Baumax is concentrating on Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia

The Austrian home improvement store operator Baumax will introduce massive cost cutting measures in its loss-making countries, Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria and Croatia. In the next few months measures such as the closing down of unprofitable sites and various closing down sales activities will be implemented. “Our goal is to build up a solid and healthy business by 2016. Therefore we need to close down the stores which are the most unprofitable. It’s also conceivable that some stores or rather, whole store groups will be sold off,” said Michael Hürter, CEO of Baumax. 70 per cent of future business activities will be carried out in the three countries – Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, with 103 stores and a turnover volume of approximately one bn €. The stores in Hungary (15) and Slovenia (3) will continue to operate as before. A decision regarding business activities in Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria and Croatia should be taken by the end of 2014.