DFS and Furniture Village are to reopen outlets in time for the bank holiday weekend after the government cleared furniture stores to restart trade. Furniture Village will reopen all 46 branches on Saturday after testing physical distancing measures in six stores including Bristol, Gillingham, Tamworth and York over the past week. DFS is set to open a handful of outlets on Friday. Fellow sofa specialist ScS said it was aiming to reopen “as soon as practically possible”. Ikea is also believed to be planning to trial a small number of stores as early as this weekend. The openings come after homewares chain Dunelm tested the water with the opening of seven stores in the Midlands on 12 May after it said the government had given it the go-ahead. The retailer has gradually reopened 39 of its 171 stores and enabled online shoppers to collect orders from the majority of stores since 12 May. The furniture retailers have taken action after the government subtly clarified its definition of “essential” retailers on 13 May to say homeware stores were included, rather than its earlier definition of “home and hardware” stores. Industry insiders said retailers had also held back on reopening because of concerns about how to safely operate deliveries of large items, such as sofas, which require two people. Charlie Harrison, the commercial director of Furniture Village, said: “We are delighted to be officially reopening all Furniture Village stores this week in line with the latest government guidance.” He said stores had been rearranged so every customer would be greeted at the entrance, where their temperature would be checked and they would be asked to sanitise their hands. Staff will have their temperature checked before entering the stores and will be equipped with protective face shields and perspex screens in front of tills. Disposable pens will be available for paperwork.