HomePro keeps target despite good 1st half

“We benefited from the demand to buy home accessories and renovate housing from customers hit by last year’s floods, and that drove revenue and net profit to show aggressive growth in the first half, compared with the same period last year,” marketing senior vice president Nat Jaritchana told a press conference yesterday.
The company reported revenue of Bt16.37 billion and net profit of Bt1.2 billion for the first half, up 20.76 per cent and 35.51 per cent respectively from the first six months of last year.
Meanwhile, in the second half of the year, the company believes demand for construction materials and home-decoration items will continue to expand, but the rate of growth could be lower than during the first period. This is because many shoppers are still waiting to see what happens in the current rainy season before deciding whether to buy, he said.
Despite the expected slowdown in the second half, the company has set aside a marketing budget of Bt70 million to launch a special promotional campaign to celebrate HomePro’s 16th anniversary.
The campaign, which runs from this coming Thursday through to September 16 at all 50 branches, will offer discount s of up to 80 per cent, with revenue of Bt2.5 billion being targeted from the event, Nat said.
The company also plans to open three more branches by year-end. They will be in Samut Sakhon’s Mahachai area, Ubon Ratchathani and Ratchaburi, and cost Bt500 million per store.
Meanwhile, the company’s investment plan in Malaysia, delayed since 2010, has been revived and negotiations are under way with the landlord for the purchase of a plot to develop a HomePro branch in Kuala Lumpur. “We believe our investment in Malaysia will be undertaken before the Asean Economic Community comes into effect in 2015,” he said.