Eason ‘making stationery sexy’ as redeveloped flagship store opens

We’re making stationary sexy — the head of retail development, David Field, says of the newly redeveloped flagship Eason store on Patrick St in Cork City.

After investing €1.1m in the new store, Eason & Son is bidding to expand itself beyond being Ireland’s largest retailer of books and become a destination shop — a one-stop shop where customers can browse the shelves and find books, gifts, stationary and newspapers.

The investment is part of a €20m retail development programme that Eason hopes will help it capitalise on the goodwill customers have for the retailer. The redeveloped Patrick St outlet is part of Eason’s restructuring plan designed to achieve significant cost savings of €8m per annum.

“The new chief executive Conor Whelan has set out a business strategy that places the retail offering at the heart of the business.

“If we don’t get that right we’ll be on the back foot. If we can’t get our retail strategy right our downfall will become a self-fulfilling prophecy,” said Mr Field.

Eason embarked on the largest customer research project it had ever undertaken. The retailer talked to customers, authors, publishers and even its bankers to find out what it is that people wanted from Eason.

“The customers turned around and said we love your brand. It was incredible the amount of people who said I can remember being brought in on a Saturday to get a magazine. There was great affinity to the brand, but people felt the stores were tired and people couldn’t find what they were looking for. They weren’t sure what Eason stood for anymore,” said Mr Field.

The customer research resulted in Eason pursuing a new strategy, ‘Eason for everything’, which led to the marketing campaign, ’Whatever your into get into Eason.’

The flagship store takes this a step further by introducing zones to cater for customers — a body and soul area, gift, teen and children’s fiction area and an e-reader shop where you can get e-readers and e-books.