Kingfisher to launch agentic AI-powered shopping across UK and Europe

The retailer said the multi-year partnership with Google Cloud will “significantly improve the online shopping experience” for its customers, moving away from “traditional keyword search on its sites towards enabling proactive, AI-driven shopping assistants”.

As a result of the partnership, B&Q, Castorama France and Poland, and Brico Dépôt France will all upgrade to Vertex AI Search for Commerce to “align with modern shopper behaviour to deliver faster, more precise” product searches, following an earlier trial with B&Q, which “has already shown meaningful results”.

Kingfisher will also be able to use the new technology to “unlock its extensive product and data catalogues to build proactive AI shopping agents”. The retailer said this in turn would “empower customers with their capability to plan complex home improvement projects, generate smart shopping lists, and execute seamless purchases”.

Kingfisher chief executive Thierry Garnier told Retail Week: “Through this partnership with Google Cloud, we are enabling our customers to search for and buy home improvement products with AI – delivering a fully personalised and easy shopping experience.

“These investments put Kingfisher at the forefront of AI-powered shopping, delivering meaningful innovation as part of our expanding digital ecosystem, and helping us to meet rapidly evolving customer needs.”

The announcement builds upon an existing partnership between the Home and DIY retail giant and Google Cloud, which has already helped Kingfisher deliver more than 20% of group sales from ecommerce in the three months to October 31, 2025.

It will also build on Kingfisher’s in-house AI platform, Athena, which the retailer launched in 2023 to power visual assistants such as Hello Casto and Hello B&Q.

Retail Week understands that the announcement will have no impact on jobs or headcount at any of the Kingfisher brands included in the partnership.