Portsmouth-based family furniture retailer Material Things has been the victim of significant vandalism to its store front.
Situated on Fitzherbert Road, the store suffered an attack by vandals after a car intentionally drove into the shop in the early hours of Tuesday morning (2 September 2025).
CCTV footage showed how the incident unfolded where a small car reversed into the shop’s entrance, causing major damage, which is likely going to cost the business around £10,000 to refurbish.
The incident, which has been reported to the police, is the second time the shop has been targeted, with two luxury sofas, worth £5,000, pinched during a robbery back in 2021.
Commenting on the vandalism, Matthew Gingell, Sales Director at Material Things, told Big Furniture Group: “It’s so disheartening, it’s genuinely been done as an act of mindless vandalism. We have video showing the event, they drive past, slam on their brakes, reverse back, drive in to our car park, turn around with the back of the car facing the showroom, sit for 20 seconds, turn off their headlights, slam in to the front entrance, sit for a further 10 seconds, then drive away at speed on the wrong side of the road in to a side street.
“It’s mindless. There’s clearly no intent to steal, you can clearly see on the video that there isn’t. Plus, it’s a little car, so they can’t exactly fit a sofa in it. I’ve never known anything like this in my life. At least you can rationalise the theft. Somebody steals something they want. Simple. With this, they’ve just gone out of their way to cause damage. It makes no sense.
“There’s at least £10k of damage there, the whole frontage with windows, automatic doors, and frames, all need replacing as well as a £6k corner group which has been impaled with glass. We are going to have to board the front entrance up which isn’t going to look as nice. It’s really sad because there will be a massive disruption to the business in terms of getting the front fixed.”
The business, which recently celebrated its 50th anniversary milestone (see related), will continue to operate as usual while the work is completed.
