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PAUL MCENTAGGART OPENED The Foot Shop on Main Street in Naas in 2012, with high hopes for the future.
Paul felt that the north Kildare town would be a great place to start his business, which aimed to sell footwear for people with specific orthopaedic needs.
However, after four years in Naas Paul says he’s now forced to shut the doors on his business.
“I was abroad for a long time and I came home and wanted to be a success story,” says Paul, who is originally from Clondalkin in Dublin.
“I’m not naive, I’m not stupid but I genuinely thought I had a good product.”
But you’re hit with a brick wall here. People just don’t want to come to Naas.
The Foot Shop in Naas is the latest in a string of retail businesses closing in the town, which has a population of about 20,000 and sits about a 45 minutes drive from Dublin.
Kate Conway, the owner of Top Drawer Boutique – which has been present in Naas in some form for 100 years – announced recently that her shop would also be closing its doors.
“It has become almost impossible for small traders to survive in the town,” Conway told the Leinster Leader last week.
Mattimoe’s Londis – which was present in the town for over 30 years – also closed its doors for the final time last month.
The closures are compounded by other business ceasing trading in recent years. Estimates are that over 40 businesses have closed in the town in the past decade.
The closures include high-profile chains and franchises like Penneys, Marks and Spencers and Superquinn as well as multpile smaller, independent outlets.
“Its feels like the Naas Main Street has been forgotten,” says Paul. “They’ve taken the heart and soul out of the town.”
If you look at the small towns across the country it’s the same thing.
What’s happening in Naas?
The people closing their businesses in Naas list a number of issues the town has been facing, one of the principle of them being parking.
“There’s no car park spaces for people here,” says Paul.
Business owners state that parking spaces in the town are at a minimum.
With the closure of Superquinn in 2011, shoppers lost the use of the 60-space surface car park there. Superquinn shut its doors as a result of its lease expiring.
The building in which it was situated was located was owned by Penneys (who operated a smaller outlet store nearby).
Penneys had plans to redevelop the site into a bigger store in the centre of the town but in 2015 it announced it would be leaving Naas altogether and cancelled the development plans after closing its store there.
Compounding the parking issue is the site of a planned 16,000 square metre shopping centre which been a fixture in the centre of the town for the past seven years
The cranes still hang above the Naas skyline from the project, which was abandoned and the loans on it transferred to Nama. Over 200 car parking spaces were lost when construction began on the site.
If the centre was to be developed it would provide hundreds of car park spaces in the town
On top of the parking situation, retailers point to the opening of the huge Tesco store on the outskirts of the town as drawing business away from the centre.
“I think there’s been a number of things that have happened to Naas in recent years,” Catherine Murphy, Social Democrats TD For Kildare North tells TheJournal.ie.
Murphy points to the opening of the Tesco store, the closing of Superquinn on the Main Street and the lack of parking which she says “undermined the Main Street at a critical time”.
It’s lost the vitality that it used to have. There use to be a variety of shops.
Council plans to pedestrianise Poplar Square are also being met with resistance from local retailers, as the plans would further reduce the number of parking spaces in the town.
“It’s going to take more car park spaces,” says Paul McEntaggart.
They’re choking the town of life – they’re suffocating it.
Online shopping
Alan Shine, CEO Kildare North Chamber of Commerce, paints a different picture of businesses in Naas.
“I would say that there has been a lot of openings recently,” he tells TheJournal.ie.
He points towards the recent opening of Meadows & Byrne homeware store in the centre of the town as an example of improved business
Shine says that Naas is “striding forward and going forward” as a town with strong restaurants and higher-end fashion boutiques.
“Naas like any other urban town close to Dublin is competing with the likes of Dundrum, Liffey Valley and Kildare Outlet Village,” says Shine.
He says that problems exist for the retail sector of many towns in Ireland.
“I think the retail sector is continuing to struggle and compete with out of town and online,” he says.
Shine says that hotel and restaurants are doing good business in the town, stating that Osprey’s Hotel and Lawlor’s Hotel are both adding rooms to their dwellings.
He also states that the Punchestown Racing Festival in April should bring 120,000 people through the town.
He did state that any further loss of car park would not be acceptable, however.
Hopeful
In a statement to TheJournal.ie Kildare County Council pointed to a number of investment projects and initiatives it was undertaking in Naas.
These include:
In relation to the Naas shopping centre Nama site, the council said that a decision in regards to the sale of the site was “imminent”.
“Kildare County Council officials are working non-stop with a clear focus on facilitating appropriate development on the site in question,” a spokesperson says.
Despite these commitments and plans, retailers in Naas say that the town is suffering.
A new group called Naas Against Authority Sabotage met in the town last Friday to express anger at the business closures and the view that the council wasn’t doing enough for retailers.
Despite planning to shut the doors on his business, however, Paul McEntaggart remains hopeful for the future.
“I remain hopeful that with proper planning we can turn this around,” he says.
Paul says he will continue to run his business online for the time being, but he hopes the issues facing the town can be sorted out.
“I’m a positive guy. I still believe in Naas.
I’m hopeful for the future and I still believe this can get sorted. I still believe in this town.
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‘The most common loan amount is now €200 to €500…’
Way to make me feel snowed under in debt!!!
Whose fault is that, think carefully… I’ll give you a hint a mirror would be handy
You’re quaaaaare sound…
Whats a tracker mortgage ?
Mike, it is one of the few things where the customer has the banks by the short ‘n’ curlies and not the other way around for a change.
I know .. I have one ! The latest desrease will pay my prop tax !
And long may it last Brian, but we all know that the busturds will turn the tables in their favour, as they always do.
What nosense! Most common debt between €200-€500! Hardly a debt add a zero or two at least!
it’s wise to keep on top of loans and interest rates.
I was paying €75 a week on a remaining loan of €12000 at 8.45% Just over three years left on it. Savings built up of nearly €3000 that i couldnt touch because the loan amount was higher. So I borrowed €9000 from family member and completely paid off the loan using the savings that had built up
Then I shopped around in different banks/credit union, and got a new loan of €9000 at 7.75% spread over 5 years. Now I’m repaying €42 a week.
I know it’s longer again but like insurance, its no harm to shop around and change loan providers.
You’re better off clearing these debts as soon as possible IMO.
@Fionn – not sure if you realise so apologies if I’m being patronising but the interest you pay back on 12,000 compounded over 3 years at 8.45% apr is 3,448; on 9,000 compounded over 5 years at 7.75% is 4,243 with no savings or interest in savings so you’re actually paying back more to the bank the new way. But it’s a more manageable sum to repay if that’s what you were looking for.
You’re right John. But with the credit union, a person has to lodge money into savings each week along with the repayments on the loan. I should have clarified that. So the savings is building up again a small bit each week. (which is how the savings built up earlier)
Also I showed the amount being repaid each week, as that was the actual figures of the loan term, but I chose to keep repaying the same amount as I was previously as I can afford this.
Others might not be able to do this. Would I be right in doing so? Pay it off in three even though it’s a new five year loan again?
fionn & John
You haven’t mentioned it, but Credit Unions only charge interest on the outstanding balance of the loan, so the interest paid goes down over the repayment period. Paying back quicker automatically reduces the total interest bill.
Whereas banks charge a fixed amount of interest on the whole amount which they will often not rebate for early repayment. (Other credit providers will even charge an extra ‘fee’ for early repayment!)
It is for differences like this that the obligatory stated ‘APR’ rate was designed for, to make cost comparisons easier.
Would that be because many Celtic Tiger cubs who never had to think about interest before 2007 have now had to emigrate and are no longer around to be interviewed while those who had learned all about it 20 years before are still here to answer the questions?
What was the age profile comparison?
Can’t really have any sympathy for such stupidity
“Take action where necessary to protect borrowers interests”
How about getting rid of the ridiculous interest rates that the government allow them to charge? Up to 600% in some cases. It’s no wonder that these parasitic predators make a fortune when the country is on it’s knees and nobody has a penny. This is one industry that seriously needs to be regulated and rigorously controlled.
@niall Could not agree more, those in power have never given a damn. These loan sharks are glorified gangsters that prey on the vulnerable.
The really sad thing is, per an RTE Radio News commentator this morning, that many lower and middle income families are now being forced into the welcoming arms of illegal money lenders in order to get money to pay the unjust, unfair, immoral and anti-family LPT (Family Home Tax).
Why? Fear.
LPT is a fear ridden tax under the threatening administrative control of Revenue. If you cant pay and thus don’t pay you are immediately crimnalised and the state then imposes their accumulating artificial debt on your Family Home ad infinitum.
It is scandalous to think that the very same administration which is artificially lumbering debt onto the backs of middle and lower income Ireland are rolling back on controls in relation to the fat pension tax allowances still being granted to politicians and senior state administrators.
If ever there was inappropriate multiple taxation scheme in need of urgent repeal it’s LPT.
Rome Aug 2103 .. Italian Voters scrapped their hated Local Property Tax (IMU) on Family Homes.
Irish Voters will also take the law into their own hands in the next election and scrap it.
If the banks actually lent money people wouldn’t go near the moneylenders…..
I agree. Most people in difficulty cant get a loan/overdraft from a bank where their wages are lodged monthly/weekly but can access a loan by making one phone call.
It will be worse when the credit unions fall under the umbrella of the banks which apparently it is doing at the moment.
Not on my watch it wont,most people with credit unions wont tolerate any interference or money grab by banks and will withdraw their money.
How many know what Fractional Reserve banking is? 0.01% ?
A valid question
How many know that banks’ ‘Reserves’, fractional or otherwise have no bearing whatever on whether banks lend or not?
They don’t lend either reserves or deposits. In fact loans create deposits, because banks credit customer loan accounts from thin air, creating both the customer liability & their own asset simultaneously.
So, ‘loanable funds’ or banks as mere ‘intermediaries’ is largely bollox. (But a highly convenient deception for the banksters who have ensured that their operations have been excluded from all mainstream economic forecasting models. Doesn’t say much about mainstream economists eh?)
Banks do have ‘Capital’ constraints, but as we’ve seen, ‘creative’ accounting of valuations of often complex financial instruments, counted as Capital, has rendered this constraint fairly meaningless as well.
Deregulation of banks – the high street variety, responsible for the payments system – should never have happened.
95% of what such ‘systemic’ high street banks now do in ‘complex’ products & proprietary trading should be banned.
Former regulator William Black has called current system ‘criminogenic’ and has accused publicly most of the big six US banks (and some others) of ‘control fraud’.
None has sued him for libel – the last place they want to be is answering questions in a court room. (Hence all the out of court ‘settlements’ for Libor rate rigging, class action customer defraud and all the rest.)
It’s not rocket science to regulate high street banks. A public system is a good option too. The neo liberal mantra of ‘competition’ for systemic, payments system banking is pure stupid. We’ve seen the results – fraud & reckless behaviour that blows up taking the real economy with it.
But the banksters have the biggest lobbying operation in the world, owning most of the US Congress & much of Europe’s political & public institutions.
They already succeeded in getting ‘lowest common denominator’ (race to the bottom) forced deregulation into the WTO ‘trade’ regulations around 1999. (Where no financial services had been previously included or thought necessary for ‘trade’ agreements.)
I’ll lay money on the fact that financial services (de-) regulation is the driving force behind the (Wall St. shill) Obama administration’s secretive rush to sign a transatlantic ‘trade’ deal – the so called, barely publicised TTIP.
These binding international ‘trade’ deals are only marginally about trade in real goods, but are all about preventing national governments from protecting their citizens from predatory multinational corporations. And writing legislation to that effect with virtually no public or democratic scrutiny or even publicity.
There is a reason that further WTO ‘agreements’ have completely stalled for over ten years after repeated attempts to finalise & sign the ‘Doha’ agreement.
Some of the global ‘South’ finally couldn’t stomach any more rip offs, voted in some real politicians who’d grown a pair & told the US (& its allies) where to stuff their ‘deals’.
So it’s back to the ‘bilateral’ arrangements where multinational corporations agree in secret with poodle politicians etc. to divvy up & stitch up the rest of us. Minimal pesky ‘democracy’ involved.
The whole system is rotten to the core & filled with comfortably off ‘landlords’ agents’, like mainstream economists & senior public servants (we expect politicians to lie anyway) who could care less about ordinary citizens.
Time for Mr Brand’s (non violent) revolution I think.
Nicely written Mike!
That’s a stupid comment
Rightbackatya, Patrick .
It is time for the banks to pay us back with interest what they were given out of our tax money!
I think the point should be made that there is a difference between Legal and Illegal moneylenders. The legal moneylenders operate within the law, even if the law is somewhat without regulation. The illegal ones don’t. Having said that it is a pity that people are driven to make application for loans from moneylenders, simply because they are refused credit elsewhere. This is a thriving industry, always has been. Maybe more so now.
A Failed Society:
- 360,000 people using moneylenders!
- Government taxes Family Homes for €500 milliion … every year!
————————————–
No EU government or Troika has a mandate to tax Family Homes.
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