23 February 2023
By Tom Collins
tom@TheCork.ie
If I asked you to name an Australian brand with a Cork store, you’d say ‘Harvey Norman’? and you’d be right, but now there’s another antipodal brand trading Leeside, it’s called ‘Chemist Warehouse’
Chemist Warehouse is an Australian brand operating a chain of retail pharmacies. The company is Australia’s largest pharmacy franchise retailer with over 350 stores down under. It offers discounted prices for pharmaceutical goods. The company has been dubbed “the McDonald’s of pharmacy” and uses a franchise structure in Australia, where it recently expanded into eyeglasses, as this TV news segment explains:
The brand is relatively new to Ireland. Companies Registration Office data shows ‘Chemist Warehouse (Ireland) Ltd’ was only incorporated in August 2019. The Irish company is wholly owned by an Australian company called ‘CW Retail Holdings PTY Ltd’.
Chemist Warehouse Ireland has a small website at chemistwarehouse.ie which lists the addresses of their 6 Irish stores, job adverts, and contains a link to their current 12 page seasonal catalogue. The brands Facebook post advertising the Ballincollig store opening gives an incorrect phone number, but this adds to the brands allure. It’s like Ryanair, cheap prices are key, not optics.
Incorrect phone number
Here in Cork, the new Ballincollig store is located at ‘Chemist Warehouse, Unit 3, West City Retail Park, Innishmore, Ballincollig, Cork, P31 D256′. It’s opening hours are
Monday – Wednesday: 8am – 8pm
Thursday – Friday: 8am – 9pm
Saturday: 9am – 8pm
Sunday & Public Holidays: 10am – 6pm
To learn more about the Chemist Warehouse empire listen to this podcast from Australia which interviewed brand founder multi millionaire Jack Gance.
Best wishes to Chemist Warehouse. In retail, competition is generally good for customers.