JC's sold to Dunnes Stores

ongarboy

Charles Ingles wrote: »

Ben Dunne needs to come back, Dunnes have fell apart he left

You mustn't be old enough to remember the Dunnes of the 80s and even 90s. Extremely cramped, small stores with emphasis on poor quality (St Bernard) pile em high, sell em cheap approach.

The stores today in many of their outlets are really upmarket, spacious and can sometimes look like high end department stores with lots of designer concessions and food offerings (Baxter and Green, Cafe Sol, Paul Costello, Carolyn Donnelly etc). The latest consumer surveys has it as the leading supermarket in Ireland per market share for several quarters in a row so I don't know what you mean by falling apart.

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2019/0408/1041350-kantar-supermarket-figures/

The only issue I have with Dunnes is where they shut down former large stores on the main shopping streets of towns and cities around the country and refuse to sell or let them to any other occupier to ensure there is no competition threat. It means such large and prominent buildings lie derelict for decades in some cases (Tralee, Dundalk, Wexford, Limerick all have examples of former Dunnes outlets being kept this way).

plodder

pinkypinky wrote: »

The other thing that occurs is that Dunnes have just spent a lot of money fancying up their Pavilions branch. Why would they buy another in Swords?

Look at the size of the site. It's massive. Imagine what else you could do with it.

Inquitus

Is this anything more than a random boards rumour? Haven't been able to hear anything about it beyond this thread?

PCros

Inquitus wrote: »

Is this anything more than a random boards rumour? Haven't been able to hear anything about it beyond this thread?

Nope nothing except word of mouth.

Interestingly enough though their social media has come to a halt. They used to post on Facebook every 1 to 2 days. That is strange considering the lead up to Easter which is an important period in retail.

carltonleon

PCros wrote: »

Nope nothing except word of mouth.

Interestingly enough though their social media has come to a halt. They used to post on Facebook every 1 to 2 days. That is strange considering the lead up to Easter which is an important period in retail.

Not for JCs, They have been selling all their Easter Eggs since Christmas :)

pinkypinky

They had been tweeting again before Easter. I wondered if their social media person was on hols.

plodder

Inquitus wrote: »

Is this anything more than a random boards rumour? Haven't been able to hear anything about it beyond this thread?

The rumour seems to be all over the town now. I wonder if it's a case of Chinese whispers starting off from the Lord Mayor's being closed.

micks_address

plodder wrote: »

The rumour seems to be all over the town now. I wonder if it's a case of Chinese whispers starting off from the Lord Mayor's being closed.

I don't know about the dunnes takeover but I heard from a neighbor who shops there that they were looking for 30 redundancies there from the higher paids

Uriel.

micks_address wrote: »

I don't know about the dunnes takeover but I heard from a neighbor who shops there that they were looking for 30 redundancies there from the higher paids

Yes there's a bit of a clean out from what I've heard. Including some longtermers in management. Haven't heard of a sale or a takeover though.

Dazed909

Uriel. wrote: »

Yes there's a bit of a clean out from what I've heard. Including some longtermers in management. Haven't heard of a sale or a takeover though.

Now confirmed that Dunnes are the new owners. Staff told today.

Odyssey 2005

Dazed909 wrote: »

Now confirmed that Dunnes are the new owners. Staff told today.

Sad day.

Salvation Tambourine

Dazed909 wrote: »

Now confirmed that Dunnes are the new owners. Staff told today.

That's awful, I'm a big fan of the Big Shop and loved wandering round JCs each week.

I can imagine a lot of people just moving down the round to Lidl.

Tropheus

Nokotan wrote: »

I can imagine a lot of people just moving down the round to Lidl.

They already have. That's the problem. Having a Lidl lilterally next door was a nail in JC's coffin. Very hard for a family owned store to compete with the multi-nationals.

It's odd timing given the amount of investment in the facelift.

Hopefully the staff are employed by Dunnes.

ongarboy

Nokotan wrote: »

That's awful, I'm a big fan of the Big Shop and loved wandering round JCs each week.

I can imagine a lot of people just moving down the round to Lidl.

Lidl won't have the range that JCs or Dunnes would have. As Lidl just provide a single (their own) brand of any one product - that might be fine for a lot of people but many customers want their branded Barrys Tea, Nescafe Coffee, Jacobs biscuits, Kerrygold butter etc

JCs must've been one of the last independent single managed supermarkets in the country. While Supervalus are individually managed/franchised, they still follow the overall corporate Supervalu brand/layout/pricing etc

Grolschevik

ongarboy wrote: »

As Lidl just provide a single (their own) brand of any one product -

Not any more, if they ever did.

Salvation Tambourine

ongarboy wrote: »

Lidl won't have the range that JCs or Dunnes would have. As Lidl just provide a single (their own) brand of any one product - that might be fine for a lot of people but many customers want their branded Barrys Tea, Nescafe Coffee, Jacobs biscuits, Kerrygold butter etc

I actually used to shop at Lidl and went to JCs for the variety available.

I might need to stock up on a few things over the next few weeks. Four large bottles of Peroni for €10 at the moment for starters.

pinkypinky

Really really sad to hear this.

Is there a date for official switch over?

Arthur Daley

Sad to see independent Irish retailers that cannot compete in the country anymore.

lpool2k05

Switch over is August 1st

Peatys

I'd say it was more an owner who didn't want to spend the years at the coal face like his father.

Jc's got busier, not quieter when lidl opened, as people who went to other Lidl's were using that one and dipping into jc's for the other ranges.

I don't think he's selling cause he has to.

Same fella let the Lord Mayor's staff go and no sign of even statutory redundancy.

lpool2k05

They are selling because the company is losing money every year...Too much competition and sales aren't what the used to be! The lord mayors staff got 3 weeks redundancy and that also closed because they couldnt compete and was also losing money!

All good things come to an end

Dizzyblonde

Ah that's a pity. JC's treated their staff very well and I hope Dunnes will keep any on who want to stay. It's the end of an era, that's for sure

PukkaStukka

Literally just back half an hour from there after doing a shop. I'm absolutely shocked to hear this. A great shop, great staff and very hard to understand after them spending a small fortune in recent renovations.

Homer

JC's and the Lord Mayors both owned and run by the family and both closing their doors within a few weeks of each other.. hmmm
Me thinks a decision was made to cash out the chips. Pity as I always enjoyed shopping in JC's

pinkypinky

I wish them well but wish they weren't closing. Careful consideration will have to be given as to main shop now. Pavilions parking such a pain in the bum. Aldi/Lidl not great for buying small quantities of fruit and veg.

Dizzyblonde

Homer wrote: »

JC's and the Lord Mayors both owned and run by the family and both closing their doors within a few weeks of each other.. hmmm
Me thinks a decision was made to cash out the chips. Pity as I always enjoyed shopping in JC's

As far as I know it was JC's brother who owned the Lord Mayor's. He died a few years ago too so it's more than likely his family who had been running it since and decided to sell up.

I'd imagine that selling the supermarket wasn't a decision that was made lightly, the Savage family have probably been under huge stress and have worked hard to keep it going and I wish them well. When Dunnes opened the attached store there was an agreement that they'd have first refusal should the supermarket ever be sold.

pinkypinky

Here's some of the earlier Savages on the 1901 census - running a shop on Main St.

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Dublin/Swords/Main_Street/1267170/

Tropheus

Does the Savage family own the shopping centre where JCs is located? My understanding was that they did.

I wonder if JCs is being sold to Dunnes or just closing and the premises will be leased to Dunnes. If they were making losses in recent years, leasing and having to do very little must have been attractive.

pinkypinky

Pretty sure they own the building and rent the front to Dunnes.

Uriel.

pinkypinky wrote: »

Pretty sure they own the building and rent the front to Dunnes.

Correct. I heard that Dunnes signed a 99 year lease when they took the front part.