National Women’s Enterprise Day 2017

This Thursday (October 12) is National Women’s Enterprise Day (NWED) which is a Local Enterprise Office (LEO) initiative, and has become a national event.  There will be 15 events taking place across the country which feature some of the leading female lights in business today.

This year’s NWED theme is ‘Open Your Doors to New Markets’ and the various talks and sessions taking place encourage female entrepreneurs in Ireland to investigate new markets, an especially relevant theme given the ever-increasing spread of globalisation, and of course that B word that is constantly mentioned yet nowhere nearly defined, which of course is Brexit.  With this day in mind, we decided to reflect on some of the organisations we have worked with who have had some great female leaders at the helm.

Anne Heraty, CEO & Co-Founder, CPL Resources Plc.

The first of our formidable females that springs to mind is the indomitable Anne Heraty, who really needs no introduction to anybody familiar with the Irish business landscape.  She is of course the founder and CEO of CPL Resources Plc.  She was the first female CEO of a listed Irish company. Initially we met with Anne herself informally and we worked with CPL on a big project that encompassed branding, digital and print.  In the process we created the tagline, ‘the best people for the job’ which is still in use today. Click for the CPL case study

Caroline Horgan, Managing Director, Abbeylands Furniture

One of our biggest projects in recent years is the website and e-commerce platform we created for Abbeylands Furniture.  The Navan based company occupies a manufacturing site of over 30,000 square feet and has been in the business for over 35 years now.  They are a specialist soft furnishings wholesaler, supplying private label for multiple retailers as well as bespoke products to furniture manufacturers, hotel and leisure contractors.  Caroline Horgan took over the business from her father and is now currently the company’s MD.  You can read more about the Abbeylands project

Meave Hurley, CEO & Co-Founder, Ag Éisteacht

Ag Éisteacht is a Cork-based charity who specialise in training frontline practitioners working in the areas of health, education, social & youth in both the private and public sectors.  Founded in 2001 by Meave Hurley, the organisation has delivered training to over 1,500 practitioners.  Meave trained in medicine at UCC and went on to work in the UK.  While she was there, she undertook professional training in the field of relational well-being to enhance her work with her patients.  It is here that the roots of Ag Éisteacht were formed as they strive to deliver evidence-based programmes that focus on the relational skills of the practitioners they serve.  Read more about our work with them here https://www.passionforcreative.com/project/ag-eisteacht/marketing/

Rachel Walsh, Owner, Inspired Events

Did you know that event-planner ranks as one of the world’s five most stressful jobs?  Well it does, and we have personal experience. Anyway, this fact did not deter Rachel Walsh from launching her own event planning service based in Waterford.  Rachel was running a successful interior design business when she heeded the call to become a wedding planner and then Inspired Events was born.  She creates bespoke, elegant event experiences for weddings as well as corporate and other social occasions.  We were delighted to help bring her business dreams to life.  See here for a taster of the work we did for Inspired Events.

Jill Hincks, Managing & Creative Director, Passion for Creative

Well we couldn’t complete this post without a nod to our own managing director Jill Hincks.  Jill has years of experience in the business and knows the branding game inside out.  Before launching Passion, she co-founded GCP Direct, a Manchester based agency. She can count names such as Marks & Spencer and Disney as former clients.  Jill has also given talks on female entrepreneurship and has mentored women beginning their own ventures in business.

So there you have it, a selection of some the top females in business we have been lucky to work with.  We hope to meet many more and wish all the female entrepreneurs across the country every success with their organisations and future endeavours.