Last minute.com is the order of the day for Galway Races outfits, say businesses

Two Galway-based businesses are glad to see the return of race week to the city. Michael Lally of Lally menswear, and Suits by Lally, likened it to Christmas week, saying 80 per cent of sales on Monday alone consisted of suits.

“It was suits, suits, suits all day, and it’s pretty much the same today (Tuesday), and that’s not even the busy part of the week. It’s normally Thursday-Friday that are the two busy days for the suit department, so I am expecting a bumper week,” Mr Lally said.

The store took a chance on buying extra stock for the return of the races. “We’ve bought big for it, we have a lot of stock in, and hopefully by the end of the week we won’t have a lot of stock in, but so far so good.

“There doesn’t seem to be huge crowds around the town but the people that are around are busy spending,” he said.

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Weight gain during the pandemic had led to the rush to buy new suits for race week, he observed. “During the pandemic, they were all eating takeaways so they put on a bit of weight, so the old suit now in the wardrobe doesn’t fit them any more.

“Because they hadn’t any events to go to, unless they had a wedding in the last six months they all need new suits for the races and for some other events, so they’re splashing out because they hadn’t bought a suit in two or three years.”

And it’s mostly last-minute business.

“Lads are laid back; it’s last minute dot-com, you will have lads in now tomorrow and Thursday at one or two o’clock in the afternoon and the races might be starting a half an hour later, just before they go out to the racecourse they get the new suit,” he said.

“Often during race week we’ll have several bags of worn clothes left up in the stockrooms for them to collect the following day — and sometimes they forget all about it.”

The week is a “great lift” for the city following the pandemic, he says: “It’s a great injection for us, and we need it really after the lockdown and everything, we look forward to it this year more so than any other year.”

Corofin-based milliner Caithriona King of Caithriona King Designs, echoed his delight at the return of the races.

“I think people are in great spirits ... even from the hats point of view it seems to be the bigger the better, the more, the wow, rather than the smaller pieces, for me anyway,” she said.

Ms King added that people do not seem as organised as in previous years: “I have people that are super organised, but there seems to be a lot of people that are last minute, and I suppose they didn’t know whether or not they’d be going or even due to Covid whether they would be able to get going or not.”

She is busier for race week this year than in 2019, and says it is “great to be back doing something you love”.