A MASSIVE push to attract 180 jobs for a new £5 million superstore on the site of the former Asda supermarket in Jockey Lane, Huntington, York, has received an "amazing response".

Those are the words of Chris Dawson, the managing director of The Range Home and Leisure as the first tranche of 100 jobs are advertised for his vast new store in a building which he is extending from 61,000 sq ft to 100,000 sq ft in time for a grand opening in September.

Hundreds more jobs could come to York if an unnamed out-of-city distribution depot is chosen to serve Range stores all along the M62 corridor and more in Scotland where the organisation plans to expand.

The Jockey Lane store will be the second biggest among 19 The Range Home and Leisure stores in Britain, which each sell at least 70,000 different products at knockdown prices.

Already a new roof is being fitted on the building, which will include a garden centre outside, and inside departments for DIY, lighting, electrical, houseware, textiles and fabrics, arts and crafts, stationery and flooring.

There will also be a bathroom boutique, a camping and leisure section, a gadget shop, a restaurant and a "playschool" where child minders use store products for constructive play sessions.

Mr Dawson, the tough-talking founder of CDS superstore which spawned Range Home and Leisure stores in 1989, said: "It is going to be an advanced concept in York, and we have had an amazing response to our call for jobs, even though we have been looking for specialists in their field."

He said hundreds more jobs could be on the way if a 400,000 sq ft distribution centre in the York travel-to-work area was chosen as one of two prospects to serve his stores, but he refused to say where they were.

He celebrated "a brilliant working relationship" with the City of York Council. "If everyone worked like them then it is surely the way to bring in inward investment," he said, and promised: "It will be amazing. People will think they are in Disneyland. Our Christmas display is legendary."

Updated: 10:31 Friday, April 28, 2006