Brown Thomas to open in Belfast

Despite the current widespread air of gloom among retailers, ongoing expansion is planned by the Brown Thomas group, including a new department store for Belfast. Paul Kelly, managing director of the company, says of Northern Ireland's capital: "that's the city for the future; I see us being there in the next five years".

At the moment, although a number of chains such as Debenhams have a presence there, Belfast has no independent department store and Kelly clearly perceives this as a gap his company could fill. The Brown Thomas group's womenswear chain A-Wear is also set to expand north of the border, with the existing two outlets in the province joined by another four over the coming year.

New A-Wear premises have recently opened in Swords, Co Dublin and in Limerick's Crescent shopping centre and during the months ahead existing sites in Dublin's Henry Street, Waterford and D·n Laoghaire are to be overhauled.

Kelly admits that Brown Thomas would have liked the opportunity to consider another department store in the State at the retail complex being built in Dundrum Shopping Centre, but this option went to the English House of Fraser group instead. Since 1995, Brown Thomas has spent some £55.5 million (€70.47m) on the refurbishment of its core set of stores, rebranding those in Cork, Limerick and Galway under the corporate name. At the moment, a further £10 million (€12.7m) has been allotted for additional work on the same group of premises. In Dublin, for example, the past year has seen work on the women's footwear, cosmetics and, most recently, contemporary menswear; the ground floor accessories department is still in the throes of a makeover. Next year, it will be the turn of first-floor womenswear and then homewares above it to be given some attention.

"This store is going to be completely transformed in the next 24 months," says Kelly, despite the fact that Brown Thomas Dublin is less than 10 years in its present location. "As business slows up in a recession, there's a temptation to ease back on capital spending. It seems to make sense, but it's dangerous because you have to go on investing wisely throughout the period. So we won't be spending recklessly - we'll be more focused on areas we see as being profit-centres for the future."

He imagines menswear to be among the strongest of those profit entres, explaining that "we have all moved on during the boom too far to go back now to what it used to be like here; if you have the right product and services, then the demand will be sustained".

Awareness of the need for constant and vigilant maintenance of both high standards and changing tastes underlies why the various Brown Thomas outlets remain successful. "The last five years have been very good for us," Kelly acknowledges. "Our growth was continuous and it peaked around the middle of this year." But he recognises that even before September 11th, circumstances were changing and business is likely to grow steadily tougher in the months ahead. "Unlike some retailers, we don't rely on mass-market tourism for our business; they don't come into our shops in their droves. But we will still experience a knock-on effect because our customers may not have as much money to spend as before."

Kelly argues that the international luxury brand sector - which is now closely associated with Brown Thomas - will survive any recession better than middle-market labels. "The luxury end is doing very well; I do think brands like Vuitton, Dolce & Gabbana and Gucci are all doing fine."

As if to underline the company's commitment to this area, next year Brown Thomas Dublin will devote specific parts of the store to a range of high-profile brands including Gucci accessories, Prada, Christian Dior and Fendi.

Although it is still far too soon to tell how the current season will fare, Kelly says that already certain areas of the business are performing particularly well, most notably cosmetics, underwear and accessories.

But he accepts that the relaxed confidence enjoyed by retailers of late has now gone and believes quality of service will be of paramount importance in a tougher economic environment.

"The country has run out of steam right now. Last year, things were so busy we weren't able to control what we were doing. I think people at this moment are still as busy as they were, but their energies are going to be in a different direction. They're going to have to be more intelligent, more focused, and in some ways that's a good thing; it's a wake-up call. Everyone will start looking at things a little differently."

While both A-Wear and Brown Thomas are due to acquire additional premises across the country, BT2 will remain a single store on Dublin's Grafton Street. Specialising in casual sporty clothing for men and women, the shop was set up because the range of labels it stocks could not be comfortably accommodated in Brown Thomas due to shortage of space.

But this is not the case in the group's other department stores, thereby negating the justification for regional branches of BT2. This careful differentiation between markets across Ireland helps to explain why Kelly continues to be buoyant when talking on the state of retailing here. "I still feel confident about the business," he concludes. "There may be a tightening for a while, but people have got used to certain products and standards and they're not going to stop spending."