THE alcopops business is booming in Ireland. In less than a year, the market is estimated to be now worth around £29 million, with the Woodies alcoholic lemonade and fruit drinks the most popular brand with Irish drinkers.

The drinks, which first began to appear in pubs and off licences last summer, have proved less popular with concerned parents and other consumer groups, who have vehemently attacked them as encouraging teenage drinking.

Their protests echoed those which started three years earlier in Britain when the drinks were introduced there.

Mr Philip Smith, marketing director of United Beverages, the group which manufactures Woodies in Ireland, said yesterday that the situation has largely settled down here.

In Ireland, he said, around 90 per cent of the alcoholic fruit drinks are sold in pubs, compared to 60 per cent in Britain. With close to half of overall sales in the UK through off licences, he stresses that the British market place is hugely different to that in Ireland.

"We have a very responsible drinks trade here, in the main. I'm not says there isn't a teenage drinking problem, but most traders are responsible," Mr Smith stated.

The drinks, which taste like lemonade or fruit juice, have an average alcohol content of 4.5 per cent. The main consumers are women between 23 and 30 years of age, as well as those who prefer to mix fruit juices and soft drinks to disguise the taste of alcohol.

Sales of Woodies account for around 60 per cents of the Irish market, with Hooch, Corky's and Mugshot among the other strongly performing brands.

Hooch is produced by Bass Breweries.