Retail Property - Next takes Junction One unit for Irish outlet store

Next has signed up for its biggest-ever factory outlet unit, taking 2,300 sq m at the Junction One scheme in Antrim. The letting means that the 13,000 sq m centre is now 60 per cent let 10 months before opening day.

John Drummond, managing director of the Guinea Group, joint developer of Junction One with the Kennedy Group, said Next wanted an unusually large unit because it plans to use the Junction One site as the single clearance outlet for all of its Irish branches. This will cut out the costs of shipping surplus stock back across the Irish Sea.

Other retailers already signed up for Junction One include Suits You, Louis Feraud, Autonomy, Ponden Mill, Cotton Traders, Logo and Julian Graves.

The Next letting will only add to the intense rivalry between Junction One and the Gilford Mill outlet scheme, which developer John Farmer is promoting on a site further south, and closer to the Irish border.

The scheme has been delayed while a workable solution has been devised to add another 3,650 sq m to the existing 11,000 sq m in the historic mill building, but opening is now scheduled for spring 2004.

Although Junction One has stolen a march in terms of lettings, Farmer insisted that a number of lettings to high-profile international fashion brands -accounting for 40 per cent of the floorspace - are already in solicitors' hands, with active negotiations on another 20 per cent of the scheme.

GVA Collier Coxhead and Markham Vaughan Gillingham are letting agents.