DIY store gives stock away as doors close

Stock was given away free at a DIY store today and looters reportedly ran amok at another branch as the business shut down.

Nearly 200 people lost their jobs when the Budget DIY chain of six stores in the North closed for good.

Administrator PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) had kept the stores open on a daily basis since being called in last Friday, but ordered the doors to close at noon.

There were chaotic scenes in the run-up to the closure, with reports of looters running up and down the aisles in the Derry store, although police said they received no formal complaint.

In Bangor, Co Down, things were handled differently. Staff told customers to take what they wanted for free.

Hundreds did and staggered out of the store pushing trolleys laden with pots of paint, tiles and other goods.

The branch at Kennedy Way in west Belfast was the only one not to open for its last few hours, following an attempted armed robbery yesterday.

Teams from PwC spent the afternoon advising the 187 staff at the stores how to fill out forms to apply for redundancy aid from the British government.

The staff were only alerted to the prospect of losing their jobs a couple of hours before the company went into administration last week. PwC said it was ensuring wages were paid up to the moment the doors closed.

The business advisers also approached a number of local employers, mostly retailers and call centres, to see if they could offer the employees work, even only for the run-up to Christmas.

The British department of enterprise, trade and investment was asked to provide an advisory service for the staff.

Budget DIY, founded in 1983, had stores in east and west Belfast, Derry, Bangor and Newtownabbey, Co Antrim.

In recent years it suffered from increased competition from chains B&Q and Homebase.

In March the share capital of the company was acquired by Star Trading, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Manchester-based Hilco Group. Unable to turn the business around it called in the administrator.

Announcing the business was closing, joint administrator Garth Calow said: "This is an unhappy position for a well-established Northern Ireland company and it is particularly difficult for staff in the run-up to Christmas."