Ireland is "being colonised by the cheque book", according to the owner of a Co Mayo family business facing closure.
Peter Shanley, Westport, said that competition from multiples had made it impossible for his drapery business to compete and the shop is due to close shortly.
"Unfortunately, we don't have the population in the west of Ireland and our activity has become a bit like farming, in that the value of land is now greater than the business associated with it," he told The Irish Times.
Shanley's has traded as a drapery for about 150 years - initially owned by another family and taken over by Mr Shanley's grandfather. Its manager, Cecil Horkan, has been with the shop for almost 50 years.
"Cecil Horkan has been the public face of Shanley's and there is nothing that happens in Westport that he doesn't know about, or can't talk about with customers," Seán Staunton, a long-time customer and former editor of the Mayo News, said yesterday.
"His personal touch and that of his staff, is something we will all live to regret in this culture, where businesses feel that they can operate on a 'get them in, get them out' basis," he said.
The company will maintain its Cloona Design Shop in the same building in Bridge Street, Westport.
The imminent wind-up of the drapery comes just months after several family businesses in Galway have decided to opt out - including Kennys book shop, which is now trading solely on the internet.
The Kenny Gallery, in the bookshop building, is due to move to new premises.
Griffin's Bakery, founded by John Griffin in Galway in 1876, also announced that it would be closing this year. An Taisce has expressed concern about the trend which will, it says, have a detrimental impact on the urban landscape.
"It would seem to An Taisce that Galway has lately come into the grip of accountants, auctioneers and developers, whose only apparent interest is to maximise their own financial returns," Derrick Hambleton of the Galway branch said in a comment on the bakery's future.
