MORE than 150 shopkeepers in the region were looking forward to £31,000 windfalls last night after voting overwhelmingly in favour of a £60m takeover.

Ninety-seven per cent of nearly 2,000 UK storeholders in the Londis convenience store chain approved the offer from Musgrave, the Irish owners of Budgens, at a meeting in Birmingham last night.

The move will see Musgrave take over Londis' wholesale and distribution operation, in which the shopkeepers are shareholders.

Musgrave group managing director Seamus Scally told the meeting: "All I can do is pledge that we will return that support back to you over the coming years.

"We will engage with you very early on and we will be engaging in the development of your businesses with us.

"We can only go from strength to strength if we work together, and I have every confidence we can do that."

Last night's vote ends a six-month bidding process, which had to be restarted after Musgrave's original £40m offer was withdrawn when it emerged that four Londis executives stood to earn £20m because of a clause in their contracts.

The deal means the directors will share a one-off payment of £2m and gives each of the shopkeepers in the chain £31,645 in two payments - one in August and the other 12 months later - provided they maintain their current trading levels. Although only two per cent of shareholders were against the deal, there was concern about Musgrave's commitments to the Londis brand and issues such as the expansion of chilled distribution and the introduction of electronic scanning at tills.

Responding to concerns that Musgrave could pass on the costs of its debts to Londis shareholders, finance director Chris Martin said that would not be in Musgrave's interests.