RETAILER PROFILE | Hyde Park Bathrooms and Kitchens
Once upon a time in the West (End)
Hyde Park Bathrooms and Kitchens is celebrating 25 years and has grown by providing a loyal clientele with a quality of service. Chris Frankland met owner Ahmed El-Ghazoini to learn the secrets of its success
major recession, Brexit and the coronavirus pandemic, is to be congratulated. And it was to visit one such KBB business, retailer Hyde Park Bathrooms and Kitchens, that saw me heading south along London’s busy Baker Street to talk to owner Ahmed El-Ghazoini (pictured) in his beautiful West End showroom. I am warmly greeted by El-Ghazoini who sits me down with a coffee before giving me a quick tour of the showroom, which has an air of luxury and opulence, reflecting the tastes and preferences of its clientele, but still anchored in modern practicality and a broad price spread.
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As we retire to his office, I ask him how it feels to be celebrating 25 years in business. “It has been very rewarding, very challenging, but I think we have done a good job and have been very
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ny business that is still going strong after 25 years, having survived a
successful,” says El-Ghazoini. “We have customers who have been with us for the whole length of the journey and are still with us. In our area, in our market, we are fortunate that clients will generally have multiple properties. So once you have done one bathroom for them and they are happy with you, they have rental properties. It’s all about the long-term relationship with our clients.” El-Ghazoini acknowledges just how challenging some of those 25 years have been. He says: “Two recessions, Brexit, the pandemic and through those we have watched a
lot of
companies go under. Fortunately, we have survived and come out stronger.” So what is the secret of Hyde Park Bathrooms and Kitchens’ success? “To be honest, it is the way I have run the business. We don’t have any credit, believe it or not. We don’t take out any loans and if we don’t have the money, we don’t invest. We don’t rely on the banks for loans, because when a recession kicks in, and the income is
low, you still have to pay them back. This, I think, has been one of the main reasons for our success, and of course very loyal clients come rain or shine.”
El-Ghazoini did not move into the current showroom at 30 Baker Street until 2005. Before that he had a 4,000sq ft two-storey showroom around the corner in George Street – although he opened his very first showroom in 1997 at 20 Connaught Street in the same area.
But how did he get started in the KBB industry?
“I left college looking for a summer job before going to university and stumbled across an advert in the Evening Standard for a sales assistant at a bathroom distribution company called AW Andes,” recalls El-Ghazoini. “Twenty-five years ago, AW Andes was the leading distributor for bathroom products in the South-East. I went in for a short-term job and ended up staying for a good five or six
years. I did so well that one of my client headhunted me and convinced me to join his growing business. He had six showrooms in Temple Fortune, a company called Baths and Tiles Plus. I was running his main showroom for a good number of years.”
Then fate took a hand. “One of my clients there was very impressed with the service I gave him and the designs I did for his mansion. He had a number of retail premises in London and he asked if I would like to partner with him in a bathroom business. He had premises in Knightsbridge, South Kensington and Hyde Park.” You will have guessed that he took
him up ion that offers. “He had a retail shop at 20 Connaught Street right next to Jimmy Choo. I was in my mid-twenties and was happy to take up the challenge, but not as a partner. I just took the lease on from him. He was very keen to put money into the business but I have a very strong belief that partnerships are not the way to
· November 2022
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