It's no secret that the entertainment retail business has struggled with the advent of the internet and more recently streaming, and that consumers are now largely opting for subscription services over physical media, which was once the bedrock of the business.

At its peak in the 1980s and 1990s, Ireland's leading entertainment retailer Golden Discs had more than 100 stores across Ireland and Northern Ireland as demand for CDs and later DVDs boomed.

Co-founder Jack Fitzgerald, who passed away at the age of 94 on Saturday (15 March) opened the first Golden Discs, then the Trans-Atlantic Record Agency (TARA) on Tara Street in 1962 with Tom Rogers.

Over the following decades, Golden Discs expanded nationwide, and its offering grew to include gig ticket sales and VHS rentals, but as the market for entertainment on disc has compacted, so has the company's footprint.

Now owned and operated by Fitzergald's son Stephen Fitzgerald, Golden Discs has 21 stores nationwide, and its website makes more sales than any of them.

Fitzgerald took over the running of Golden Discs in the late 2000s, and the group entered what it called a "punishing and testing period in examinership" in 2009 after file-sharing and the crash had decimated the trade.

The group was insolvent with liabilities of €9.5m, the High Court was told prior to the appointment of the examiner. Entertainment giant Sony said it was not prepared to continue supplying stores in the absence of court protection as it was owed €1.38m.

After exiting examinership with a €250,000 investment in 2009, the group flipped between profit and loss in the 2010s, with revenues reaching a recent high of €13.2m in 2019, although sales have yet to recover to pre-pandemic levels in the years since then.

The group has also seen a continued surge in sales of more expensive vinyl, and has invested in its POP! store-within-a-store concept, which retails merchandise and other pop culture miscellany.

The first one opened at its Dundrum outlet in 2022, and the group made a €1.2m loss that year as administrative expenses increased from €2.6m to €3.5m and 'other' operating income collapsed from €1.4m to €40,000. The company also drew down at €400,000 loan.

Speaking at the time, Fitzgerald said vinyl sales made up 40-50% of the income in any given Golden Discs store, and he described vinyl as a "hero" product that was helping the company get back on its feet post-Covid.

The group's latest accounts show turnover fell €1.2m or 9.7% in 2023 to €11.2m. Golden Discs returned to profit (€115,700), however, reducing accumulated losses from €448,100 to €332,400.

Cash stocks have dwindled to €1.4m, excluding a €936,400 overdraft, and employee numbers have been cut from more than 130 pre-Covid to 97, helping to reduce staff costs from €3m in 2022 to below €2.6m.

The accounts show tangible assets of €1.2m, stocks of €758,400 and €2.4m owed by debtors, the bulk of which (€2m) is owed by group undertakings. Golden Discs had net current liabilities of €1.1m at the end of 2023, and equity of €58,100.

“If you had told me two years ago that my business would close for four and a half months in each of the next two years I would have said it wouldn’t be possible to survive," Fitzgerald told the Irish Times' Inside Business podcast in 2022.

“But we’ve seen huge growth in our online business and while DVD and visual have been challenged others like vinyl and merchandise have seen exponential growth. But we’re certainly glad it’s [Covid] in the rear view mirror.”

Photo: Stephen Garrigan, lead singer with Kodaline, busks to members of the publc with fellow members outside Golden Disc on Grafton Street in 2013. (Pic: Leah Farrell/Photocall Ireland)