Howdens has outlined new plans to open a further 30 depots before the end of the year, comfortably taking the trade kitchen giant past the 900 locations milestone.
As revealed in the company’s latest trading update, Howdens confirmed it was looking to invest roughly £30m this year to support its ongoing growth. As part of this, it has plans to open 25 new depots in the UK, and an additional five depots in the Republic of Ireland.
To put that into perspective, at the end of 2025 Howdens confirmed it owned a total of 892 depots.
In addition to these proposed new stores, Howdens says it also plans to refurbish around 45 of its older UK depots before the end of 2026 as well.
Across the first 16 weeks of the year, Howdens also reported seeing a 3.5% year-on-year increase to its UK revenue. Outside of the UK, the kitchen company said its International turnover also saw an increase of 9.1%.
Discussing its turnover boost, Howdens said it successfully implemented price increases across all of its territories at the start of this year in a bid to “optimise the balance between margin and volume”.
Providing an update on the expansion of its Runcorn manufacturing facility – which the company has previously said will be “one of the largest cabinet production lines in the world” once completed – Howdens said expansion of the site is progressing as planned.
Looking ahead to the rest of the year, Howdens said it is “confident” about its business prospects for the rest of 2026, noting that its sales are usually weighted towards the second half of the year given the peak Autumn trading period.
Although it manufactures all of its kitchens within the UK, Howdens reassured customers that its supply chain “remains robust despite the ongoing instability in the Middle East”. The trade kitchen giant says it is maintaining good stock availability to continue to support its customers, and that it has hedged its fuel expenses through to the end of the year.
In related news, Howdens enjoyed steady group revenue growth of 4.1% across 2025 as a whole, pulling in sales of £2.4bn last year.