Ivan Simpson Bathrooms and Kitchens | RETAILER PROFILE
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We were very reluctant to try kitchens, but customers kept asking for them and we realised we were throwing business away
or Browns 2000 or Burbidge, and stick them on a carcass,” Simpson explains. “That kitchen is then sold at £2,999 and at £29,000 – the same door and carcass. So we went down to kbb in Birmingham one year and had a conversation with Pronorm.” The pair soon realised the upmarket German brand could give them the elusive something different they were looking for. But with most of their customers well into the 50-plus bracket, wouldn’t a more traditional offering have been advisable? “No, it’s what a lot of other people are offering,” Simpson counters. “That’s why Pronorm stands out for being very clean, very simple. Customers have to get their head round the fact that they’re buying furniture rather than just a kitchen door. It’s designed around the open-plan style of living. Pronorm isn’t geared up for a shaker door. It’s offered but it’s not their strong point. It’s the linear look.”
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So why did they choose Pronorm when so many competing German brands offer a similar look and feel? “They’re very innovative and keen to be one step ahead,” Burns explains. “The innovation of textures and colours is very important. It’s what we want and what customers want.
“At Living Kitchen in Cologne, the dark colours really came through – the golds, the browns, the marbles, the monolith idea. It’s really nice and on-trend and the quality is superb. We sell Y-Line and X-Line, their premium two products with a Hettich drawer system.”
Custom built
1. Ivan Simpson, managing director and David Burns, showroom manager 2. Pronorm’s extensive range of colours and materials 3. Corian Limestone Priam work surface with integral sink 4. Pronorm’s X Line 5. Adamsez freestanding bath on ground floor
White and cream are still the most popular colours, Burns admits, despite all efforts to persuade people otherwise. But Pronorm is also proud of its ability to provide customised solutions, recently helping a customer in a wheelchair when another dealer told her he’d have to ‘butcher’ her furniture to make it work. By contrast, says Simpson, Pronorm can literally make anything – in any height, width or depth – “and that was the difference”. “But the biggest difference is the fitter,” adds Burns. “The guys have been with us for 20 years. They work solely for us. We have three employed joiners, electricians, plasterers, audiovisual guys... Customers want a complete service from proper tradesmen.” A lot of thought has clearly gone into the overall store layout.
It’s a constant work in progress that Simpson estimates has cost him as much as £400,000 over the years. He’s coy on how this stacks up against yearly turnover – “it’s just vanity, you need profit” – but says it’s normally over £1 million. Interestingly, rather than give the bathroom displays plenty of space to breathe, Simpson has built numerous small lifestyle
August 2019 · kbbreview
settings along the walls, mirroring the real thing in a typical customer’s house. “This is designed to be like a bathroom in a Barratt home, a semi,” he explains as we come to the first room set. “It’s based on the actual footprint – the size of a double bed. If you want to sell to people, you have to show what’s realistic. Spark the imagination.
“The layout makes people track round the store, too – it’s the Ikea effect. People have an attention span of a minute to a minute-and-a-half. You need to slow them down. Give them a good experience and have a joke with them. They’re not dealing with a salesman, they’re dealing with a friend.”
Brexit
Despite supplying various German brands, there’s little concern over the potential impact of a no-deal Brexit. Nobody seems worried about it anymore, Burns says. Now they’re just sick of it.” Simpson agrees: “No matter where you are in the world, there’s always trade, even in refugee camps. There might be some tariffs. But if they’re too large, hopefully manufacturers will take a percentage of them. The Pronorm trucks will run all the time. It might slow things down by five or seven days, but there’s already an agreement in place on transport. “It’s like the panic over the millennium bug. Trade can’t stop. In excess of 50,000 trucks a day come into the UK. Are you going to have them stop somewhere for 10 days? It’ll sort itself out, it’s got to.”
Like others, Simpson also rejects the idea that it’s a good time to buy British, reminding UK suppliers that their components usually come from Germany or China. For the moment, he’s more than happy with Pronorm, particularly as the margins are apparently so much better than in bathrooms.
“The advantage is you can’t buy a kitchen like this online,” he says, “so the margins are a lot better. The internet takes 25% to 30% off a bathroom.”
So is the bathroom game still the race to the bottom that showroom retailers often complain about?
“It is when you’re going up against the internet people,” Simpson agrees. “I can’t understand why they get a product with a 40% to 45% margin and the first thing they do is give 25% of it away? Then the next person gives 26% and the next 30%? I’ve seen some research from the economics department of Durham University that says if you reduce your price by 10%, you’ve got to do 50% more business. It’s frightening.”
Simpsons counters the impact of online by selling the likes of Villeroy and Boch and Imperial Bathrooms. He’s adamant
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