Ahead of Ireland’s first motorway service stations opening in September, Applegreen, the independent forecourt retailer is creating of 300 new jobs.
The SuperStop Consortium was awarded the Public Private Partnership (PPP) contract, with Applegreen contracted to operate and maintain the three Motorway Service Areas (MSAs) by the National Roads Authority (NRA).
Each service area consists of two individual sites on either side of the motorway at their specific locations of Castlebellingham, Co Louth (M1), Lusk Co. Dublin (M1) and Enfield, Co. Kildare (M4).
Construction is in the final stages with the MSAs due to open during September and October, with the Lusk northbound site the first to open.
A recruitment drive is now underway to fill the 300 full and part-time positions that will be needed to operate the sites. The positions will primarily be in the food service area, with additional positions available in retail, cleaning and maintenance. The recruitment drive is now underway with information available on www.applegreen.ie.
The project represents an investment of more than €70 million on behalf of the consortium, operated and maintained by Applegreen. Each of the MSAs will incorporate separate fueling areas for cars and HGVs, Burger King and Costa Coffee restaurants as well as rest areas, showers, playgrounds and other amenities to ensure safe, relaxed travel for road users traveling on the NRA’s motorway system.
Commenting on Applegreen’s recruitment drive, Joe Barrett, Director of Operations said: “Applegreen is Ireland’s leading independent, 100% Irish owned, forecourt retailer and nothing could give us more pleasure than to create 300 jobs, particularly in these constrained economic times. We have invested heavily in the Irish economy across our network and the MSA investment of €70million are just the latest demonstration of our commitment to provide outstanding value and quality to the Irish motorist and indeed the non motoring public who visit Applegreen stores. We aim to deliver better value always and that is not just on our petrol pricing, that promise includes many leading grocery items such as the much requested late night purchase of “milk for the morning”.”
Applegreen’s successful bid to manage and run these MSAs saw it as part of the SuperStop Consortium which includes Top Oil, and Pierse Contracting. The project is financed by Bank of Ireland.
