Directors

Oren is the President for the Dungarvan & West Waterford Chamber. Oren’s day job is Director and Studio Manager with TOTEM, a strategic branding agency based in Dungarvan and Cork.

TOTEM work with national clients such as Cork Airport, Focus Ireland, Trocaire, Failte Ireland, EirGen Pharma, Shorla Pharma, Waterford Greenway, Limerick Greenways, Cork Chamber, Eurofins, Waterford city and County Council and Cliff Hotel Group. Oren has a wide-ranging understanding of all media platforms and has worked in Arts PR for national and international touring productions, and as marketing consultant to festivals and production companies.

Aware of how fortunate she is to be living and working in such a great place; Oren is heavily involved with the Dungarvan & West Waterford Chamber applying her skills by way of contribution to her community.

Chamber Vice-President Eugene has experience of more than fifteen years in the cinema industry. It started out as a manual process and moved to a new digital era, where SGC Dungarvan were first to use an abundance of new technologies to bring new innovations in cinema to Dungarvan and from there to all cinemas in Ireland.

Eugene has a BSc Hons Cam and a Diploma in Digital Marketing, manages teams in 4 locations in Ireland and is also a Director of the CMT (Chamber, Museum & Tourist Office) Community Employment Scheme. Eugene also enjoys being part of a steering group for the promotional initiative for the Irish Language in the area promoting Dungarvan as a service town for the local Gaeltacht. Eugene also has a keen interest in Tourism and is active selling Dungarvan & West Waterford as a tourism destination.

Whilst the story of Dungarvan Paints & D.I.Y. only began in 2012 David’s interest in the construction industry stemmed from a very young age.
Having benefited a vast knowledge from the family business he then moved on to further his training in the hardware industry.

Over the 25 years his interest in Logistics, Customer Service and Problem Solving grew further which inspired him to open his own business.
The experiences he has gathered led him to become a Director at Dungarvan and West Waterford Chamber where he offers assistance , especially to start- ups, having built his own business from the ground up, he is always on hand to offer support.

An active committee member of Dungarvan Tidy Towns, the environment and our association is very important to David. Shop local is a culture that is also very important to David and something which he is very passionate about and can explore and promote through his involvement with the Dungarvan & West Waterford Chamber.

Shane Connors is managing partner of Connors and Co., Chartered Accountants, servicing the South-East region with offices in Waterford and Kilkenny.

He is a qualified Chartered Accountant with a first class honours MBA degree.  Shane has over 20 years’ experience of working in and advising Irish SME’s and has also lived in Eastern Europe where he worked for an international commodity trading company.   Shane has held senior management roles and managed assets in excess of €250m.

Shane has extensive experience across many sectors including retail pharmaceuticals, wholesale distribution, technology, construction, plant hire, professional services and internationally traded goods. His unique experience gained in corporate finance and especially in mergers and acquisitions makes him an expert in this area, and one of the most sought-after professionals in this field based in the South-East.

Connors and Co. is a full-service accountancy practice. Within the practice, Shane specialises in the following areas:

• Acquisitions, disposals, joint ventures and succession planning in the SME sector
• Cash flow forecasting and cost reduction programmes
• Bank and other financing options, reviews and re-negotiations
• Liquidations, examinerships, corporate recovery and turnaround strategies

Marie has been part of GSK Dungarvan for 16 years and lives in Lismore.

As Technical Director at GSK Marie has responsibility for Product Lifecycle Management, New Product Introduction, Business Development, Process Robustness, Packaging Technology, Cleaning Validation and Process Validation, Project Management of NPI’s, Portfolio Optimisation, Value Engineering, Team Management of the site Technical function.

Marie shares GSK’s strong community ethos and responsibility and is delighted to be part of the Chamber Board of Directors where she can represent manufacturing, large industry and their connection to the community.

Patrick is an award-winning radio producer, podcast host, and communications strategist, with over 20-years experience working in traditional and digital media. He has produced shows including The Last Word with Matt Cooper (Today FM), The Big Bite with David McWilliams (RTE TV), and Beat Talk with Niall Power (Beat 102 103) .

In 2017 Patrick founded AudioBrand, a podcasting agency that creates turnkey podcast series for brands including EY, Ibec, Irish Life, SuperValu / The Happy Pear, Mario Rosenstock, GIY, TELUS International, and Dublin City University.

Patrick is the founder and director of The Today FM School of Radio and Podcasting; he also creates and delivers bespoke podcast training programmes for organisations including The Public Relations Institute of Ireland and Learning Waves Skillnet.

A Waterford native, Patrick moved home in 2020 and now runs AudioBrand from Dungarvan.

John Nugent has over 18 years’ experience in Financial Services and as a well-recognised leader in the industry has vast experience in Finance, Product & Proposition design, Leadership, Technology and Business Transformation.

In John’s current role he is responsible for all mass affluent and high net-worth customers in Ireland’s leading pillar bank. John is a qualified Actuary and member of the Institute of Actuaries in the UK and Society of Actuaries in Ireland. He is also a Qualified Financial Advisor and was recent Chairman of the Dublin LIA which is educational body for financial advisors in Ireland.

Originally a West Waterford man he currently lives in Dublin with his wife and three children. John is keen to give back to the local area which has given him so much and which he extremely proud of.

Paul is the Managing Director of Paul O Connor Cars Limited, based in Dungarvan. Paul started the business in 2019 after spending 6 years working for a large motor group in Waterford and Cork. Since then, he has grown the business from a solo operation to employing 10 staff across 3 different garages: Paul O Connor Cars (Sales) and Paul O Connor Service, which looks after service maintenance work as well as an Autobody garage that looks after respraying cars, refurbing alloys etc. The business has now grown to selling over 500 cars per year and you will find his little ‘P’ company logo on a car in nearly every county in Ireland at this point!

Paul’s approach to business is based on quality, good customer service, creating a relaxed and enjoyable environment for both customers and staff as well as an innovative approach to marketing. Online marketing is one of Paul’s strengths and the company has amassed a social media following of over 20,000 people across Facebook and Instagram.

Outside of work Paul enjoys holidays and travel, music, spending time with his English Bulldog Gus and the rollercoaster journey of being a Man. United fan. He is also big car fanatic – as you may have guessed!

Originally from Dublin, Emilene moved to Dungarvan in 2008 when she purchased Merry’s with her father, Jim and began a renovation job, converting Merry’s into a Gastro Pub and opening its doors on 1^st May 2008.

She lived in America where she worked as a chef and ran a successful Gastro Pub for a number of years before returning to Ireland to start a catering business and eventually finding Merry’s & Dungarvan. Emilene, her father & brother Will, opened a new venture, The Merry Cobbler, in Dublin 4 in November 2016, located next to The Aviva.

After opening The Merry Cobbler, Emilene was invited to join the committee of The Licensed Vintner’s Association, dealing directly with international suppliers such as Diageo, Heineken and Bulmer’s, organising trade deals to benefit pubs nationwide.

Covid made Emilene realise how blessed she is to live in a wonderful prosperous town like Dungarvan and she decided to get more involved with the community. She organised Dungarvan’s first ever Dungarvan Pride – letting people from all over the world see what a wonderful welcoming town Dungarvan is to all walks of life, through the virtual Pride video of Dungarvan.

Emilene hopes that by joining as a Chamber Director she can bring something new to the Board and continue to help develop Dungarvan as the welcoming tourist destination it has become – making it a town where we all feel blessed to live and appreciate what we have on our doorstep.

Chamber Treasurer David Walsh is a Qualified Financial Advisor with over 25 years experience in the Financial Services Industry and runs his own Independent Financial Advisory Business nationwide, having previously worked with Canada Life, Field Financial, Holden & McEvilly Ltd and ACE Life & Pensions. David is a Director of Complete Financial Planning Ltd. t/a Better Finances. David’s philosophy in building long term relationships with clients is ‘going the extra mile’ and delivering quality service. He believes this is much easier to achieve working as an independent financial adviser with a ‘close knit’ team.

David is a Director of the Dungarvan Community Employment Scheme and is Chairman of the Glenbeg School Boar of Management. David continuously works on behalf of the Dungarvan & West Waterford community and has a big picture view when leading Chamber activities. David is a keen supporter of hurling, soccer and other sports and is currently Secretary of Dungarvan Utd and has been Chairman previously for a number of years.

Jack Walshe is founder/director of Hanntec engineering ltd,  Hanntec provide CCTV, Networking solutions and Technical installations to the SME and agricultural sector in Ireland. Hanntec are Lucky to have a broad customer base and now supply technical services to Irelands leading Agri food companies and Farms, Providing customers with results driven solutions in the fields of Security, Electrical and Automation and product development.

A graduate of Engineering from WIT Jack has a strong interest in new product development and emerging technologies, he is passionate about how technology can solve the Energy crisis and help the world heal from the negative environmental impact caused by human activity.  A Proud Waterford man, when Jack is not working on the business or his Beef farm he spends time travelling Ireland with Family, Mountaineering and is an avid wild track walker.

Stephen Walsh has 15 years experience within the construction industry. He is the Managing Director of AerHaus Ventilation, providing a host of mechanical ventilation solutions to trade and retail markets. With over 3,000 installations completed to date Stephen brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to every project.

Representing a dozen manufacturing partners from seven different countries, he is no stranger to international trade. Indoor air quality is at the centre of everything he does and he frequently visits international industry fairs, sourcing the latest and most advanced residential ventilation technology for the Irish market.

Stephen is target driven, customer focused with a keen eye for quality and value. Stephen has also held the position of Chairman of the Residential Ventilation Association of Ireland ( RVAI), a national organisation which promotes awareness and proper deployment of ventilation technology within the Irish new-build and retrofit market. He is married to Karen and they have three children. He regularly reminds them that every day is a school day and lives by the same ethos himself.

Stephen is keen to build relationships nationally & internationally that will benefit the economy and environment in which we live.