More services for customers in Taiwan

In actual fact, Taiwan doesn't offer very good conditions for operating a home improvement retail chain. Probably no-one knows this better than the man who manages the chain which dominates this market on the small island: Jason Chang is responsible in the Test Rite Group as general manager for the TLW chain (it is pronounced a bit like "Ter Li Wu", which stands for "Test Rite House" - and in the mind of most Taiwanese people for DIY) and he can immediately think of quite a number of differences, for example compared to the major markets of USA and Europe.
A lack of do-it-yourself education is the first he mentions, but also the construction of the houses and, as so often in Asia: "Labour is cheap, that's why people hire a professional". However there is one problem which is comparable with western countries - only worse: "Our challenge in Taiwan is the population. The birth rate is one of the lowest in the world". Only in South Korea are fewer children born.
Yet where there is a challenge, there are also opportunities, and the Test Rite Group has seized these: first in 1996 when the trading company, which was already well established at that time, entered into a joint venture with Kingfisher and, together with the Brits, brought their DIY store format B&Q to the island, and that with success: "We were already making profit after three years," remembers Jason Chang. And then eight years later, when they took over the 50 per cent owned by Kingfisher in order to continue the chain independently under the new name TLW - after all, they had quickly learned how DIY retail can be operated profitably.
So they then prepared for the new situation with an ageing society and at the same time an e-commerce which was gaining strength, meaning that stationary trade once again faced new challenges. The strategy is: focus on the renovation of the bathroom and the kitchen as well as more services. "They can't do DIY," Jason Chang says of his ageing target group, "that's why we try to offer more services".
First and foremost, these are installation services in the fields of renovation, flooring, toilet seats, kitchen cabinets and lighting. TLW trains the handymen and acts as agent. The consumer pays a fixed price for these services and obtains the materials from TLW. The biggest departments in TLW stores are therefore electricity (also because of the important product group of air conditioning), followed by the continuously growing bathroom field and also kitchens. In order…