Homebase


Homebase

Homebase is one of the biggest home improvement and garden centres in the country that sells everything for the home including building and hardware equipment, soft furnishings, furniture, garden sheds, power and manual tools, bathroom fixtures and fittings, plumbing, lighting, painting, decorating and garden materials. It was founded by Sainsbury's as a subsidiary of the supermarket chain in 1979. You will find more than 200 stores up and down the UK, open throughout the week at varying times from location to location. Although the size does to an extent dictate the availability of certain items, they are still one of the best sources of great deals and offers on DIY and gardening equipment.

Homebase Opening Times  and Locations

While a Homebase can be found in most cities, London is where the largest number of establishments can be found in an area. After that, it's places like Derby and Norwich that have more stores than the other 150+ cities that are home to one. Homebase can be found easily, even in a busy retail park, thanks to their large green signs, white writing, save for the orange O.

Homebase opening times may vary from branch to branch, however the Homebase opening times are usually from 8am to 8pm, Monday to Saturday, with a slight variation from 10am to 4pm on Sunday. It goes without saying that on special occasions, such as Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year's Day and Easter Monday, there could be different Homebase opening times and closing times. Find the opening times for a Homebase branch near you using the store locator.

5 Things You Didn't Know About Homebase

That green sign with the white writing and the striking orange circle is something that we are all incredibly familiar with. However, unless you studied Homebase as part of your university dissertation or just were really bored one night looking at Wikipedia, there's lots you could still learn about the company. Therefore, we have gathered together five of our favourite fast and fun facts about Homebase.

  1. The Homebase Spend & Save loyalty card has been used in their stores since 1982 and considered one of the first of its kind.
  2. Wesfarmers was forced to sell Homebase to Hilco Capital for £1. The Australian organisation originally spent £340m to purchase it two years previously.
  3. The actual cost of the Homebase deal for Wesfarmers is likely to total at around £1b after costs and losses are taken into account.
  4. Between 1999 and 2005, Leslie Ash and Neil Morrissey, who played a couple in the hit comedy series Men Behaving Badly, became the face of Homebase.
  5. Girls Aloud's Love Machine was used in advertisements between 2006 and 2009, while Peter, Bjorn and John's track Young Folks was used from 2009 to 2013.

Products

At any Homebase establishment, you will find a huge array of different DIY and gardening equipment and materials. The main categories are tools, building & hardware, outdoor living, garden, kitchens, lighting & electrical, bathrooms & plumbing, paint & decorating and storage & home. Simply put, anyone who is looking to carry out any work on their home or property, whether it's a full revamp, decorating or adding new pieces of furniture and accessories to inject new life, will find what they need at Homebase. There will be variations on the sheer scale of their inventory from store to store, depending on the size of individual establishments, but there will definitely be a wide variety available.

It's really not surprising that the company had the advertising slogan 'make a house a home',  especially when you consider that they've essentially got everything from structural raw materials, equipment and tools to those little finishing touches that really make a building feel complete. You will find that timber, sand, cement and insulation can all be purchased from Homebase, along with furniture for all rooms in the home and exciting extras like hot tubs.

A Brief History

In 1979, Homebase was founded by the partnership of GB-Inno-BM, the Belgian retailer and Sainsbury's. It was originally named Sainsbury's Homebase and aimed to bring the same approach that the supermarket chain had to groceries and food shopping to the DIY market in the UK. Croydon was the location for the very first Homebase shop, when it opened on Purley Way on March 3rd, 1981.

By January of 1995, the company had expanded to three times the size it was in the beginning, largely due to the acquisition of the then Ladbrokes-owned Texas Homecare. All of the Texas Homecare branches were given a complete facelift and rebranded as Homebase. Sainsbury's continued to add and expand to the Homebase family of stores. The DIY chain has changed ownership a number of times though, with Home Retail Group acquiring it and then eventually Wesfarmers ill-fated ownership. It is now owned by Hilco Capital and while there have been job cuts and store closures, it's still many people’s go-to place when they need DIY and garden products.

More Department stores in the UK

Homebase closed? Then try one of the other Department stores nearby.