Shelbourne Bakery, Newry

Shelbourne Bakery, Newry

The Shelbourne Bakery and Restaurant in Newry is an institution. Situated on Hill Street in the city centre, the business has been serving the local community for 108 years.

In that time, many things have changed but the focus on high quality products and excellent customer service has never waned.

The bakery has been in the heart of the community for many years and has always been a busy spot in the city centre. However whilst business overall has been good it has had had to endure and overcome various obstacles such as multi-national supermarket Tesco moving to the outskirts of the city.

“We were extremely aware that Tesco could potentially affect trade, not only here at The Shelbourne but for many local businesses,” explained manager Marie Downey.

“As predicted, trade did fall slightly but thankfully it has returned to normal after a few weeks as we offer a premium product to our customers. This highlighted to us the fact that home bakeries simply can’t survive doing the same things as everyone else. Convenience stores and the multiples are offering their own bakery products so there is a lot of competition.”

This has led The Shelbourne to focus on the wholesale side of the business and to expand it further.

The Shelbourne products are already available in a number of convenience stores and independent supermarkets in Newry, Markethill, Camlough, Portadown, Warrenpoint, Bessbrook and Rathfriland.

Marie explained: “We have the people and the expertise to develop the wholesale side of the business from the site here in Newry. We have a team of bakers and decorators and it will all be done in house. It’s not industrial, it is home baking all under the one roof. It means we can be more flexible and have more control over the whole operation than if it was all being made off-site.”

She continued: “It’s an exciting chapter of the business. We have 55 staff here and we don’t want to lose any of them as they have all been here a long time so we want to bring in more business so the wholesale expansion is the right thing to do.”

The bakery’s fresh and healthy breads are very popular and despite having to compete with supermarket promotions, Marie is confident that the high quality products at The Shelbourne are what keep customers returning.

“All of our breads sell well but the healthy options are extremely popular. The granary, spelt, GI multi-seed wholemeal, plus the whites are all baked fresh on site each day ”

It’s no surprise then that The Shelbourne Bakery has a proven record as one of the best in the country, having scooped more than 25 awards including eight first prizes in All-Ireland Bakery competitions.

The Shelbourne does a great trade in birthday and novelty cakes too which have always been extremely popular over the years. The wedding cake business is also developing well and Marie and the team are actively attending trade shows to bring in new business.

Generating new revenue streams is the key to success for any local retail business as the decline of the high street is all too evident across Northern Ireland.

Marie acknowledges the issues for local retailers but is adamant that always maintaining a point of difference will help The Shelbourne continue to flourish.

“Hill Street in Newry was once a buzzing place and with the continued support of all our customers shopping local  we are returning Hill Street to its former state. We are determined to keep Hill Street alive and many of us retailers are coming together to try and drive business and we are all trying to hold on to our customers.

Marie added: “However, I do consider this business to be almost recession proof. Whilst people may have cut down on buying as many cakes, they still will treat themselves and come in to the store so we have had no lay-offs and kept our heads above water and continued to grow.”

A destination since 1906, The Shelbourne has proven a success through the good and the bad times and as we see the green shoots of recovery in the wider economy, the business is well   placed to capitalise on the demand for artisan bakery products across Northern Ireland into 2014 and beyond.