KITCHEN RETAILER PROFILE| Leicht KDC North London
liabilities and my costs were as minimal as possible.”
He points out that marketing is crucial for the business, but also knows that people looking for a Leicht kitchen will find the shop.
Clever marketing “We do a lot of online marketing,” he tells me. “Huge amounts on social media. I am not talking about putting a picture up on Instagram. That’s Mickey Mouse. I am talking paid advertising on Instagram – paid, clever marketing that brings people to our website and in-store. People come to us because they want a Leicht kitchen.”
And Leicht KDC has more than one string to its bow, with a lucrative contracts operation that accounts for between 45% and 55% of turnover, which Hopper predicts will be around £5 million for the year to March 2021, – up by £1m, he tells me, on the previous year.
“Each year we do 300 to 350 contract kitchens,” Hopper reveals. “Our current scheme is £1.4 million and 130 plots with Ardmore in The Pantiles in Tunbridge Wells. Ardmore is one of the largest construction companies in the UK and that is a great scheme for us. When we set up the business, it was originally a contracts operation. We went from just a few to tens, twenties, then fifties. We work in Bristol, Wales and London. We have three separate regions with three warehouses. We take on what we can handle.”
“I was the original founder of Leicht Contracts UK Limited, along with Leicht Küchen AG as the financial partner [in 2015], which went to £12m turnover in four years. That was designed for the FTSE 100/250 and 250 builders. At peak, we were doing around 70 kitchens a week across 20 sites. To go from that to what we are doing now, around five to 10 kitchens a week, is easy.”
company. I resigned and Leicht Küchen AG Germany put in a new management team that would be able to take it on. I wanted to focus my time on my own individual stores, open my fourth showroom and continue doing smaller projects. We are not interested in the FTSE house builders. But we can do smaller projects. One hundred and thirty is great but look, there are not many retail companies that have the infrastructure to be able to take that on.”
Putting a picture on Instagram is Mickey Mouse – I’m talking clever, paid marketing that brings people in-store
But, as Hopper explains, what he really enjoys doing is starting things from scratch.
“My skill set is building companies
He adds that he has a pool of subcontracted installers that have been working with him for a long time. They handle retail and contracts work. And Hopper points out that he has a track record on the contracts side.
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from zero to probably £10m,” he enthuses. “I enjoy doing that. I am an entrepreneur. To take companies beyond £10m, you need a different style of management.
“Leicht Contracts is a great
The new Finchley Road store has obviously opened up the possibility of lots of local contracts work, but who does Hopper see as his typical retail customers? “It’s an affluent area and we could have three or four types of customer
with different types of
kitchen requirements and spend values,” he says. “We sold a kitchen recently in Battersea for £16k and one in Sevenoaks for £90k – so it’s anywhere in between and we can cater for that difference.”
He also tells me that although the displays clearly look expensive, as our
photographs show, they are actually from Leicht’s price group one – one out of eight. The average spend tends to be £25,000 to £35,000. £30,000 is also not uncommon for contracts.
Developments
He adds: “A lot of houses we do are developments – people are going to live there for a couple of years and move on. So what’s the point of putting in a 50-grand kitchen? So it will be £30k and then they’ll come back for their next kitchen in two years’ time. And we know this because we’ve been going for 10 years and we can see the patterns.” To complement the Leicht kitchen offering, there are worktops from Cosentino, sinks and taps from 1810 and hot taps from Quooker. Appliances are from Siemens, Miele and Bora. So what is next for Leicht KDC? Hopper is clear: “You know what,
we weren’t looking for North London. It just came up. With all of our stores, we weren’t looking for them. They just happened. Originally, I set up Sevenoaks for me, for the easy life, to make money. I lived in Sevenoaks, so it was perfect for me. Of course, there will be more casualties, but we have got to get our own house in order. We have to survive where we are in the market, like everyone else has. We have got to get to the end of the Ardmore site in Tunbridge Wells and reassess things in the summer. “We are not looking at anything at the moment, but should anything come up, and it’s the right fit, then of course we will always look at it. We’ve got to get this one where it needs to be first. There’s normally a two or three year gap between opening shops.” I guess I might well be talking to him in another two-and-a-half years.
· April 2020
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