Boots the chemist is to create 400 new jobs with the opening of four new stores and the establishment of a warehouse and distribution operation in Dublin.
Some 190 jobs will be created at the company's new 20,000 square feet store at the Liffey Valley shopping centre in Lucan, west Dublin which opened yesterday.
The new warehouse and distribution centre will create 50 new jobs on the back of a £1.5 million investment.
Some £5 million has been spent on the Liffey Valley store and Boots intends to open new stores in Galway, Killarney and Waterford, which will open next year.
At the moment much of the distribution for Boots is done from a centre in Belfast and the company believes substantial cost savings can be made when it is moved to Santry, Co Dublin.
The plans for 400 jobs will bring Boots total employment in the Republic to 1,000. The company has now converted all the stores it acquired from Connors and Hayes Coyngham and Robinson (HCR) earlier this year into Boots stores at a cost of £8 million.
After opening the four new stores Boots Ireland will have 27 stores in the Republic and plans to open more "when suitable opportunities arise in the main urban centres," said a spokesman.
Boots is currently reviewing its contracts with Irish suppliers to see how many will be retained in the future. Mr Clive Stanley, general manager of Boots Ireland, said the negotiations are taking place on an individual basis and that 70 per cent of the inventory in former HCR stores is Irish.
A spokesman for the company said it was impossible to say at this stage if 70 per cent of Boots overall stocks in the Republic will be Irish. "The company is negotiating with suppliers and we have to see if certain suppliers are able to fulfill the orders the stores require," he said.
Meanwhile the Dublin-based pharmacy group O'Riada yesterday said it had bought a further four shops, mostly in Dublin, bringing its total to seven, making it the fifth-largest chain in Ireland. O'Riada bought the Unicare chain of pharmacies, which has branches at Castleknock, Blanchardstown, Rathmines and Kilkenny.
O'Riada's managing director, Mr Fergus Hoban, said last night the acquisition was the first phase in a planned expansion programme. He said he could not reveal the amount paid for the four pharmacies, citing a confidentially clause in the contract. The Unicare chain was owned by Mr Kieran Pathak.
