Page 48 - HW May-June 2020

then as now
Then as now – June 2010
10 YEARS AGO this month, mid- year, John Key was our Prime Minister, Phil Go was the
leader of the opposition and the Auckland Super City he’s now in charge of wouldn’t be formed until November.
Another signi cant marker for 2010 was September’s 7.1 magnitude earthquake centred on Dar eld. is event would be followed six months later
by the devastating aftershock we now call the Christchurch Earthquake.
10 years later, with the region back on its feet but still far from back to normal, the event is still fresh in one’s memory.
What followed was termed at the time a “slight PR disaster” for Mitre 10 when Bunnings acted rapidly and snapped up the high-pro le Tory Street site...
Former All Black Norm Hewitt performed Bunnings Wellington Central’s o cial opening (2) in front of Mayor Kerry Prendergast and assorted luminaries, Bunnings NZ General Manager Rod Caust, Store Manager Suzanne Taylor and sta .
Having nished the upgrade of its Porirua Warehouse, work had also started on the Lyall Bay Bunnings Warehouse that was expected to open before the end of the year, bringing the brand’s total New Zealand estate to 18 Bunnings Warehouses and 26 small format stores.
10 YEARS IS A LONG TIME
10 years ago, the hardware industry was marking the passing of Rod Williams. In uential in establishing Makita in New Zealand, the experienced Welshman was acknowledged as a larger than life personality with friends in every area of the industry.
Makita’s Graham Norris said at the time: “If you had a new product, you’d want Rod to be fronting
it. He was unique – amboyant, a horse trader, a drinker and a lad. He was the man.”
10 years ago, we
noted the appointment 3
of plain speaking Mark
Laidlaw (3) as the new CEO of Australia’s Mitre 10 Group. He took over unexpectedly from interim CEO, Mark Burrowes, who’d brought “a much needed period of stability” to Metcash’s newly acquired banner in less than a year.
10 years on, Mark Laidlaw has just handed over the reins to Metcash GM Merch, Annette Welsh.
As for Mark Burrowes, with Woolworths and Lowe’s having bought Danks, by 2011 he was General Manager of Woolies’ Home Timber & Hardware Group, reporting directly to the short-lived CEO of the ill-fated Masters venture, Don Stallings.
Announced as far back as 2009, with the rst Masters store opening in 2011, the disastrous Woolworths-Lowe’s home improvement venture would last just ve years, until August 2016, and cost Woolworths and Lowe’s a packet. Mark Burrowes would leave in 2014; he’s now a private equity advisor.
As an aside, as part of the Masters exit, Metcash under Mark Laidlaw would subsequently acquire Danks and Home Timber & Hardware and subsequently form the Independent Hardware Group.
What goes around comes around...
1
BUNNINGS STEALS A MARCH
From NZ Hardware Journal’s June 2010 edition, we report that Bunnings had snatched a prime site on Wellington’s Tory Street (1) from under the nose of Mitre 10.
e Tory Street Mitre 10 Home & Trade store had been one of three stores owned by former PlaceMakers top dog, Rob Vincent, which folded during 2010.
2
46 NZHJ | MAY/JUNE 2020
MORE AT www.hardwarejournal.co.nz