DISCOUNT RETAILER Euro General Retail has announced the creation of more than 100 new jobs with the opening of 12 new stores.

The company operates a network of discount €2 or less shops across the country.

Owner Charlie O’Loughlin said yesterday the move marks the company’s first expansion since 2007.

Half of the new stores, which will open between now and September, will be in Dublin.

“We stopped expanding in 2007 because the rents were so crazy and so high.

“There are now more favourable rents available,” Mr O’Loughlin said.

“We see potential to open even more stores. We are much more competitive than we were seven or eight years ago.”

The first of the new stores will open in the next four to five weeks.

Mr O’Loughlin opened his first discount store on Dublin’s Moore Street in 1990.

The company now employs 500 people in 50 stores.

Accounts recently filed by Euro General Retail Ltd show revenues of €48 million in the 12 months to the end of May 10th last year – a drop of 4.5 per cent on 2009.

However, gross profit margin increased by seven percentage points to 35 per cent, according to the directors.

Pretax profits last year declined by 30 per cent, €2.5 million, in part because of a depreciation charge of €1.86 million.

Mr O’Loughlin said: “The market is very tough, but we are trading okay. We have pared back costs.”

He expressed frustration with the response by some landlords to renegotiating leases for a number of the company’s existing shops.

“We have had a mixed response. Some landlords have been quite helpful but where properties are owned by pension funds, they are completely and utterly unmovable,” he said.

“We say business is down, but we are told ‘just read the lease’.”

The filings for Euro General Retail Ltd show that the company had €14.3 million in accumulated profits in May of last year.