This week’s guest on Inside Business is Leo Crawford, who recently stepped down as the head of BWG Group after nearly 40 years with the business.

BWG is a wholesale group at heart that supplies groceries to a large network of shops in Ireland and the southwest of England under a variety of retail brands, including Spar, Eurospar, Mace and Londis.

Leo will recall the boom times of the Celtic Tiger years, through a couple of management-led buyouts, to almost losing control of the business post the 2008 crash.

BWG ultimately bounced back to become the €2 billion a year business that it is today.

He also has some tips for young business leaders and entrepreneurs, you’ll hear him compare retailing in Ireland and the UK and prices on both sides of the Irish sea, and talk about the growing levels of shop lifting and abuse targeted against small retailers and how these might be tackled.

Produced by John Casey with JJ Vernon on sound.

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