This year has seen a multitude of new shopping centre openings in the UK and Build-A-Bear Workshop has taken full advantage by taking stores in five of the new retail-led developments.
To date, the American retailer has opened in Victoria Square in Belfast, Liverpool One and the Eden Centre in High Wycombe. And a further two stores are scheduled to open in the Grand Arcade in Cambridge in September and Westfield's long-awaited Westfield London in October.
"Shopping centres are important to us," says managing director of strategic bear planning Dorrie Krueger. "We have most of our stores located in or near to major shopping centres throughout the world. We bring something very unique to the centres because it really is a family focused concept. It's parents and children interacting and being in a store together."
Build-A-Bear now has 48 UK stores, and believes there's plenty of scope for further expansion. So far there's only one store in Northern Ireland and one in the Republic. "Both are places we'll continue to explore and there are still opportunities in and around London. We want to be in the new development in Bath and we're not yet in Portsmouth," says Krueger.
The retailer believes there is market potential for approximately 70 to 75 outlets in the UK and Ireland. "The economy is tough and to a certain extent will calibrate the real estate market, so we're not rushing into anything," says Krueger. "We're continuing to grow at a steady rate."
Commenting on the current credit crunch, she adds: "When it's a down time for the economy we're a very affordable place for families to go, have fun and reconnect with something that's loveable, huggable and nostalgic - the icon that is the teddy bear. That's helped us, and while I'm not saying we're going to be immune to the economic downturn, hopefully our UK operations will hold their own."
In the UK, stores have all been company owned since 2006 when Build-A-Bear purchased the company operating as The Bear Factory and at the same time bought their own franchises, which they had been building across the UK since 2003. "We converted the stores so there was just one national brand and then started our management and expansion on a company-owned basis," explains Krueger.
Outside the UK, Ireland and France (52 stores), the US (257 stores), Puerto Rico (one store) and Canada (20 stores), the Build-A-Bear Workshop also has franchise operations in a large number of other countries including Germany, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Japan, Korea, Thailand and Australia to name only a few. Despite this, the company is looking at further expansion opportunities throughout the world.
With an established online social networking site which extends the in-store experience to the virtual world, as well as an in-store party business, it's clear that Build-A-Bear has the potential to stand strong in the face of the storm.
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=== Statistics ===
build-a-bear workshop
Number of stores worldwide (including franchises): 385
Total number of company-owned stores: 330 (48 in the UK and one in Ireland)
Average store size: 1,500 sq ft selling space
Total selling space in the UK: Approximately 73,200 sq ft
Primary letting agent: CB Richard Ellis
Founder, chairman and chief executive bear: Maxine Clark
President and chief operating bear: Scott Seay
Chief financial bear: Tina Klocke
UK trading director: Roger Parry
European operations net retail sales (full year 2007): $59m (increased year-on-year by 80 per cent)
European operations net retail sales (first quarter 2008): $16.4m (increased year-on-year by 52 per cent)
European operations like-for-like sales (first quarter 2008): 14.5 per cent increase
