Fascination with Zara goes well beyond its sense of fashion

For other more pragmatic individuals however, the Zara fascination stems more from the business model operated by the firm.

Zara's head of UK and Irish operations, Mr Mike Shearwood, likes to sum this up as the company's ability to concentrate all its efforts in designing and making the clothes that customers want to be wearing next week, or even tomorrow and then allowing that to happen.

This full-on focus on getting product to market means that Zara never advertises and rarely engages public relations advice.

Thus, while other stores are busy trying to convince customers to buy their goods, Zara is twisting it around by asking the customers about the kind of goods they want to buy.

It's all a nice way of saying that Zara tries to be more responsive to the market than its competitors.

Until last year however, would-be Zara customers in the Republic might have been less than convinced that the firm was even aware of their existence, never mind responding to it.

After all, Iceland, Jordan and the Lebanon were among the countries housing Zaras before the Republic got one.

Such was the pent-up demand when the first Zara store opened its doors within Roches Stores on Dublin's Henry Street last November, that the company had to set up a special delivery to make sure the shop would be stocked for the following weekend.

Mr Shearwood, who was in Dublin this week to speak at a Hamilton Osborne King event, admits that it was the firm's most successful opening day ever.

He declines, however, to put figures on the performance.

Looking back, he says the thing that most struck him about the opening day was the patience of the Irish customers, who were all very good natured in their ability to queue in the name of fashion.

Zara, meanwhile, has been "really happy" with its performance.

The arrival in Henry Street was facilitated, according to Mr Shearwood, by Mr Richard Roche of Roches Stores, a man he describes as "quite visionary".

In effect, Mr Roche solved Zara's Irish problem.

The Spanish company had been seeking a presence on one of Dublin's two main shopping streets or in a large shopping centre for about four years, but had found it impossible to locate a minimum floor space of 16,000 sq ft at a price that would allow for sufficient profits.

At Roches, the company has 20,000 sq ft and its own frontage on to Henry Street - the State's busiest shopping precinct by footfall.

Mr Shearwood is again coy on how the relationship with Roches works, but he says it is not a concession.

"Richard shared the risk of coming to market and will share in the reward," he says.

This store-within-a-store model is not, however, where Zara traditionally sees itself, with operations in other countries proving the firm's usual tendency to go it alone.

Looking to expansion in the Republic, Mr Shearwood says the firm would not rule out further linkages with Roches but it is clear that other avenues are also being explored.

A store in the new Dundrum shopping centre will open in 2005, with the company also eyeing space at Blanchardstown and Mahon Point in Cork.

Mr Shearwood has been visiting Galway and Limerick too, but has again been confronted with the lack of space issue.

And all the while, Dublin's Grafton Street, where only one- fifth of the units would accommodate Zara's needs, remains in the background.

Zara is not, according to Mr Shearwood, the kind of company to presume that customers will flock to it regardless of where it is located. Desperate Irish shoppers might see it differently, but given that Zara is renowned for getting the temperature of the market just right, it is hard to argue.

One of seven brands within the Inditex stable, Zara has been on the go for almost 30 years. It currently operates more than 1,800 stores in 48 countries and its parent has had a successful listing on the Madrid stock exchange since 2001.

In the first nine months of last year, the Inditex group - which also features names such as Pull & Bear and Massimo Dutti - pulled in profits of close to €300 million, but this did not satisfy the market, which showed its discontent by selling off Inditex shares in December.

There was a sense at the time that Zara and the rest had lost their way a little after years of doing it right.

Since then, however, the tide looks to have been turning, with brokers such as UBS Warburg and Morgan Stanley recently issuing favourable research on the stock.

Despite the immense global scale and financial strength of Inditex, the Zara brand retains a local air, with operations still based in the home region of its founder, Mr Amancio Ortega, in the North East and the bulk of designs (20,000 a year) manufactured between Spain and Portugal.

The local feel extends to another level too, with each Zara store manager directly responsible for choosing which clothes or accessories will feature in their shop, regardless of location.

This selection happens twice every week, and deliveries occur with the same frequency. And if something is not selling, the company stops making it immediately. Likewise, the best-selling items also have short runs, with Zara always aware that its customers will baulk at the notion of too many people owning the same clothes as them.

As with all Zara stores, Mr Shearwood says Dublin customers caught on very quickly to the made-to-order model, with some more devoted individuals making a point of dropping in on delivery days, just to see what might be new.

We are apparently particular fans of the more cutting edge fashion numbers.

"The Irish are very sensitive and well educated on global fashion trends," he says, pointing to internationalising factors such as the high number of Spanish holiday homes owned by Irish residents.

One potentially unwanted side-effect of this of course is that international shoppers will often return to Dublin with a claim that Zara clothes are cheaper elsewhere.

This is indeed true for some places where costs are lower (Portugal and Spain, for example) but the theory wears thin when it comes to so-called northern European countries. This means that Irish prices are on a par with those charged in Germany and Italy, and are about 12 per cent cheaper than in the UK market.

And as for those keen-as-mustard Irish customers, while Mr Shearwood will not say how extensive Zara wants its presence to be, it is clear that the brand has plenty more Irish expansion in mind.