Bunnings to open two new stores despite closures
National retailer Bunnings, which last week announced plans to shut seven stores in regional areas, says it will now open its largest New Zealand store mid-winter and a new Queenstown outlet early next year.
“Last week in July for Westgate,” said Jacqui Coombes, Bunnings NZ director of the big-box DIY chain’s new warehouse in the growing northwestern fringes of the city “and Queenstown in April 2021”.
Westgate already has a Pak’nSave, Mitre 10, Harvey Norman, NorthWest shopping centre and by 2021 is due to get the first New Zealand Costco, the size of two rugby fields, with a 30-pump fuel station cutting prices by as much as 20 to 30 per cent.
Bunnings first announced Westgate plans in early 2016. Construction work behind the green mesh fence has been under way on the former farm site ever since and locals are curious about the exact opening date.
Coombes said last week that Bunnings was proposing to close stores in Cambridge, Te Awamutu, Putaruru, Hastings, Rangiora, Christchurch’s Hornby and Ashburton.
ASX-listed Wesfarmers, with a market capitalisation of A$42.7b, owns Bunnings.
Meanwhile, Andrea Scown, retail operations general manager for Mitre 10, said that chain’s Whangapara¯oa store, where 23 people had worked, had shut. The store was owned by a member under the co-operative model and that person “has made the difficult decision to temporarily close the store until economic conditions improve”.
Chris Wilkinson, managing director of First Retail Group, said Auckland northwest was becoming a “powerhouse” with the 27,000sq m new Nido store to open acting as a gateway “then Costco and this massive new Bunnings as well as all the residential development”.
Toby Lawrance, former head of Bunnings NZ, said two years ago that Bunnings Westgate at 21 Fred Taylor Drive had been long-awaited.
At 15,544sq m, that will be NZ’s biggest Bunnings, with an estimated completion value of $65 million to $67m and 745sq m of retail tenancies were also being built, making this complex 16,290sq m on completion, with 318 car parks. More than 180 staff are expected to work there.