Donation follows factory closure
Health and beauty retailer Boots is donating£3.6 million to a Lanarkshire regeneration company. The decision follows Boots' closure of its cosmetics factory in Airdrie at a cost of about 800 local jobs.

The as yet unnamed regeneration company, which is a joint venture between Scottish Enterprise Lanarkshire and North Lanarkshire Council, will use the cash to attract a further£10 million of investment and cover running costs for one year.

Boots' Airdrie factory manufactured cosmetics for more than 50 years before its closure in February last year and operations were moved to units in Germany and France. Boots announced it was shutting the Airdrie site in 2003, citing the company's move out of third-party manufacturing as a reason. Following the closure, 96 per cent of workers have found new jobs.

Boots head of corporate and social responsibility in Scotland Jane Wood will chair the regeneration body. Wood said: It is an unusual and good example of how public and private sectors can work together.'

Proceeds from the sale of the factory's land to a developer were used to fund the donation.

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