Published on January 18, 2006

Central Power Retail plans to invest Bt500 million to open a stand-alone branch of homeWorks in Pattaya in the second half of the year, following the

opening yesterday of the outlet’s first such branch at Phetkasem soi 65 in Bangkok.

Vice president Pong Skuntanaga said the company had invested Bt500 million in the first stand-alone homeWorks furniture and home decoration store at Phetkasem soi 65 because consumer behaviour has changed to buying home decorations at furniture outlets rather than at department stores.

As well as the new stand-alone store, there are nine branches of homeWorks within Central department stores.

Pong said Central Power Retail believed the stand-alone stores would attract 20 per cent more customer spending than the homeWorks branches within department stores because of the greater variety of goods on offer.

Currently, consumers spend an average of Bt1,500 per visit to department store branches.

With customers enjoying higher purchasing power, Pong expects sales of Bt350 million from the first stand-alone homeWorks store at Phetkasem soi 65 this year, increasing to Bt400 million next year.

This will lift homeWorks’ overall sales to Bt2 billion by the end of the year, an increase of 33 per cent over last year’s Bt1.5 billion.

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