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PEOPLE POWER

Why should you have to travel to
Balbriggan,
Trim,
Ardee,
Dundalk
to have a
VARIETY of shopping.

By Kathleen Barrington

When Kathleen Ward read in the local paper that Meath County Council had turned down planning permission for a discount store in her native Trim, she "went mad".

In a country more used to residents objecting to developments, Ward is unusual.

She mounted a campaign in support of Lidl opening just a short walk from her home.

Ward returned to Ireland from Germany seven years ago to look after her mother. Now working as a childminder three days a week, she says she found Trim expensive for food and clothes due to lack of competition.

Trim has only one large supermarket, a SuperValu. It also has a number of convenience stores, including a Centra and a Spar.

The nearest supermarkets are in Navan, about 14 kilometres away, which has a Dunnes Stores and a Tesco. There are a number of supermarkets, including a Lidl discount store, at Blanchardstown Shopping Centre about 25 kilometres away.

But Ward cannot easily make the journey to the other shopping centres, though many of her neighbours around Athboy Road in Trim regularly drive to Lidl, Tesco and Dunnes Stores seeking better value.

As far as clothing is concerned, none of the major chain stores operates in Trim. "We cannot go into boutiques to buy clothes, because people cannot afford to buy them," Ward said. "I would like to see a Penney's store here."

Ward may have to bide her time before she gets a discount clothing store. But Trim is set to get its own discount supermarket - thanks, in part, to her efforts.

Lidl's arrival follows a campaign by Ward and her neighbours to reverse a decision by Meath County Council to refuse the German discounter planning permission for a store on the outskirts of the town.

Ward was so annoyed about the decision that she decided to collect signatures urging the council to reverse it.

She contacted her neighbour Bridget Gaynor, who in turn contacted another neighbour, Mags McGivern. The three women agreed that Trim needed more competition in the supermarket sector, and got involved in organising a petition.

In an interview with The Sunday Business Post, they said their main concern was to see another supermarket in Trim - regardless of whether it was Dunnes,Tesco or Lidl - to provide consumers with a choice.

Ward stressed that she had no quarrel with SuperValu, even complimenting supermarket owner Steven Nally on the quality of service in his store.

Gaynor said she was particularly annoyed when she saw one Meath councillor shopping in the Lidl store in Blanchardstown after the council had refused Lidl planning permission in Trim.

McGivern was angered by the apparent mismatch be-tween political rhetoric and the reality experienced by consumers. "It's all about value for money," she said. "Mary Harney tells us to shop around. How can we shop around when we've no choice?"

"I feel there is a great need for a competitive market in Trim," she said. "People are already travelling to Blanchardstow n, Navan and eve n Mullingar to shop.

"Why? Because they find it worked out better value for them. Do the people in authority really think they know better than the rest of us?"

Others local people, including Bridie Tully and John Shanley, became involved in the campaign. Shanley, a pensioner, estimated that the cost of his weekend shop should fall to €20 - comparedwiththe €50 he was spending - once Lidl opened its doors on the Athboy Road.

"We wanted a cheap supermarket. There is only one supermarket, and we need more shops. One shop is not good enough. The more competition the better," he said.

The group said they succeeded in collecting about 2,000 signatures from a town with a population estimated at about 7,000. They said they submitted the signatures to the council and later collected a further 1,000 signatures.

And while some sources in the grocery trade dispute the numbers, it appears the group collected enough signatures to force the county councillors to review the situation.

Fianna Fail councillor Jimmy Fegan said he sought a change in the council's retail strategy to give the discounters a chance of success in future planning applications. The revised plan allowed discounters in out-of-town locations.

Fegan said he took the initiative after being approached by Ward in the wake of Lidl's initial failed planning application. He said he arranged for two Lidl managers to meet the planners to discuss their concerns.

According to some of the councillors, it was the planners who were strongly opposed to Lidl setting up in Trim. The planners wanted to concentrate development in the centre of the heritage town rather than on the outskirts, where Lidl had applied to build.

They feared that if business were attracted to the outskirts of the town, the town centre would lose out. They also objected to the design proposed by Lidl.

Fegan said he was bewildered by the planners' "resistance to anywhere other than the town centre".

But people on the Athboy Road accuse the politicians of jumping on the Lidl bandwagon in anticipation of the local elections this June.

They indicated that they were more used to politicians doing the bidding of the local Chamber of Commerce. "People felt the Chamber of Commerce should not take our choice away," said McGivern.

Last summer, for instance, Athboy Road resident Felix Gallagher wrote a letter to the Meath Chronicle after the councillors suddenly signalled a change in the retail strategy that would facilitate discounters such as Lidl opening on the outskirts of the town:

"Cllr Fegan's intervention is a reaction to the petition being carried out inTrim to allow the Lidl application to go ahead," he wrote.

"This lobbying would not have been necessary had Cllr Fegan and his colleagues not endorsed this anti-competitive legislation.

"All this in the same month that Mary HarneyTD puts the blame for inflation on consumers for not shopping around.

"Unlike the Tanaiste, I do not have access to the state helicopter to do my shopping and have to drive to Navan or Blanchardstown for competitive prices.

"In the county council elections next year, I will be shopping around with my vote."

When Lidl appealed the matter to An Bord Pleanala, Ward, Gaynor and McGivern also sent letters to the board saying they supported the establishment of the discount supermarket close to their homes. They say they had to pay €20 each to make their submissions.

They were delighted when Lidl finally got its planing permission on appeal in February this year, subject to certain amendments to the scheme. The German discount store is in discussions with the town planners about the amended scheme.

Ward hopes the new store will be open in time for Christmas, though no firm opening date has been announced.

Butwhile thesiteon the Athboy Road is still a green field, the residents are already feeling the benefits that even the threat of competition can bring. They say that Nally's SuperValu in Trim has been cutting prices in recent months.

This may be partly a reaction to the fact that consumers were travelling to rivals in Navan to shop.

But residents reckon that the threat of a Lidl setting up in town has also concentrated minds.

Earlier this month, for instance, Nally's SuperValu in Trim took out half-page ads in the local media promising to "match or beat any prices that our competitors compare to ours in an advertisement".

The ads were directed primar ily at Dunnes Stores, which later in the month responded with a full page ad under the banner headline: `Are you finding SuperValu expensive?' It said: "Compare our prices to `Nally's SuperValu' Trim . . . Your pocket tells the difference!"

The activism of Trim consumers may have come as a surprise to local business and political interests. But it appears to bear out a warning from Ben Dunne in an exclusive interview with this newspaper last year.

At the time, the former supermarket tycoon said that existing supermarkets were under severe threat from the discounters - consumers would vote with their feet.

"The discounters haven't really done the damage yet," he said. "But they will get there, because the consumer will want them.

"The consumer will win, because if there is somebody giving the consumer the right product at the right price, the consumer will get it."