That Great Business Show

Frank Brennan failed his way through three years of mechanical engineering.
His words, not ours.

So he went to Australia, took a 100%-commission door-to-door sales job, learned to survive 50 rejections a day, saved 25 grand — and then spent the lot travelling.
He arrived home in Cork with 80p in his pocket.
Excellent financial planning.

Then he walked into an empty building on Cork's South Mall where a man was planning an innovation hub. There was no proper Wi-Fi. No desks. No team. No coffee dock. But there were 14 tonnes of IKEA furniture arriving the following morning.
Frank's response?
“I'll start tomorrow.”

That business became Republic of Work. The early years were brutal. Start-ups, Frank discovered, don't necessarily have any money. EY arriving looking for space for 30 people gave the business breathing room. Today Frank owns Republic of Work, has expanded it by another 7,500 sq ft and says one of the world's biggest gaming companies has taken its fifth floor on a two-year deal.
We talk sales, rejection, risk, remote working, Cork, community, the future of the office, why Irish businesspeople insist everything is “flying” when it absolutely isn't — and the person Frank would ultimately most like to hire.
His wife.
That Great Business Show — Real Business. Real lessons.
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EP 311: €130,000 Short of Becoming a Pilot. So He Built a €1m+ Business | Erik Jentetics

He was €130,000 short of becoming a pilot. So Erik Jentetics decided to become a businessman.
He was 17.

He and two school friends started by Googling how to buy a domain. They put €6,000 between them into Grafton Digital, knocked on doors looking for customers and, in one early pitch, confidently told a prospective client that yes, of course they charged VAT. They walked out and had to find out what VAT actually was.

Then came the less funny bit. At 19, Covid hit a business heavily exposed to hospitality. Contracts disappeared. Erik had to help lay off more than eight people. Then a whiteboard session changed the company. Web development was producing the best revenue per employee. They dropped much of the rest, hired three students to cold-call businesses and, at their peak, were taking about 50 website orders a week.
Then they moved into apps.
Then software.
By late 2022/early 2023, Grafton Digital had passed €1 million in gross revenue.

At 25, Erik bought a 39-year-old Irish technology business.
Now 26, with more than 50 people across his businesses, he wants to buy more Irish technology companies. His particular target: smaller, family-owned businesses whose founders are looking for an exit.
There's New York too. Erik explains why Grafton's first American expansion actually damaged its Irish business, why Irish executives need to “cut the blarney” when selling in the US, how he finances acquisitions, and why he doesn't want to raise an enormous fund and lose control.

He also says some of New York's most influential and wealthy families invested in him last year — and reveals that Grafton Digital has just signed a two-year digital transformation deal with a US corporation with more than 3,000 retail outlets, with another major airline customer announcement to come.
And his Hire in a Heartbeat?
John D. Rockefeller.
At 26.
Of course it is.
That Great Business Show, Episode 311. Real Business. Real lessons.
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Six figures in debt.
Then Kel Galavan did something fairly extreme. She put her family through a No Spend Year and cut their annual outgoings by €27,000.

Today, Mrs Smart Money says she has a seven-figure net worth.
Naturally, I wanted to know how.
Where did the money actually come from? How much difference did the No Spend Year make? Why can intelligent people earn very good salaries and still have absolutely no idea where their money goes? And why does Ireland remain so uncomfortable talking about investing?
Then Kel drops something else into the conversation.
She's building a personal-finance app in Ireland that she believes can eventually be rolled out across Europe — and this one, she says, will need funding.

Also back at the table is Geraldine Jones of Skin Formulas.
When Geraldine joined us five years ago, Skin Formulas was bootstrapped and she was thinking about Britain and perhaps outside investment.
She never took the investment.
Instead, she kept control.
Today there are 170+ stockists, a flagship store in Nenagh, a 2,500 sq ft warehouse, B Corp certification, manufacturing relationships in Britain, Korea and Turkey, European expansion underway — and Dublin Airport is next.
Oh, and Geraldine has just recruited someone who was selling for Trinny Woodall.
Not a bad five years.
The common denominator?

Both women came through ACORNS, the extraordinary programme for female entrepreneurs in rural Ireland.
Applications for ACORNS 12 close 18 September 2026.

And, inevitably, we finish with Hire in a Heartbeat.
Geraldine wants Emma Grede.
Kel wants…her husband.
She eventually even tells me his name.
Kel Galavan — Mrs Smart Money
Geraldine Jones — Skin Formulas
That Great Business Show with Conall Ó Móráin.
Made in Ireland. Listened to everywhere.
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E309 That Great Business Show with Conall O Morain

I thought the kidnapping was the revelation. Then I asked about his family.
After our interview, Vince Lawson told me he had never told his parents. His children hadn’t been told either. Almost none of his work colleagues knew.

In Episode 309 of That Great Business Show, he describes being bundled into a van in Tanzania, threatened with machetes and driven into the darkness. He explains how patchy Swahili and a conversation about football helped change the atmosphere.
Then we get down to business.
Vince’s career includes Fever-Tree, itsu and now Biotiful Gut Health, where he is Chief Marketing Officer. We discuss:
• Twice the price. Half the size. Why customers still bought.
• The difference between a passing fad and a business with staying power.
• Wellness overload—and the opportunity in making things simpler.
• Why customers saying something matters doesn’t mean they’ll buy it.
• Biotiful’s plans for growth in Ireland.
Plus British roller-skating medals, six years completing a three-year degree, and Hire in a Heartbeat.

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Frank Olden is a pharmacist.
So naturally, he went to Toyota.
Why? Because he was fed up wasting time.

Frank once calculated that simply looking for a pair of scissors in pharmacies was costing him about nine working hours a year.
Nine hours.
Looking.
For.
Scissors.

So he started applying Toyota’s Lean principles to community pharmacy.
Five small changes later?
46 hours of labour saved.
And this is not really an episode about pharmacies.
It is about something almost every SME does: waste time without noticing.

Frank explains why some apparently busy workplaces actually achieve very little; why Toyota gives workers time every day to remove tiny pieces of friction; why standard processes matter; and why fixing a recurring problem beats repeatedly fixing the consequences.

There are some particularly Irish moments too.
Seven years training to become a pharmacist — and then spending your day printing labels and sticking them on boxes.
And until recently, certain HSE reimbursement claims could still involve putting paperwork into an envelope, adding a stamp and posting it.
We also talk about:

why chaotic businesses can feel busier than productive ones
the Toyota Andon cord and the importance of fixing problems once
knocking two seconds off repetitive tasks
reducing prescription waiting times
the bank that responded to Frank's request for business finance by trying to sell him pension and income-protection products
and why the best process improvement may be ridiculously small.

HIRE IN A HEARTBEAT: Ryan Tierney of Seating Matters.
That Great Business Show is brought to you by De Facto Shaving Oil — the world's finest shaving oil, made in Mayo and sold worldwide.
Find all episodes at www.ThatGreatBusinessShow.com
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