After more than 50 years serving the people of Ranelagh, Dublin 6, Jimmy Redmond of Redmonds off-licence is tickled that news of his retirement and the sale of the business has gone international.
“People have been coming out of the woodwork. I had a guy who heard from his son who lives in New Zealand. Another customer told me we were the talk of a pub in some town in Spain,” says Redmond (70) of the response to the For Sale sign appearing outside the shop. “It’s lovely to hear it and there’s genuine warmth and I suppose sadness in a way. I would like to thank people for all the support and everything over the years, and all the fun we had.”
Redmonds, an institution in the southside Dublin suburb, started life when Jimmy’s parents bought the business in 1943.
“It was primarily a grocery shop, with a four-foot unit of wine and sherry out the back. It wasn’t actually even in the store; we sold Cardinal red sherry and things like that. My parents ran it as a grocery probably for about 35 or 40 years and then my brother Aidan came into the business, followed by me about seven years later.”
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One of nine children, Redmond’s entry came at age 16; he recalls being taken out of school the week after Easter so he could start working, initially as a grocer’s apprentice. Over time, he discovered a talent for the wine business and Redmonds grew to become a grocer with a dedicated off-licence section, before the off-licence took over the whole shop in 1999.
“At the time we were told we were mad, that it would never work, but thankfully it did – it worked very well.”
The timing was driven by both declining grocery trade, as supermarkets became popular, and a growing wine-drinking culture in Ireland.
“The grocery business was becoming difficult. We felt you either had to be a specialist in something or join a group like Spar and become just another link in the chain, so we decided to focus on the off-licence, and have never looked back,” he says.
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“It was a great time to be in this trade because it was at the infancy stage where it began to blossom. People began to realise they could afford things they previously couldn’t. In those days there wasn’t really a big off-licence category in the in the multiples. The drinks trade was still pub-orientated; drinking at home hadn’t really sort of developed as it has now.”
From the customer’s perspective, Redmonds offered a wider knowledge of wine than many retailers and the brothers were known for dispensing direct, no-nonsense advice. They championed speciality spirits and good beer ahead of many others as well as importing an always interesting selection of wines.
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Redmond was also known for getting the best prices from wholesalers. Being thrown out of the shop was almost a badge of honour among sales representatives; they just needed the courage to go back in a few days later and apologise for whatever misdemeanour they had committed.
Having reached 70, Redmond feels he can look back on a happy career just off the Triangle in the heart of Ranelagh, with the off-licence providing “a dream job”.
“We got to meet fabulous people, we built great relationships with our customers and the people of Ranelagh and afar ... I’ve maintained that I’ve never worked because it’s such great fun.”
His brother Aidan retired from the business about three years ago, with another brother, Michael, also stepping back when he reached 65.
So, what will he do with his own retirement?
“I’m going to have time for myself, walk, play a little bit of golf, travel, travel a little bit to New Zealand [where his son lives] and stuff like that. Yeah, a nice easy quiet life if there is such a thing.”
He also plans to learn more about Dublin while upping his step count.
“The one thing that I really want to do is walking and to walk my city. During the pandemic we used get up very early in the morning drive the car down to, say, Hatch Street and we’d wander for hours and the city was deserted. You could just wander around and see things you never saw because you never had time. I haven’t given myself time; that’s probably my greatest failing is that I don’t make time. The shop always came first.”
