AROUND 300 Irish staff at shoe retailer Schuh are in line for a significant windfall after the company was sold.

US retailer Geneseco has paid £125 million for the UK shoe chain founded 30 years ago in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Announcing the deal, the company said it was setting aside £37.3 million of the sale price to distribute among its employees “whose work and dedication has been instrumental to our success”.

That includes hundreds of staff at Irish stores. Schuh has eight stores in the Republic, employing 312 people. A further two stores are located in Northern Ireland.

Anyone working at Schuh for more than three months is eligible for a payout under the staff windfall. A spokeswoman for the company said yesterday that the gesture meant a sales assistant with two years’ experience with the company would get a once-off payment equal to 40 per cent of salary. The maximum payment for long-serving staff is 2½ times salary. Schuh employs 2,827 people staff in 75 outlets.

Schuh founders Colin Temple and Mark Crutchley will pocket up to £25 million each.