North: 200 jobs created by Asda
Supermarket giant Asda has created 200 new jobs during its first week of operations in the North, it revealed today.
The company has opened the first four of 12 former Safeway stores bought from Morrisons earlier in the year.
Asda confirmed that it would now be creating considerably more than the 250 extra jobs it had estimated would be created when all 12 stores have been reopened after undergoing a £30m (€44m) refurbishment.
The remaining eight stores will be opened by the beginning of December.
News of the 200 jobs came with the completion of phase one of Asda’s entry into the province and the opening of its store in Ballyclare, Co Antrim. Earlier in the week stores opened in Bangor, Co Down, Coleraine, Co Londonderry, and Cookstown, Co Tyrone.
The four supermarkets now employ 635 staff.
John Deasy, Northern Ireland director of the supermarket chain, said: “We are delighted to have created 200 new jobs for Northern Ireland.
“The Northern Ireland public has shown a staggering interest in working for Asda with 2,000 application forms sent out for jobs in the first four stores alone.”
He said the company was hopeful that phases two and three of their opening schedule would prove as successful.
Meanwhile, tile and stonework company Armatile announced today it had doubled the workforce at its Armagh headquarters and flagship showroom to more than 100.
The jobs were created following a £5m (€7.3m) development of the Loughgall Road premises.
The company also has sites in Newry, Co Down, and Belfast, employing a further 50 people.
The Belfast showroom is being relocated from Boucher Crescent to another site on nearby Boucher Road – the North’s most lucrative strip of commercial real estate.
The move into the new premises will be completed before the end of the year and will create further jobs, said the company.
