A Wicklow business that helps you fit stuff under the stairs is tripling in size

AN IRISH COMPANY that makes a storage unit to fit under stairs plans to triple in size over the next year and a half.

Smart Storage, which currently employs 50 people, has announced that it will take on an additional 100 employees over the next 18 months.

The Wicklow-based business is creating 60 jobs in Ireland in sales, marketing, logistics, operations and manufacturing. Another 40 jobs will be added in the UK, it said.

Founded in 2011, Smart Storage supplies and installs a storage unit that fits inside a set of stairs or attic space.

Last year the firm fitted over 5,500 units, which retail from €399, across Ireland and the UK. As well as selling directly to consumers, it is now selling flat-pack product to developers who can include the feature in their projects.

Smart Storage's slide-out drawers

The company’s head office in Wicklow is also the location for their sales, marketing and logistics operations. In the UK, the company has five satellite bases and plans to add a further three – two in the Greater London area and one in the northeast of England.

Growth

Managing director Paul Jacob said that the company has grown “considerably” since 2011.

“In our first year, we had a turnover of €110,000 with one person in the business,” he said. “We have grown the business to a turnover this year of €3.5 million and 50 people employed.

“Next year we are on target to sell over €7.5 million of our under-stair storage product (and) in order to meet these targets we are taking on 100 new employees.”

Founded by husband and wife Paul and Clodagh Jacob, the company’s units were made in Smart Storage’s headquarters in Wicklow, but in 2012 it also launched the flat-pack conceptt.

Smart Storage managing director Paul Jacobs

The firm is backed by publisher and broadcaster Norah Casey, who invested €65,000 in the business in return for a 20% share during the 2012 series of RTÉ show Dragon’s Den. She remains a director in the firm. The Jacobs own the other 80% of the business.

In 2014 Smart Storage employed just nine people, according to the most-recent accounts for the company, and delivered a slender profit for its owners.