Home improvement and garden retailer Bunnings Warehouse officially opened its doors in Rochdale today (03 January), creating over 80 full and part time jobs, after announcing that Rochdale would be on the list for future Bunning locations back in September.

The new store in Sandbrook Park, is the biggest Bunnings Warehouse yet, at over 110,000sq ft and occupies a former B&Q unit on the retail park. When Kingfisher announced it would be pulling out of the site, plans had been submitted to redevelop it and introduce several new retailers to the park, including Wickes and a B&M Home store, as well as a leirure outlet, KFC restaurant and Travelodge hotel.

The application, submitted by developers AIG Holdings in November 2016 would have seen part of the B&Q store demolished, with the remainder converted into five separate commercial units. Whilst the development was given the green light by Rochdale council in July 2017, Bunnings submitted a successful application to occupy the entire site the following month.

The huge store will offer customers more than 30,000 leading home improvement and garden products from a wide range of global market-leading brands. Other services include everything from paint mixing to key cutting, a garden centre, timber cutting and in-store DIY Workshops.

Bunnings’ team members have already been busy ahead of today’s store opening, helping with projects in the Rochdale area. These included restoring the play area and garden for pupils at Sandbrook Community Primary School and fitting a new fire place at the Carders Court Residential & Nursing Home.

Rochdale Complex Manager, Richard Hammond, said: “All our team members have worked really hard to get the store ready for opening and have undertaken many hours of training to make sure we have the expertise to help customers with home or garden projects.”

To celebrate the opening, Paul Parker, former professional footballer is joining a welcome breakfast for team members.

Paul said: “I’ve had a fantastic time celebrating with the team members here at Bunnings this morning. I’m certain that the store will be a great addition to the Rochdale community”

The store will host two weekends of events on 6/7 and 13/14 January, where customers can enjoy a range of family activities including the famous Bunnings Sausage Sizzle, face-painting, balloon modelling and even join Peppa Pig & George for a Story Time session (see in store for details).

Bunnings, the leading retailer of home improvement and garden products in Australia and New Zealand, acquired Homebase for £340million in February 2016 – and plans to invest a further £500million building a new Bunnings Warehouse business in the UK and Ireland over a five-year plus timeframe.