Business

Dunnes Stores set to close Portadown branch

Dunnes Stores at High Street Mall, Portadown is set to close
Dunnes Stores at High Street Mall, Portadown is set to close Dunnes Stores at High Street Mall, Portadown is set to close

DUNNES Stores is to close its Portadown branch with the loss of 50 jobs, staff have been told.

Workers at the High Street Mall outlet were given 30 days' notice after being called in by management on Tuesday.

Staff were told the store, an anchor tenant at the shopping centre "isn't viable".

It will be a major blow for the centre which has lost a number of retailers in recent months and was recently sold to new owners.

The closure comes after Dunnes shut its outlet at Connswater Shopping Centre in east Belfast in February.

Portadown employees have expressed concern the store could close "within weeks, even days" given the sudden nature of other Dunnes closures this year.

There were protests after the retailers closed its shop in Gorey, Co Wexford in May, seemingly without notice.

Meanwhile, a branch in Bradford was shut with immediate effect in February with the only notice a sign erected for customers outside the store.

"It seems that all the jobs are going, they didn't mention redeployment," a worker told the Portadown Times.

"We will know more on Friday when directors are believed to be coming up from Dublin,

"We're shattered and so many of our faithful customers are really annoyed.

"Dunnes have been a good firm to work for. Some of the staff have been here since they opened at Magowan Buildings about 35 years ago.

"As a Dublin-based firm, they bravely survived the trouble that affected Portadown so much, but it seems they can't survive the economic depression that has hit the town centre."

The Portadown branch sells clothes, homeware, and groceries.

Its closure will come as a major set back to the new owners of the mall, Hillsborough-based Brittas Properties which bought the centre in February.

The mall, built in 1996 at the site of the former Irwin's Bakery, was put on the market last year for £2.8 million.

It recent years, it has lost major names including Mothercare, Internacionale, Clinton Cards, Game and Woolworths.

Dunnes Stores operates 152 stores, mainly in the Republic with 21 in the north and others in Britain and Spain.

The company failed to respond to a request for comment on the latest closure.