A new Bunnings Warehouse was officially opened in Sittingbourne today by former featherweight world boxing champion Barry McGuigan MBE.

The new Bunnings Warehouse at Sittingbourne Retail Park on Mill Way replaces the former Homebase and has created 50 new full and part-time jobs. The 58,000 square feet store offers customers more than 30,000 leading home improvement and garden brands and a wide range of in-store services available from paint mixing to key cutting, a garden centre and DIY workshops for customers to learn a range of skills first hand.

Bunnings’ team members have been busy ahead of the store opening, helping with projects in the local Sittingbourne area. This included renovating an area in front of the community classroom at Canterbury Road Primary School, tidying up the external railway garden at Sittingbourne and Kemsley Light Railway (SKLR), refurbishing the gallery for local artists to display their work at Community Art Hub and revamping the benches and raised beds in the reading quadrant at Sunnybank Primary School.

“After opening our doors to customers last week we are really thrilled to have a local legend here to help us officially launch the store,” said complex manager Ian Allcock. “All of our team members undertook many hours of training and worked hard to get the store ready for customers, so meeting Barry today was a real treat.”

Bunnings plans to invest a further £500million building a new Bunnings Warehouse business in the UK and Ireland over the next three to five years.