Tony Galati will extend his growing Spudshed empire further into Perth’s northern suburbs when he moves into a Joondalup warehouse left vacant after the collapse of Masters.

The Spud King won planning approval from the City of Joondalup this week to set up shop at the site on Injune Way, which will have more than 4000sqm of floor space and operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

But approval did not come without a legal hurdle after Lendlease, which owns the nearby Lakeside Joondalup shopping centre, challenged the council’s interpretation of land use definitions being used to consider the application.

A proposal put to councillors earlier this month was withdrawn for the city to seek its own legal advice before being resubmitted on Tuesday under new definitions and given the go-ahead.

The new site is expected to create 80 jobs but only 25 staff will be allowed on site at any one time.

Several small business owners in the area spoke in favour of Spudshed’s application, saying they had been on “struggle street” since Masters collapsed two years ago and dramatically cut foot traffic around their shops.

While several councillors spoke against the proposal, Mayor Albert Jacob said it would have minimal impact on surrounding grocery competitors in Joondalup, Heathridge or Edgewater and, more importantly, create more jobs than regular big-box stores.

“This site will be far more employment intensive. This proposes 80 direct full-time equivelent jobs, right in the heart of the Joondalup CBD.

“We have very clear employment goals. Its full economic benefits is some 226 FTE job positions. To put that into scale, that’s more than one quarter of our annual jobs target for the Joondalup city centre in one proposal.

“If we’re looking to signal to the rest of the State that we are open to business, that we want the Joondalup CBD to be the CBD of the north I believe these are the sort of proposals we should be supporting.”

Spudshed increased its profit by 76 per cent to nearly $4 million over the past year, despite pressure on margins fuelled partly by rising competition from international players.

Spudshed entity Vegie Bandits’ $3.96 million net profit for fiscal 2018, up from $2.25 million a year earlier, still reflected tight margins in a business which turned over $285.5 million, up 10.5 per cent, according to financial statements lodged with the corporate watchdog.

Spudshed recently opened stores in Midland and Jandakot. The Joondalup store will be his 11th.

In November Mr Galati said he had longer-term plans to open stores at Geraldton, Kalgoorlie and Albany, though this was still several years away.