‘The cost of doing business has gone off the charts’ – Centra chief calls for supports to cover retailers’ higher labour costs

Ian Allen estimates said changes to the minimum wage, sick pay and leave entitlements are pushing up employment costs by around a quarter in the average Centra outlet, as he unveiled record-breaking 2023 sales and plans for 20 new stores and 500 new jobs.

“The cost of doing business has just gone off the charts, really,” he said.

“When we look at the cost pressures, they are obviously external in nature but equally government policy-related.”

He said the €250m business support fund in Budget for this year is “just insignificant, completely”.

“We want government to do more here,” he said. “We want support. We fully support the idea of all of our communities being served, getting a fair standard of living.

“The issue we face is that the cumulative effect of everything that the Government has introduced. What we want are policies to help us transition through that.”

Despite cost pressures, Centra plans to open 20 new stores this year, ­creating 500 jobs, around half of them in “the greater Leinster area”, Mr Allen said.

The plans are part of a €27m investment that includes a revamp of 40 existing stores and the cost of bringing in the new deposit return scheme, which will be live in 320 Centra locations around the country from Thursday.

Centra, which is owned by ­SuperValu operator Musgrave, currently employs around 12,000 people in its 496 Irish outlets.

Mr Allen said the business hopes to grow its revenues by around 5pc this year, following a record €2.1bn in sales last year – which was around 6pc above the previous year.

He said Centra also hopes to drop the prices of various household staples but is not ruling out price hikes if costs mount.

“We’re constantly and still getting price-increase requests from suppliers now,” Mr Allen said.

“It’s at a level that is significantly lower than it was, but it hasn’t stopped, by any means.

“Our plan is to absorb as much of that as we can possibly, before we pass it on to the consumer. And our plan is as prices drop, as commodities drop – and we are seeing some of that – we will pass those fully on to consumers.”