Discount retailer announces 100 jobs and 12 new stores

DISCOUNT retailer Euro General Retail has announced the creation of more than 100 jobs and confirmed the opening of a further 12 stores.

The company operates a network of discount €2 or less shops across the country and owner and chief executive Charlie O’Loughlin said yesterday that it is the firm’s first expansion since 2007.

Mr O’Loughlin said the new stores will open between now and September with 50% in Dublin and the remainder outside the capital.

He said: “We stopped expanding in 2007 because the rents were so crazy and so high. There are now more favourable rents available.”

He said the expansion would create “somewhere north of 100 jobs”, adding: “We see potential to open even more stores. We are much more competitive than we were seven or eight years ago.”

Mr O’Loughlin said some of the new stores will be based in Westport and Sligo and the first stores will be opened in the next four to five weeks.

Mr O’Loughlin opened his first discount store on Dublin’s Moore Street in 1990 and the company now employs 500 people in 50 stores across the country.

Accounts recently filed by Euro General Retail to the Companies Office show revenues of €48 million in the 12 months to the end of May 10 last year – a drop of 4.5% on the €50.3 million turnover for 2009. The company’s gross profit margin increased 7% to 35%.

The report states the directors “consider the results for the year and the position of the group at the year end to be satisfactory”.

The figures show that pre-tax profits at the company last year declined 30%, from €3.6m to €2.5m.

Mr O’Loughlin said: “The market is very tough, but we are trading okay. We have pared back costs.”

He claimed his discount stores are the largest seller of greeting cards in Ireland, selling 10 million each year.

However, he expressed frustration with the response by some landlords to renegotiate leases for a number of the existing shops.

He said: “We have had a mixed response. Some landlords have been quite helpful, but where properties are owned by pension funds, they are completely and utterly unmovable.”

The company had €14.3m in accumulated profits in May of last year. The firm had a depreciation charge of €1.86m last year

The figures show the company donated €25,000 to charities last year.