Meet the Young Businessperson finalists – West Cork Business & Tourism Awards

The West Cork Business & Tourism Awards take place this Friday, February 2nd, at The West Cork Hotel in Skibbereen. Brought to you by The Southern Star, in association with Carbery, the awards celebrate the best of West Cork business and tourism.

Meet the finalists in the Young Businessperson of the Year category, sponsored by Access Credit Union, below.

Jack Regan, Trend 7 Media – Strategic social media

Jack Regan of Trend 7 Media. (Photo: Andy Gibson)

TREND 7 Media is a marketing agency focused on delivering social media and online podcasting services to its clients.

Founder Jack Regan from Ballydehob set the business up as a way of providing value to local West Cork businesses.

‘We help brands understand their target audience online and implement social media and podcast marketing strategies that will provide value to their audience and bring value to their own business,’ the MTU graduate explained.

Trend 7 Media develops a bespoke social media and podcast marketing strategy, and also implements the strategy, creating content and uploading it to social media platforms.

In other words, he said, they allow business owners keep doing what they love, and ‘we can do what we love.’

Social media and online communication change over time, he said, however Trend 7 Media ‘will be there at the cutting edge of latest developments to deliver for our clients based on the changing media landscape.

Always staying informed and acting quickly to new changes in the online space for our clients.’

Jack said he’s committed to growing the business and has over 20 clients globally. He’s hoping to hire two freelancers shortly to expand.

‘I began Trend 7 Media as a way of providing value to local West Cork businesses and will be forever grateful to my early clients who took a chance on me in the Ballydehob, Skibbereen and Schull area.

‘I have been fortunate to work with many brilliant clients and meet exceptional people who have provided me with numerous opportunities. The Ludgate Hub in Skibbereen has also been a huge help to me on my journey with Trend 7, providing me with opportunities to attend events, speak at events and engage and work on projects with them and their team.’

His ambition is to be best digital media agency in the world – scaled from Ballydehob.

Olwyn Hanley, Ol Over It Creative – Creative, effective branding

Olwyn Hanley of Ol Over It Creative. (Photo: Andy Gibson)

WHEN Olwyn Hanley couldn’t find a suitable role in the workforce after graduating, she took it upon herself to create one —and it’s her dream job that fulfils and excites her every day.

The pandemic put her hope for Australia on pause and compelled her to seek a creative outlet during the lockdown and in less than three years it has evolved into a successful business with a team of three female founders.

From Castletownbere, she set up Ol Over It Creative, a brand agency that specialises in the creation of authentic brands for ambitious businesses through strategic and intentional design.

She has collaborated with businesses across sectors including technology, hospitality, healthcare, education, and lifestyle.

However, her particular affinity lies with passion-driven and purposeful brands that make a significant impact.

Additionally, Olwyn offers ongoing brand consulting services to support businesses in their quest to make a significant impact, offering insights and helping to develop creative marketing strategies to enhance sales and foster continued brand expansion.

Her latest venture is creative business coaching, driven by a mission to empower designers and creatives to help break free from traditional 9-5 jobs and build lives centred around their passions.

Her ultimate mission is to make a continuous positive impact on creatives’ lives by helping them build businesses that bring not only financial success but also genuine happiness and a foundation for positive, fulfilling lives

‘My journey has served as an inspiration for numerous talented creatives who have embarked on their entrepreneurial paths and side hustles following my lead. In an industry often undervalued, with creatives frequently advised to relegate their passions to mere hobbies, I am here to demonstrate that there has never been a better time to be a creative professional or entrepreneur,’ she said.

Shannon Bennett, Smooth Beauty Group – Cutting-edge beauty service

Shannon Bennett, Smooth Beauty Group.

DRIVE and determination, with strong business acumen, is how members of the Smooth Beauty Group describe its founder Shannon Bennett.

Starting out back in 2017, Shannon launched the business from a single treatment room in Dunmanway.

By 2019 she was ready to expand to a larger premises in the town and employ three other staff and by 2021 she opened up in Skibbereen taking on four more staff.

Fuelled by her desire to offer West Cork people the best in skin-care and beauty innovation, the latest Smooth Beauty in the chain has opened in Bantry – that’s all in just five years.

The business covers every facet of the beauty industry, with a wide range of treatments on offer from eyelash extensions, nails, and tanning to laser hair removal, pigmentation removal and radio frequency micro-needling.

‘Our mission is to help clients with any cosmetic services that they require, helping them become their best version of themselves. We have invested heavily in providing up-to-date cutting-edge services for our clients, so that it is no longer necessary to travel to the city for specialised skin procedures.

‘Our 10 staff are constantly training and upskilling to stay up to date with current trends,’ said Shannon, a mum-of-four.

An advanced skin care and laser clinic is the focus in Bantry, designed to complement theservices offered in her other salons in Skibbereen and Dunmanway.

‘Our Bantry clinic will focus on skin health and more of the technical aspects of skin rejuvenation, along with the increasingly popular laser hair removal. We are really passionate about making unique skin care and treatments more accessible to the women and men of West Cork,’ she added.

‘Ambition and passion are what have driven to me to grow the business and never give up.’

Cian Minihane, CM Fitness & Personal Training – From strength to strength

Cian Minihane of CM Fitness & Personal Training. (Photo: Andy Gibson)

CIAN Minihane set up his fitness and personal training business, five years ago, shortly after turning 23 years of age.

Since then, he said it’s gone from strength to strength, successfully navigating major challenges namely the Covid pandemic, and evolving to come out the other side more robust than ever.

‘We adapted, when Covid hit and left us, and others in the sector, totally in limbo, with in-person training gone. But we reacted straight away and developed a hybrid programme, and as a result we managed to maintain all our staff, as well as all our clients,’ said Cian, whose business operates from the Glasslyn Rd in Bandon.

Pivoting the business, he invested in software which now allows him and the team to further their reach, and they now have clients all over Ireland, the UK, Switzerland, Australia and Saudi Arabia.

‘We’ve now built an incredible community of clients and are now looking for a bigger facility to take on more clients and more staff,’ said Cian who currently employs a team of three.

At the moment CM Fitness & Personal Training has 150 clients and Cian’s ambition is to double that.

He also has ambitions to expand into coaching trainers with a bid to improve standards in the industry, and to work with secondary schools. His motivation is to help busy people ‘change their lives from not prioritising their health both mentally and physically to regaining their confidence in themselves and their bodies.’

And he’s adamant that doesn’t have to mean misery. ‘You can eat bread!’ he said.

Category sponsor – Access Credit Union

Keep it local, support local

ACCESS Credit Union are delighted and proud to once again sponsor this year’s West Cork Young Businessperson of the Year award.

This award category recognises and sup-ports the creativity and dynamism of young business people under the age of 35 in our West Cork community. The quality and variety of entrepreneurship in West Cork can be seen in our local towns, with many successful startups and numerous established businesses spread around our region.

We are especially renowned for our artisan food ranges, using local produce which are much sought after at home and abroad. Top this up with the wide variety of tourism and agriculture led initiatives in the area and you can really see how successful our business community is.

It is great for our local businesses to have such a showcase event as the West Cork Busi-ness & Tourism Awards to promote their products and services.

‘We are delighted to be involved with this awards event again, and excited to sponsor the West Cork Young Businessperson of the Year Award’ said Tony Hughes, CEO of Access Credit Union.

‘We are big believers in the strength of our community, in supporting local and shopping local. It is important to support and recognise the contributions of entrepreneurs to our West Cork economy. The quality of our local entrepreneurs is clearly evident when you look around the room at this event every year.’

Access Credit Union has three branches in Skibbereen Bandon and Schull that service the West Cork area. We employ local people to support local members and businesses. Their range of business loans are tailored to meet the needs of their members to help them develop, grow and success in their ventures.

Access Credit Union offers very competitive lending interest rates along with flexible repayment options to match the needs of the business cashflow.

They are also providers of loans under the various SBCI Credit Guarantee Schemes supported by The Dept of Enterprise, Trade & Employment to give access to low-cost finance for businesses impacted by increased supply and energy costs.

Cultivate Farm Finance is also available at Access Credit Union. These loans are tailored to the farming community in order to help with stocking, new equipment and more recently with additional land purchases.

One of the key benefits of borrowing from Access Credit Union is, according to Karen Farr, Lending Manager, is that ‘all decisions are made locally so we can factor in our local knowledge to the benefit of the applicant.’

By choosing to take a business loan from Access Credit Union, businesses in West Cork can not only invest in their own success but also support the local economy and contribute to its growth and sustainability.

For more information on their business and farm loans, please visit www.accesscu.ie or call them on (028) 21883 today.

And for all the young entrepreneurs, who entered the West Cork Young Businessperson of the Year award, the very best of luck from all at Access Credit Union.