Well, it took a good 30 seconds to figure out where I was waking up this morning but once the jet lag cobwebs cleared, I found myself in Wermelskirchen, Germany (home of OBI) beginning another week of meetings with a Presidents Council member and leading European DIY retailers.
OBI is Europe’s original Home Center. They added 60 stores in 3 weeks at the end of 2015 taking over many former BAUMAX locations in Austria. Today they are Germany’s largest DIY chain operating 589 stores in Germany, Italy, Austria, Hungary, Bosnia, Czech Republic, Russia and Switzerland with an annual turnover of around $5.3 Billion USD.
We head west this afternoon toward Belgium and France.