IT might have taken some persuasion from Den is Brosnan and Hugh Friel, but at the end of the day the 6,000 members of Kerry Co op had little difficulty in voting themselves a £128 million windfall when a quarter of the co op's shares in Kerry Group were transferred to Kerry shareholders.

That windfall is the equivalent of £21,000 in Kerry Group shares for every member of the co op, although some of the bigger co op shareholders will become overnight millionaires when the share transfer is completed next month.

The two special meetings needed to ratify the rule changes to allow the shares to be transferred were unique affairs. For the second meeting, over 3,000 co op members crammed into the conference centre in the Mount Brandon Hotel, probably the biggest meeting ever in the capital of the Kingdom outside the Rose of Tralee finals.

Despite intensive efforts by a rump of co op shareholders absolutely opposed to giving up control of Kerry Group, the result was a foregone conclusion with 85 per cent voting in favour of the rule change - and the shares windfall.

As share certificates fall through the letter boxes of 6,000 homes in Kerry next month, there will no doubt be many happy smiling faces.