising the generation and use of cash and driving longer term success through our own actions. I remain very confident in our prospects, with clear initiatives underway to make it easier for our customers to have better and more sustainable homes.”
