QUINNSWORTH is to use a new brand name - Bloomfields - for its supermarket at a shopping centre under construction in Dun Laoghaire.
The Bloomfields complex is being developed by Monarch Properties in its first major project since completing The Square in Tallaght almost six years ago, Power Supermarkets, which operates the Quinnsworth and Crazy Prices multiples, is expected to target upmarket shoppers in the new store, rather than duplicate the range of goods at its existing supermarket in Dun Laoghaire.
Officially, the company is saying that it hopes to enlarge the Dun Laoghaire catchment area, though it is likely to compete directly with Superquinn's Blackrock branch, which also caters for the top end of the market.
The store's design is likely to be broadly similar to Quinnsworth's glitzy outlet in the Merrion Shopping Centre. The Bloom fields supermarket will also carry the same name as one in Bangor, Co Down, operated by the group's sister company in the north, Stewarts.
The Bangor outlet has traded exceptionally well since it opened three years ago, catering for customers within a 25-mile catchment area. Mr Don Tidey, executive chairman of Power Supermarkets and Stewarts, said he was confident that the new Bloomfields store would do equally well in Dun Laoghaire.
He said his organisation recognised that certain locations required a "stand-alone operation, free of the corporate strictures of the 130 other stores Monarch had "responded to the proposition that we wanted to break over into the boundaries of other people's catchment areas. Bloomfields will help consolidate Dun Laoghaire as the commercial and retailing centre of this area."
Apart from describing the new £10-million Dun Laoghaire supermarket as "an exciting new concept in food retailing", Powers are providing few details of the store's design, range of goods and pricing policy. The company's marketing manager, Mr Maurice Pratt, said it currently had no plans to open another Bloomfields in the Republic.
Meanwhile the group will open four more Quinnsworth outlets over the next two years: one at the Jervis Centre in Mary Street, Dublin 1, next November; another in Gorey, Co Wexford, this summer; and a third store in Monaghan next October. The fourth store is expected to be located at the new Quarryvale shopping centre, due to open in west Dublin towards the end of 1997.
The Bloomfields shopping centre in Dun Laoghaire will have 25 units shops in addition to the anchor store. The development will also include a 550-space multi-storey car-park, multiplex cinema and two restaurants.
