A builders’ merchant is “a good bell weather of the local economy” because customer trends can indicate how confident they feel about making purchases and how they perceive the current economic situation.
According to Christopher Dickey, Manager at T. Dickey & Co. in Irvinestown: “There has been a welcome return to housing development and you are seeing that followed up by purchases.”
He said: “We are a good bell weather of the local economy because we have such a broad offering. We can see if people are renovating, painting, if they are building. It’s good to see people being able to acquire their own home.”
The family business was established by Christopher’s grandfather Thomas Dickey in 1942 and was initially situated on Irvinestown’s Main Street for a number of decades. Christopher’s father John Dickey was 19 when his father died. John took over the business in 1969 and developed the Mill Street site, which used to be the Corn Sheds on the old Bundoran railway line. The business operated on the two sites until 15 years ago when the family made the decision to move all operations (retail, hardware and manufacturing) under one roof on the four-acre site.
Meanwhile, Christopher Dickey studied Structural Engineering at Newcastle University after leaving Portora. He spent six years working as a Structural Engineer in Belfast before deciding to move home to Fermanagh to raise a family and to join the family business on a full-time basis.
He is now responsible for roof truss manufacturing.
“Fermanagh is a nice place to raise a family. I was fortunate that I had a family business to come into. I was coming in at a time of unprecedented change and difficult trading. It’s nicer now that there has been an uplift in the building industry,” he said.
Reflecting on the economic downturn, he explained that the business was “massively impacted, mainly in manufacturing.” He said: “We were impacted by bad debt. You then relied on your core retail business, servicing your natural, local customers.
“We sought further efficiencies and we rode out the storm until the market picked up again.”
He added: “We did keep trying to improve things. It led to conversations about whether we should reduce in size. But we still felt that the market would always need a builders’ merchants and we would have a place in that market. We implemented incremental changes.”
Mr. Dickey commented on “the readjustment of trading in retail and in the builders’ merchants throughout Northern Ireland,” saying: “A few have gone out of business, there have been acquisitions, a few have scaled back, a few have expanded. The decisions we’ve made in the past it has always led to great self-sufficiency. We’ve always been able to service the customer ourselves through manufacturing and our own supply lines.”
He continued: “We have a very accessible product that makes it very easy for the customer. If you go to Belfast, you don’t have a hardware store like ours. We rely on people visiting the county on the weekends and during the summer. They love coming in here because they love that personal service and the fact you have the product there - it’s a rural way of meeting the need of the customer.
This accessibility comes with challenges in that, the larger the site, the higher the rates which must be paid.
“For me to exist, I have to have a site that holds the stock and distributes the stock. My stock is really bulky. I could be slightly more efficient with space, but my customer enjoys the fact he can access the product. That is not taken into consideration in the rates,” said Mr. Dickey.
He is “not opposed to the rates going up” … “provided the Council is seeking the best efficiency and is accountable for their decision making.”
Responding to Fermanagh and Omagh District Council’s decision to increase the district rate by three per cent, he said: “The three per cent agreed would seem large in the current market.”
He added: “Rates continue to offer challenges for business. It’s a large commitment to meet and it can impede expansion.”
Despite an increased rates bill, in the forthcoming financial year the business “is in a good position for expansion,” he stated.
Operating from a rural county like Fermanagh means overcoming the challenge of offering the customer a competitive price.
“The scale of Fermanagh makes that a challenge but through buying groups we are able to meet our customers’ expectations,” Mr. Dickey said, referring to Dickey’s joining the MICA national buying and marketing group over 15 years ago.
Asked how the lack of a functioning Executive is affecting local businesses, he replied: “The current political situation hasn’t offered any optimism for business.”
On Brexit, he stated: “There are no conclusive answers from politicians or economists. We have extensive supply lines throughout Europe which means we wouldn’t be sheltered from any Brexit outcome. Until the facts are established, there is very little we can do.”
Mr. Dickey concluded: “I like my job because I like dealing with people and being able to offer a solution to the customer. We are always trying to be better in our business offering and making sure the customer is happy – it takes an awful lot of hard work to achieve that.”