LEADING FRENCH online retailer Cdiscount will formally launch in Ireland today.
Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Mary Coughlan will announce the creation of jobs at the company’s headquarters for Ireland and the UK in Dundalk this afternoon.
Ciarán O’Donoghue, chief executive of Cdiscount UK and Ireland, and his brother Niall, have a 25 per cent stake in the operation. Rig Investments, the venture capital vehicle of Dutch entrepreneur Henk Keilman, has also taken a 25 per cent share ,while the remainder of the equity is held by French retail giant Casino Group.
The Casino Group has 10,000 shops and employs over 200,000 staff in France, the US, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Venezuela, Colombia, Brazil, Thailand, Taiwan, Holland and Poland, where it trades under a variety of brands including Géant, Casino Supermarkets, Monoprix and Leaderprice.
Cdiscount sells a large variety of discounted consumer goods from laptops to clothing, garden furniture to wine.
The company launched its British website in January, and will launch an Irish site this summer.
Following the lead of the French operation the Irish subsidiary will open its warehouse to sell directly to the public beginning this weekend.
“We want to tap into some of the traffic heading north to Newry,” said Mr O’Donoghue.
Mr O’Donoghue said Cdiscount UK has done £7 million (€8.2 million) in sales since January and has promoted itself primarily through price comparison websites and advertising on the Google search engine.
He said the Irish subsidiary would borrow marketing techniques from France such as providing payment instalment options without requiring a credit check.
Cdiscount has taken over the Dundalk warehouse of PC manufacturer Iqon which went into liquidation in early 2008. Mr O’Donoghue was sales director of Iqon.
