Kahma, Daiki and Homac form DCM Japan Holdings by joint share transfer (2005)

The condition of territories that do not overlap

Atsubetsu in Sapporo, Matsuyama in Ehime, Kariya in Aichi. That the three head offices sat in three different regions is the condition that made this combination possible. What is difficult in home-centre consolidation is settling which fascia survives where stores overlap. Kahma took 53.4% of its sales in Aichi alone, Daiki was concentrated in four prefectures around the Inland Sea, Homac in Hokkaido. Partners with whom you can pool purchasing without designating a single store for closure are not easy to find. Choosing a joint share transfer rather than a merger, and leaving the three intact as wholly owned subsidiaries, was a form that simply copied that condition.

Not overlapping was also the reverse side of a weakness. The money Homac put into information systems and a distribution centre came out of the Hokkaido problem of goods crossing water. Daiki's 26.7% gross margin rested on building materials arriving at wholesale prices from its own wholesale division, and Kahma's 650-tsubo floor was a dimension fitted to the suburbs of Chubu. None of it means anything carried elsewhere as it stands. The speed with which policy merchandise was pushed to 63% of sales in the first year and 85.1% in the second was also the speed at which those non-portable parts were being pared away.