Super Quinn
Superquinn was founded in
1960 by Senator Feargal Quinn, who opened its first store in Dundalk. In his
time, Superquinn was famed for its fresh produce, innovation and personal touch
but it lost its way in recent years with sales declining by 22 per cent over
the past decade.
Mr Quinn and his family
cashed out in 2005 by selling the business for €420 million to Select Retail
Holdings, a consortium of property investors that included Bernard McNamara.
It traded over six decades,
saw off nine Taoisigh and weathered a few economic storms but from February
next year the Superquinn brand will check out of the Irish grocery market.
Musgraves
Cork wholesale group
Musgrave, which acquired the business for €229 million in October 2011, has
decided to ditch the Superquinn name and rebrand its 24 supermarkets under the
SuperValu banner.
This will result in the loss
of 102 jobs at Superquinn’s administrative base in Lucan in Dublin over the
next 18 months as the brands are merged.
Marks and Spencer’s
M&S to close four Irish
shops with loss of 180 jobs
Separately, British retailer
Marks & Spencer will close four of its Irish stores later this months with
the loss of 180 jobs.
Super Quinn Development potential
This group had planned to
capitalise on the development potential from Superquinn’s many sites in the
capital but these hopes were dashed when the economy crashed in 2008.
Speaking at the Dublin Horse
Show yesterday where he was judging trade stands, Mr Quinn said the demise of
the Superquinn brand was a bittersweet moment for him.
“From my point of view, I’m
happy that it lasted 53 years,” he said. “I would have loved the name to have
stayed for another couple of hundred years but you don’t win them all and I
think that Musgrave know what they are doing. It’s eight years since I left so
it’s no longer my baby.
