BOC Group Expands in Southern Germany

HAMBURG, Germany – The Bike & Outdoor Company GmbH & Co. KG (BOC) is announcing the take over of Bikemax, operating ten outlets in Southern Germany. With these stores BOC is becoming the country’s largest chain store for bicycles and bicycle products.

For this acquisition BOC Group founded a subsidiary named Bike & Sport Handels GmbH & Co. KG. This company is buying the ten Bikemax outlets officially on February 1, 2010 from its parent company Aktiv Sport AG in Weiterstadt. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Including Bikemax BOC is now overlooking nation-wide a total of 35 outlets. While Hamburg-based BOC has a good standing in the northern part of Germany most of the ten acquired Bikemax outlets are located in Southern Germany. “We made a step forward to expand into a nationwide operating company. We count with this take over on synergies in sourcing, logistics, marketing and centralized service,” is noted in a press release.

Taking the planned store openings in Bremen (5,000 m²) and Hamburg (4.000 m²) into account as well as the company’s successful online business www.boc24.de BOC Group’s sales will increase significantly to over € 120 million this year. BOC is currently  employing approximately 800 people.

Two existing Bikemax outlets - Bikemax Munich and Bikemax Weiterstadt - are not included in the takeover. Wolfgang and Robert Oelschlegel will continue as cooperating partners of BOC Group. Wolfgang Oelschlegel and his partner Axel Kuhn were the men behind Aktiv Sport AG and Bikemax.

Axel Kuhn will join the BOC Group’s management board with Thorsten Kochanek and Jens Oehler. BOC is owned by Vibro Group, the investment company of the Viehof family. Discount specialist Eugen Viehof founded German retail store chain Allkauf. In 1998 he sold Allkauf for approximately € 2.4 billion to Metro Group. Eugen Viehof is BOC Group chairman of the board.

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