Quinnsworth pioneer Pat helped change the face of retail industry
Wednesday November 25 2009
IT was the fashion and retailing statement of the late 1960s: Pat Quinn promoting his supermarkets decked out in a white polo neck sweater like a TV game-show host.
There was no escaping the instantly recognisable dome and spectacles above the ubiquitous white polo neck that dazzled out of newspaper ads and television commercials for Quinnsworth.
He was a pioneer, wooing customers to his shops using the latest American marketing techniques in an era when Gay Byrne and the 'Late Late Show' were arbiters of public taste.
Last night, old friends remembered him on hearing of his death in Canada, aged 72.
Senator Feargal Quinn said: "He was a breath of fresh air, full of energy and never shy about what he was proud of.
"He certainly changed retailing in Ireland. I'm sorry to hear of his passing."
Tailor Louis Copeland, who sold him the natty suits that set off his polo neck sweaters said: "I remember going to his house in Killiney and the phone never stopped, calls from people down the country looking for jobs. And Pat tried to fix something for all of them."
Salesman
His first supermarket in Dublin was in a new shopping centre in Stillorgan and Pat Quinn's sales spiel continually relayed around the public address system.
He had learned his trade in Woolworth's and honed his salesmanship skills in Canada where he arranged concerts for the Beach Boys, Supremes, Roy Orbison, Johnny Cash and the then up-and-coming band The Rolling Stones.
Yet he never forgot that he was born into a bar-grocery run by his mother in the village of Cloon in Co Leitrim, where his father was the local garda.
Returning to Ireland, his success in Ireland was meteoric, and Feargal Quinn changed the name of his three supermarkets to Superquinn in 1968 so it would not be confused with Quinnsworth's six outlets.
"He had a great ability to market himself," said Senator Quinn last night.
"He was always on the microphone in the shop giving away cars and houses," he said.
His trademark spectacles, bald head and polo neck sweater dominated the advertising -- and he had a huge advertising budget -- but he was also a gifted self-publicist.
An old friend recalls him turning up for a funeral wearing a pink polo neck sweater and others remember him always being on radio and television.
Trouble came knocking on his door in 1971 and he had to sell off the eight supermarkets a year later to Galen Weston. He bought a hotel with the cash from the sale, which made him a millionaire at age 36.
Set in a mountain outside Dublin, Pat Quinn decided to turn the Kilternan Hotel into a sports resort, like the hotel in the film 'The Shining', but the project ran into financial difficulties when petrol rationing followed an oil crisis in 1973.
He invested in the Deadman's Inn near Lucan, a venture that broke him financially, and he returned to Canada with his wife Anne and seven children.
Joe Murphy, a brother-in-law of Galen Weston, who ran Tayto, gave him a job selling crisps in Canada and then he began selling books at discount prices.
After years of hard work and saving, he opened a pub, the Irish Embassy, in Toronto in 2001, and after it became a huge success he opened another, and then a private members' club and another pub in Montreal.
Four of his children now run the pubs, two are orthodontists and the other is also in the medical profession.
- SAM SMYTH
Irish Independent
