University College Dublin (UCD) has put its €1m+ (ex VAT) a year campus book-shop business up for grabs.
This follows UCD seeking tenders for an "experienced retailer" to operate an integrated UCD book shop and College Collection merchandise unit for a four year and 11 month period.
The book operator will be located at a flagship two-floor space in the college's James Joyce Library and provide a seamless online platform, a single social media presence and a network of seasonal/event pop-ups across the Belfield campus.
The tender documentation provides an insight into the business performance of the existing book shop business at the UCD campus.
Figures provided show that during the 2025/24 academic year, the UCD book business recorded net sales of €1.09m (ex VAT) with sales peaking at the start of the academic term with net sales across September and October totalling €390,043 - which represent 35.5% for the year.
The figures show that Book Shop net sales totalled €503,454 while net sales from the UCD College Collection totalled €592,571.
The tender documentation states that the new concession will replace the current pilot arrangement whereby books and merchandise have been operated by the same supplier but treated as separate activities.
The tender further states that from 2026 the University requires these two activities to be formally merged into a single, coherent retail concept that is commercially ambitious, digitally native, academically supportive, community engaged and fully aligned with the Breaking Boundaries strategy to 2030 and UCD's position as Ireland's highest-ranked university for sustainability.
It also says the successful tenderer will be expected to treat the retail space not only as a traditional campus convenience space but as UCD's primary brand ambassador on campus - a place that sells books and merchandise driving revenue while also building belonging and identity, community engagement, and visibly demonstrating UCD's values every day at the heart of the UCD community.
The successful tenderer is to also carry out a mandatory programme of pop-up shops during the likes of Freshers' Week, Graduation weeks, sports finals, alumni events and Summer time pop ups.
Underlining the scale of UCD, the tender confirms that UCD has a turnover of €718m and 39,522 students. The university’s academic staff number 2,015 while the approximate number of library facility visits each year is 1.9 million.
The deadline for tenders is March 11. On February 5 UCD is to host a bidders' briefing as well as a site visit to the Book Shop.
Reporting by Gordon Deegan
