B&Q owner Kingfisher has re-hired John Colley as its group trading director, seven years after his first stint with the business, Retail Week can reveal.
Colley, who served as commercial director at Screwfix and later became B&Q’s commercial and marketing boss during a seven-year spell between 2003 and 2010, returned to the DIY group today.
Kingfisher said Colley, who stepped down as boss of Hobbycraft last year after just two months at the helm, will report directly to group chief executive Véronique Laury.
He will have responsibility for creating trading plans across the group, including within its European businesses Castorama and Brico Dépôt.
Colley will also be charged with helping Kingfisher “deliver one consistent proposition” across its different markets as Laury steps up her One Kingfisher transformation plan.
The five-year strategy is aimed at increasing the group’s annual profitability by £500m.
Kingfisher has already consolidated its supplier network, scrapping a number of ranges and re-merchandising new lines. As well as creating a more unified product proposition across the group, it is also creating a centralised IT platform.
But it blamed “business disruption” caused by the radical overhaul for a 1.3% drop in like-for-like sales during the six months to July 31.
Underlying pre-tax profits, however, edged up 0.9% to £440m during the same period.
Colley’s return to the DIY giant marks his first job since quitting Hobbycraft in September.
He left Kingfisher back in October 2010 to become chief commercial officer at equity-backed Maxeda DIY Group in the Netherlands.
Colley took the reins at the group’s Praxis fascia in April 2012, but returned to the UK in early 2015.
He became managing director of Majestic Wine’s core retail division in August 2015, spending almost two years in the role prior to his short spell in charge of Hobbycraft.
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