Sainsbury’s-owned Habitat to launch standalone stores

The first of the mini-stores – measuring 2,000 sq ft – carries a range of 600 SKUs with products from its furniture, lighting and homewares ranges.

Customers will be able to browse Habitat’s full portfolio of 4,500 products using integrated digital screens and in-store iPads.

Following its acquisition by Sainsbury’s last year – as part of the Argos deal – Habitat shop-in-shops of a similar size are being installed in large Sainsbury’s stores, and are open in London and Solihull.

The retailer hopes that investment in smaller footprint standalone and shop-in-shop formats will support its multichannel strategy, as it looks to further its online and offline brand awareness.

Habitat managing director Clare Askem said: “This is our first new standalone concept for the business so an extremely exciting time for the brand as we continue to evolve both digitally and offline with new store formats.

“A lot of our online customers in the area have highlighted that they want to physically interact with products before they buy, which the new store allows them to do as well as getting advice from our in-store colleagues.

“We’re looking forward to receiving customer feedback from this new store and building on these learnings as we look ahead to 2017 and our development of the Habitat brand.”

Habitat, which also has three London flagship stores, will open in Leeds this Saturday (January 28).