OBI GmbH & Co. Deutschland KG is a German
multinational home improvement
The concept of home improvement, home renovation, or remodeling is the process of renovating or making additions to one's home. Home improvement can consist of projects that upgrade an existing home interior (such as electrical and plumbing), ...
supplies
retail
Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholesaler, and th ...
ing company. It is headquartered in
Wermelskirchen
Wermelskirchen (; Ripuarian: ''Wärmelßkirrshe'') is a town in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, southeast of Remscheid. It is home to one of Europe's biggest live Christmas trees (measuring 26m).
Coat of arms
...
and operates 668 stores in
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...
, of which 351 are in Germany.
History
Obi was founded in 1970 by Emil Lux, Manfred Maus and Klaus Birker with the opening of the first Obi store in the Alstertal shopping center in
Hamburg-Poppenbüttel.
In 1985 the
Tengelmann Group acquired a majority stake in Obi. The share was increased in 2007 by buying the shares of the Lux founding family.
Obi has been present in Switzerland since 1999, in partnership with the
Migros
Migros () is Switzerland's largest retail company, its largest supermarket chain and largest employer. It is also one of the forty largest retailers in the world. It is structured in the form of a cooperative federation (the Federation of Migro ...
cooperative.
It formerly had operated 13 stores in mainland
China but these were sold to
B&Q in 2005.
The company expanded in
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, a ...
in 2008, where it opened 7 stores until 2010. Due to the economic crisis and the small market share, the company decided in 2014 to close the stores, 5 of them were sold to
Jumbo
Jumbo (about December 25, 1860 – September 15, 1885), also known as Jumbo the Elephant and Jumbo the Circus Elephant, was a 19th-century male African bush elephant born in Sudan. Jumbo was exported to Jardin des Plantes, a zoo in Paris, and ...
.
Also in 2008 the company opened the first 2 stores in
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian invas ...
, followed in 2009 by a third store. They closed in 2013.
In 2015, Obi took over 68 stores from bankrupt
Baumax, 48 of which are located in Austria, 14 stores in Slovakia, two stores in Slovenia, and four locations in Czechia.
In March 2022, Obi closed all operations in Russia due to the
Russia-Ukraine war.
On April 27, 2022, the chain's stores began to resume work in Russia. The retailer sold its business to a Russian investor. The businessman Josef Liokumovich became the new owner. According to him, he acquired the Russian business of OBI for a symbolic price of 600 rubles (10 USD).
On December 9, 2022, one of OBI's Russian stores burnt down due to a chemical explosion, resulting in at least one fatality.
Operations
References
External links
*
Official German website
Hardware stores
Companies based in North Rhine-Westphalia
Retail companies established in 1970
Retail companies of Germany
1970 establishments in West Germany
German brands
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