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Christmas Special - Interview with Don Hall, Hall Public Relations
Christmas Special - Interview with Don Hall, Hall Public Relations
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About this episode
Don Hall, a respected figure in Irish motoring PR, shares his rich history with Motor Distributors Ltd (MDL) and the evolution of car brands like Volkswagen, Skoda, and Mazda in Ireland. He reflects on the importance of personal relationships in the motor industry, the vital role of women in dealerships, and the enduring value of honest journalism. Don also discusses the future of PR amid new technologies, emphasizing the timeless human curiosity for information. The interview is filled with nostalgic stories, insights into the Irish motor trade, and reflections on a lifelong passion for public relations.
Topics:
irish motor industry history
motor distributors ltd (mdl)
skoda brand development
role of women in dealerships
public relations in motoring
relationship with motoring journalists
evolution of car brands in ireland
future of pr and media
personal stories from the industry
electric vehicle market insights
Welcome back to the Nevo EV News Podcast. If it's Tuesday it must be Nevo EV News Day. My name is Derek Reilly and on this podcast we chat all about EV. Nevo is Ireland's only dedicated EV platform and we'll be covering where we were this week, what we've been driving and what we've been doing between podcasts. If you haven't already subscribed or followed us wherever you are listening please do so and if you enjoyed the episode, please leave a rating and comment, it really helps us out and it doesn't cost you anything. Let's get stuck in.
Christmas Special - Interview with Don Hall, Hall Public Relations
https://www.hall.ie/
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Kia EV5
"... Christmas I'll be driving up and down in the Kia EV5 doing coast to coast. But let's get it stuck into..."
Car
Volkswagen Beetle
"...in the case of MDL, they assembled the Volkswagen Beetle. That was a big, big seller, as you can imagine."
Car
Volkswagen Golf
"...etle was about to be superseded by the Volkswagen Golf. And at that particular time,"
Car
Ford Taurus
"...ful woman. I couldn't I mean, I could take out to Taurus now and and spend our searching for all the great..."
Select text to request an explanation
Next interview with a man that shied away from when I sent in the request to see if we would
be interested in being interviewed and he says, Derek, I'm not a man that likes to be at the
front in the limelight.
I'm the one behind the scenes, but he has changed his mind and he's decided to do an interview
with me, which I'm delighted with.
So this episode will be an interview with Don Hall from Hallpure.
For those who don't know, my name is Derek Riley, and on this podcast we chat about
all things electric vehicles.
Nevo is Ireland's only dedicated EV platform and we'll be covering where we were this week,
what we've been driving, what we've been doing between the podcasts.
If you haven't already subscribed or followed us, whatever you're listening, please do so,
and if you enjoyed the episode, please leave us a rating and comment.
It really helps us out and it doesn't cost you anything.
Last week I was driving the Cooper Tavascan VZ.
There'll be a video coming to the channel over Christmas and into the new year as well
as the Polestar II business edition.
So some different ends of the spectrum there, performance, SUV, electric, and then some
phenomenal value in the Polestar II business edition.
And over the Christmas I'll be driving up and down in the Kia EV5 doing coast to coast.
But let's get it stuck into the main part of this podcast, the interview with Don Hall.
There I was scrolling my phone, then someone cracked open a mountain drew Baja Cabo Citrus.
I grabbed my own and took a sip.
Next thing I know I heard a rip.
My friend tried the splits and skinny jeans.
The crew couldn't stop laughing.
But hey, not a drop of Baja Cabo Citrus was spilled.
Have a blast with Mountain Dew Baja Cabo Citrus, a punch of tropical citrus flavor.
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That's Grammarly.com.
Welcome back to the podcast.
I'm here with a motoring legend that I say anyway and everybody I've talked to
in my peer group.
We've had a lovely morning of catching up with stories and we've had scones
from North County Dublin and a cup of tea.
I'm here with Mr. Don Hall.
Don, how are you?
Very well, thank you, Larry.
Nice to welcome you here to Hall, Household and Malahide.
Lovely to be here.
We're nearly neighbors now in North County Dublin
and I got a lovely heart from yourself and Ashley when I moved in.
Yes, I think you've made a wonderful choice to live in North County Dublin.
It's like every other part of Ireland.
It's becoming quite grown up now and lots of traffic and all those sort of things.
But, and there's a big but,
we have the Fingal County Council looking after our affairs here.
And I have to say by any measure,
they must be amongst the best local authority in all of Ireland.
I say that because they have a magnificent interest in the recreational side of life
here in North County Dublin in the way in which they've acquired properties
like the Malahide Castle, like Newbridge House,
like Art Gill in Castle Gardens, like out in the Scaries.
And also the way in which they look after the landscape within the county.
And you see that very much in the summertime where they plant wildflowers
throughout the roundabouts in North County Dublin and in general terms.
One of the things that they've done and I think it's a wonderful thing.
They did a booklet, a wonderful booklet,
which I hope is part of an ongoing series of the years go by.
A beautiful booklet which which tells you where the money goes.
And they explain in simple, easy to read terms
where the local authority budget is spent and what is going to landscaping
and what is going to roads and things like that.
And I have to take my hat off to them and even in a small way
because a very close friend of mine I know had reason to
to talk to them about disabled parking here at Malahide Castle.
And I'm sure the same is the case in other other amenities, you know.
And and I have to say they responded so well to to to an approach
so much so that the disabled parking now is is well provided for
in these in these amenities and hats off to them in so many respects.
And I think you'll enjoy your your life here living in North County Dublin.
Looking forward to it, looking forward to more cups of tea with you, Don.
Don, we our paths crossed because I started reviewing electric vehicles
and Mercedes Benz had a number of electric vehicles at the time
brought in by MDL and I remember going to a launch
a couple of years ago in MDL and they have murals on the wall.
And within those murals, there is all the history of MDL
and staff and management in different levels.
But there is one person in the mural
that's not an employee of MDL, and that is Mr.
Don Hall. Can you tell me a bit about your connection with MDL
and you don't just represent MDL and that motoring group,
but also you've other clients as well.
But I know you through the motoring side of things.
But can you tell me how you Hallpure started off with MDL
and and your history there?
Well, I first walked through the gates of motor distributors.
You can draw any conclusions you like from this,
but it was in the 1960s, the second half of the 1960s.
And I was brought there.
I'd never met them before.
That was my first time to go to that place.
And it was a time of great bother, so to speak,
within the motor industry, because at that time,
if you wanted to take cars into Ireland,
you had to have a license from the government.
And of course, the license, whether or not you got a license,
hinged in large measure on the numbers that you were employing.
And that was the time.
And of course, when most of the big companies
were assembling cars here, the cars came in in boxes.
And in the case of MDL, they assembled the Volkswagen Beetle.
That was a big, big seller, as you can imagine.
Everybody had a Beetle in one way or another.
And that was a big, big product.
The only problem was that the Beetle
was about to be superseded by the Volkswagen Golf.
And at that particular time,
Volkswagen simply weren't going to make or supply
the Volkswagen Golf in box format.
CKD completely knocked down with the shorthand for that.
And it was at that particular time, there was great concern.
And I hear, I have to take off my hat.
I could take it off hundreds of times
to salute the O'Flaherty family,
because that was my first meeting with them.
And really, they've been wonderful people, wonderful employers.
And they don't imply me directly.
I'm a contractor.
But I have many friends who were on the staff.
And I know throughout all that rough period
when what does the future hold and all of that?
I know the amount of concern that they had for the workforce.
And they have the very same concern to this day.
They are people who I think must be applauded.
I can't find words really big enough to applaud the O'Flaherty family
and what they have done, not just for their own business.
But when you think how it trickles down into the furthest reaches
of Irish society through the Volkswagen dealer network.
And there has been wonderful friendships over all the years
between MDL, between its employees and between its dealer network.
People still talk and think back and romance about the days
of the beetle and the Volkswagen and all of that.
Well, of course, times have changed a lot since then, we know.
But the O'Flaherty families do stand out
and they extend to which they themselves hold dear
all the things that they have they have done
as an enterprise, I think is reflected in a way in which
in which that work, that piece of artwork, that series of artworks
so graphically reproduced on the walls of that long corridor
in little featured pieces on each stretch of wall.
It was quite, and for myself, it came as a complete surprise to me.
I had no idea at all, at all, at all that I was going to feature
on that artwork, but you can imagine for a moment how very proud I was
to see that Nigel O'Flaherty, because it was Nigel,
I think who personally commissioned that, he knew the artist very well,
that Nigel O'Flaherty would have thought so much
as to put my illustration into that collection of artworks.
It really was a great tribute and I'm so proud of it then, I'm still proud of it today.
People who know MDL today will know Mercedes-Benz and, more recently,
X-Pen and Smart and BYD, new brands.
But MDL back then, you've mentioned down, was Volkswagen.
Also Mercedes-Benz, was there a Ford at one stage as well,
so they didn't have a portfolio of brands?
We did have a portfolio of brands, yes.
During my time, we have looked back on, we do the Volkswagen, of course.
My memory goes back to assembly, I do remember those days.
The assembly, we had a Volkswagen and we had the commercial vehicle,
of course, the transporter, and in and then in its various forms,
as people carriers and things of that nature.
So Volkswagen was big, Audi, Audi was big, of course,
and we had Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, Audi, Mercedes-Benz,
but there were others as well.
We had Mazda and let's take a hat off to Mazda because there was a time
when in order to maintain that assembly and in order to maintain the flow
of licenses we need to bring in fully built-up cars and in a situation
where Volkswagen weren't going to supply us with CKD cars to assemble,
we went over to Japan and as it so happens,
Mazda were interested in coming into Ireland, as were others at the time,
Toyota and Nissan being two standout examples,
and they were prepared to send us a CKD car.
So we were able, therefore, to keep the assembly plant working
and at the same time we had acquired a new brand and an excellent brand too.
Mazda was a wonderful brand to have.
It performed very, very well
and and even to this day, very, very attractive range of motor cars.
And I suppose this was a slight tinge of regret in a way
that we no longer represent the Mazda, but it's it's still a beautiful car.
And, you know, I see them pass me on the road and
and they always catch my eye and say it's a beautiful red in that.
Mazda would have been our family car as well.
My dad would have bought Mazdas over the years.
But when we look at Japanese and we look at Japanese motor industry,
just as an example, John, at that time, the respect for Japanese
car manufacturers may not have been there.
It was coming from outside of Europe and people were wary of Nissan Toyota.
Mazda would have.
And so you had a job on your hands to build up that reputation within Ireland.
Yes, we did.
I think everybody had that job on their hands because I suppose
I suppose, in a way, some of it goes back to sort of
the life of children, you know, you might get a tin,
a tin clockwork train or something from Santa Claus or something.
And you turn it upside down.
You see it was made in Japan and that, you know.
And I suppose it took Japan itself a little bit of time
before we started getting the really high
tech stuff from the Sonys of this world and also from the motor industry.
But look at it today.
I mean, Japan became a byword for product, for quality.
And so we were very fortunate.
We had Japan, of course, but we also had Germany.
And of course, you know, the German quality was there as well.
So great franchises to have.
But then through other circumstances as well,
we had a linkage for a while in partnership
with the great Jeffrey Aysenhurst Williams, Jeffrey Aysenhurst,
but the firm was Aysenhurst Williams.
And there will be many who may listen to your podcast
who will remember Aysenhurst Williams, who assembled the Lailand truck
and down in down opposite Amy and Street Station.
In fact, just just I don't know what's in the in the premises now.
But I think it's an office block.
Built there, a kind of a well, modern 19, whatever it was,
70s or 80s office blockers there today.
But that was once the where the where they were assembled.
And Aysenhurst Williams at that time also acquired the agency for Citroen.
Oh, wow. Yes.
And and they were fundamentally truck people and different,
a little bit different.
But but I think there was a friendship there
between the O'Flaherty people and the and Jeffrey himself and his family.
And I think he had some family family coming on as the saying goes,
weren't quite old enough to get involved in the business.
But for a while, O'Flaherty's had a very good and very satisfactory
and friendly association with Aysenhurst in marketing the Citroen product.
And that was another little little brief
that fell under our umbrella at the time.
And we enjoyed that very much indeed.
And it was always interesting to to notice the different style
the way in which the factories, the difference between the French and the German.
And you could just almost imagine there would be a difference there, you know.
And not just France and Germany and Japan.
You also had Czech Republic or Czechoslovakia.
Would it be? Yes, indeed, indeed.
That was Skoda. Yes.
And that was just that was a magnificent episode in MDL's history
and a magnificent episode in in our history as well.
That was that was that was that was we had the Favoret and the Foreman.
They were the two models.
They were the two models, wonderful examples of cars
that really kept Eastern Europe rocking and rolling.
And, you know, people used to make jokes and have fun and all that sort of stuff.
But what they must remember that the quality was there.
No doubt about it, these cars were made to last.
Planned obsolescence wasn't factored into anything in those days.
Like nowadays, not into anything.
And and Skoda was a wonderful experience.
Because here we had to reintroduce Skoda
because they had been here back in the day before that.
But now we had the Skoda and we had a massive challenge.
The challenge, of course, was to appoint a national dealer network
for these new cars.
The challenge was to to promote the brand Skoda
promote indeed in the in the face of some
jokes and humor that went down at the time.
You know, it was quite a quite a quite a quite a
I don't know how you describe it, but it was quite a challenge to overcome.
And but we overcame it.
And why did we do that?
Well, Volkswagen themselves, who had now bought Skoda,
brought a certain a certain ring of quality, extra quality to the brand.
They brought their design, their technical
their technical knowledge to the process.
And very, very quickly, Skoda turned out
to be one of the best value motor cars you could find on the market today.
And the name Skoda, well, look where it is today.
Nobody even stops and thinks about it.
But in those days, it was wonderful.
And we had a great, great, wonderful job going around Ireland
and appointing exclusive Skoda dealers.
And we did keep one.
Now, we did keep one dealer from who had been a dealer in the previous
Skoda's previous incarnation, and that was a dealership up in Finglas.
And because we knew there was a customer base
who still had cars from the days gone by,
cars that we weren't at that time representing.
And and that dealership was exceedingly valuable to us
because, first of all, they had a bit of a graveyard out the back, you know,
at a time when maybe the supply of parts
wasn't what you'd like it to be or what you'd expected to be today.
So they had a little graveyard, which is very, very useful.
But more importantly, they had the technical knowledge.
They knew how the old cars ticked.
Yes. And that's very important.
And that dealership was a very valid player in the Skoda network
that that we developed at the time.
And what a wonderful challenge that was to, you know,
and some great characters came out of that.
And that's one of the things, you know,
that's one of the things that has always appealed to me
about the Irish motor industry.
Disfruta mas formas de ahorrar en Fred Meyer como precios bajos en todo pasillo.
Descarga la app de Fred Meyer, elige tus cupones digitales semanales
y ahorra aún mas.
Además ganas puntos en combustible para ahorrar hasta un dólar por galón.
En Fred Meyer encuentras mas formas de ahorrar
y mas recompensas en cada compra.
Ahorrar en grande a diario es fácil con ahorros y recompensas.
Fred Meyer, fresh para todos.
Los ahorros pueden variar por estado.
Aplican resecciones de combustible.
Ve los detalles en el sitio.
There I was scrolling my phone,
then someone cracked open a Mountain Dew Baja Cabo Citrus.
I grabbed my own and took a sip.
Next thing I know, I heard a rip.
My friend tried the splits and skinny jeans.
The crew couldn't stop laughing.
But hey, not a drop of Baja Cabo Citrus was spilled.
Have a blast with Mountain Dew Baja Cabo Citrus.
A punch of tropical citrus flavor.
The dealers, the characters.
All over Ireland, you had you had characters
and they worked in the motor industry.
Fellas who are who are naturally optimistic.
Yes, had to be that to me.
Yes, they were.
But they were optimistic and they were clever and they were creative.
And and in ways, you know, some of that is lost today.
It becomes too corporate.
Yes, yes.
And a tour of Ireland was almost you could nearly think about
Callens and Cantor, you know, for example,
big Toyota dealer, formerly a Volkswagen dealer,
you know, all the you could nearly plan a route around Ireland
if you wanted to go and see scenic Ireland, you know,
Spooners and Russ Gray, all these names from those days.
And and but look, that's the way it is.
Life moves on and things are all computerized today.
But in those days, a lot of business was done
during the lunch break. Face to face.
And people. I think people still buy people today, Don.
And we've talked about that.
Skoda Ray Leddy is a listener to the podcast
and obviously started off in MDL and is still with Skoda
and one of the brains behind all the great stuff that they're doing.
But for you to take that
mixed history and the jokes, as you said, and to kill those jokes.
Yes, we did. It was a rumor that if you wanted to wind up Don Hall,
you'd put a Skoda joke into your article.
And that wasn't allowed anymore.
You're very nice to put it down as a rumor.
It was a fact.
That was one quick way of winding up Don Hall.
It was to was to crack Skoda jokes.
And it was to certainly serious.
Martin Sin would have been to write our printer Skoda joke.
You know, that was no, we tried to put those days behind us and we succeeded.
But the car really itself, the quality of the products,
that made it all possible, you know, I mean, the joke was over.
Once people started getting into the new generation Skoda, that was the end of it.
And it is about bombs on seats, Don, isn't it?
And we found out what our show as well. It's yes.
And one of the things we we we we we we we we we did put a little effort
into promoting and that should never ever be forgotten.
That Skoda, Lauren and Clement.
Was, I think, history correctly records
the fact that it was the third oldest motor manufacturer in the world.
Correct. One hundred and thirty years.
Yes. Yes.
Phenomenon.
After Mercedes, of course,
with the with the great Benz and Daimler separately,
going back to eighteen hundred and eighty six.
Then you had Peugeot, I think, was second in line.
Very good.
And then Peugeot had had, I think, some vehicle that qualified as a car.
And then Lauren and Clement, which there is, right,
a Skoda right back to its early days.
I did a video on the channel there recently where the Enyac, their large
electric SUV, and it was a special one hundred and thirty year edition model
on the seats it has Lauren and Clement.
Embroidered into the seats.
So it's their names that are still remembered today.
Absolutely. Yeah.
And and you see, you see those cars,
I remember in a different incarnation,
we had the pleasure of doing some work with Zetter.
Now, Zetter tractors, as farmers arrived today,
and sure now, who will tell you the Zetter tractor was bulletproof.
Zetter is better.
And, you know, one day, quite by accident,
I took a trip from Inish Man.
I I what do they say?
Hopped a ferry.
I hopped a ferry
and went across the Inish year
for for the day, I think, and then hopped one back to Inish Man for the night.
I couldn't believe my eyes.
I arrived into Inish here and here
we had the brief to promote the Zetter tractor.
And I remember that coming our way through the Skoda connection
and the Czech Republic and all of that.
And here I wasn't in this year.
And I swear nearly every single tractor on the island of Inish here
that was a Zetter and I was so struck by this
that I did a piece.
I took some photos.
I did a little bit of write up and that little piece ended up
in an international publication that Zetter themselves produced
a market magazine.
And here it was set out on the very west of Ireland.
In the Atlantic, you had this little
you had this little haven of Zetter tractors.
Market penetration.
Yes, absolutely.
And a fascinating thing, you know, that I remember looking in
and I can't remember which model it was,
but it had a bench seat.
You know, there it was for the driver and the passenger.
And I know that you can get those today.
But but in those times,
it was part and parcel of a standard specification, which is fascinating.
And in the year, of course, I do remember fishing boats
and not being hauled out. Yes.
By with a Zetter tractor, they just seem to go forever.
And that's probably because the mechanics
that were not sophisticated.
They were simple, simple mechanics.
Yeah, roadside repairs, those sort of vehicles.
Jiggle the wires a little bit and get it to work.
They call it the right to repair.
Now is a big thing in America and other states
where they're saying that if you buy something,
you should be able to fix it yourself.
You shouldn't have to bring it back and talk about Zetter.
You were definitely able to an Englishman.
You weren't going to bring it to the local Zetter dealership
because that was on the mainland.
You had to repair it yourself.
Yes, yes. Don, listening to you there,
talking about expanding Skoda as an example,
isn't it funny how history repeats itself now with BYD
and X-Ping and Smart and the growth of those dealer networks now
with MDL again and coming back
to bringing in brands into the country
that are starting off with no reputation
and Hall Pior have to help them out?
Yes, well, you see,
there was always a wonderful relationship between MDL
and its its dealers network.
There are many dealers in Ireland
who by virtue of happenstance or whatever
are no longer in what you might describe
as the Motor Distributors' fold.
But observing it over the years,
there was always a special relationship between them.
That's just the way it was.
This whole concept of a family
was very much part and parcel.
And it was very often a family.
You know, you start, you do the deal with with with father,
but then the son starts coming into the business.
Our daughter, as the case may be.
And let me say this, by the way,
as one who's observed the motor industry over the years.
A lot of main dealers were men.
A lot of them are male, end of story.
But I have known so many motor dealers
whose business was held together like glue by women.
I mean dealerships where the whole
the whole deck of cards would collapse
if it wasn't for for for for right hand women, women.
I mean, I do remember the first dealer principle
that I can recall up in Castle Nock,
forgotten the lady's name at the minute,
but the dealership in Castle Nock at the time,
I think it might have been Honda,
set up and managed and owned by a woman
who I think had had an earlier point
worked with the Brady organization, the motor organization.
But but aside from that,
that's the where the woman takes, sets up the business
and good luck to them.
But they but but as back up in the dealership,
you know, as right hand, as as the person who makes things,
the engine, the engine, it's it's amazing
how many dealerships in this country
survived and prospered because
because of the interest that women had.
I think it's any business, not just motor
business, there's a lot of spouses or office managers.
It is absolutely true.
And and and therein lies one of the some of the great qualities,
I think that that women bring to a business.
There is the quality of focus, focus, not distracted, not distracted.
A first class focus, loyalty,
commitment and it doesn't matter if the house,
if the dealership is run like like like the home is run.
Every business needs to be needs housekeeping.
Yes. In one way or another.
And I have to say in so many areas,
I've seen motor dealers who'd be lost
without without women in the in the in the in the operation.
Speaking of women in the operation, Don,
I have wasn't lucky enough to meet Maeve
and looking at Hallpure as a company.
And you've always said how well got she was within the industry
and with my peers as motoring journalist.
She helped you run the business as well.
She did. Maeve Barry.
I'm talking about Maeve Barry, who worked with me
for 38 years, an absolutely wonderful woman.
I couldn't I mean, I could take out to Taurus now
and and spend our searching for all the great words to use
to describe Maeve Barry.
Maeve Barry was wonderful.
And of course, in the work we do,
we were interfacing all the time
with with with with journalists, media people,
a group that, if I may say so, expands,
almost I won't say daily, but expands.
Yes. And it expands because of interest, public interest.
People just love reading about motor cars
and they look to their local magazine, their local newspaper,
whatever they may be.
And thankfully, editors are still prepared to give space
to motoring affairs because there is a massive readership out there.
People are just interested in motor cars.
And therefore you have this wonderful body of motoring writers.
And I say a wonderful body because they are to be admired.
And I say that not because it's because of any skin in the game.
And I do have skin in the game.
But the truth of the matter is that this legendary figures,
people who go down in legend today, you know,
and people who will go down in legend tomorrow,
of whom perhaps you're wondering because you you definitely have grabbed
the flag of EV and all that's new
and wrapped it very well around yourself
and your business with the exhibitions and things like that.
And so wonderful group of people
reporting on a wonderful subject matter
and right in the middle of them, it was my colleague, Maeve Barry,
38 years, who would have thought it, you know,
she was brilliant.
And sadly, God wanted her up there
and I couldn't hold hold to hold that back.
And I miss her to this day.
She knew every journalist in this country.
And, you know, she knew.
I know the old phrases, you know, where they had for breakfast.
Well, maybe she did, but she certainly they were always happy
to confide even some of the more difficult challenges
that they would meet in their everyday life.
And Maeve was a wonderful sounding board
and have a board and her friendship
with with with with all the motoring writers, all of them, male, female.
It's the stuff of legends, really it is.
And I even to this day, I miss having Maeve Barry around.
Now, a great team in Hullpure.
I'm dealing with Ashley.
You're talking about multi-generational within the dealerships.
It's now multi-generational within Hullpure.
It is. It is. That's Ashley.
And and and there again, Ashley, Ashley.
Ashley fell into the PR business.
And, you know, I was one of the most amazed people
because I was amazed because I wasn't.
First of all, I wasn't.
I wasn't I never realized that he that he might have liked it.
But that was surprise number one.
He loves it.
I I never really realized how much he knew about it, you know.
By Osmosis, maybe he was learning it from you, Dan.
Well, he did learn it.
There's no doubt about that because Ashley has a he is a good head on him.
And thankfully, he's he's popular at what he does.
He's he's efficient at what he does.
And and he's got the the element of of follow up
that I think is very important.
I mean, the job isn't done until it's really, really done.
Very efficient.
It's not enough anymore to press the send button.
That's only where it begins.
The send button.
And and I suppose it's it's hard to put old heads on young shoulders.
But I think I and I look at Ashley, even though he is he is my son.
He must have picked it up somewhere along the way
because I think he does.
He does like to know that that that shall we say the baby is safely
asleep in bed and asleep.
He likes to see a thing through to its completion.
And I think that's that's important.
And and also thinking, you know, not just waiting until things blow
imagining things that could happen, anticipating difficulties, proactive,
proactive, anticipating difficulties down the road or whatever.
I'm preparing in a way in your mind.
That's for me an essential part of the PR practice.
You have the day to day thing about building up
building up the positive story, the positive image and all of that stuff.
But it is a very, very wise PR person who anticipates
the unlikely, the, you know, the unimaginable.
And being prepared for that.
And yeah, even if it's only just thinking about it
and kicking it around in your mind for a while, always be thinking
of what could go wrong, not what could go right, but what could go wrong
and what would happen and what posture would I need to adopt
or what actions will I need to take in order to deal with that?
We spent 48 years representing the PR interests of Irish Ferries.
There's no one today as Irish Ferries.
But originally for us back in the 1960s, it was Irish Continental Line.
And it was the first direct ferry service between Ireland and Continental Europe.
I remember the days if it was yesterday, when the foundation stone
was laid at Rossler Harbour for the first drive on, drive off
car ferry to operate directly from Ireland to France.
I remember it vividly.
I remember the pictures.
I can remember every journalist that was there in the Talbot Hotel
afterwards to hear the story told about what was coming down the line.
Forty eight years we spent in the shipping industry.
What an exciting business that is.
But that is a three hundred and sixty five days a year,
twenty four hours a day business.
There isn't a moment when the shipping industry isn't prone
to accident or incident or whatever.
It may be a heavy storm.
It may be it may be a passenger related event.
You might say, what's that?
Well, say a helicopter lifting a passenger from from
off a ship in the middle of the night to a hospital on the mainland
Britain or the mainland Ireland. It's going to make the news.
That will make the news.
It may be a simple thing like maybe a lady gone to labor or something
like the birth of a child or it may be the it could be the the effect
of anything, a fall or anything like that.
The ferry industry for us was a magnificent.
It kept us on our toes all the time,
thinking, imagining things that I, you know,
I think I've got a file in our laptop even to this day
which imagines certain things that have never happened. Scenarios.
Scenarios and what would happen if that scenario were to come to play?
And you have to be like that.
You just have to be.
I hope Ashley is not spending too much time thinking of what could happen.
I know he's very busy.
I recently received an email of the cars coming to MDL in 2026.
2026. Did you read it?
It was just did you read it is going to be busy, Don?
I mean, I mean, it's just it's just incredible.
Unbelievable when you add them all together and every one of those cars
is a story in itself, right?
You know, it may look like a list of numbers and letters and things like that.
You know, but individually,
each car will have a character and a personality of a target audience.
Yes, a press launch, a press, a press pool of test drives that have been
arranged. Yes, yes.
That's not just Ashley.
You've got Thomas now within the organization, Thomas.
And so the office is getting bigger and expanding to manage
not just the L-account booth, whether it's Texaco,
whether it's Fife's, whether it's Kamatsu.
It is. Yes, Kamatsu indeed.
Wonderful Kamatsu, too.
Yeah. You know, it's funny thing that the child comes out on us from time to time.
You know, I mean, what little boy didn't want a digger from Santa Claus?
A digger, a Kamatsu or a big digger digger.
It's quarry stuff. It's huge.
Yes, I have a couple of, couple of grandsons at the moment.
There are one of them is, I think, five, I think five, five going on six.
And the other one's just a year or two younger.
And I'm thinking to myself, there has to be a moment,
sometime now in the future, when, when, when I actually arranged
for them to come up and sit in a big digger and turn on the engine,
you know, and pull a lever and see the see the the the the bucket
coming up in there or whatever, you know, that might happen.
I certainly hope it happens.
I hope it happens
even in the context of my own good health, very good, for which I thank the man above.
And but, yes, who doesn't want to play with the digger?
You've got a great variety of clients.
MDL is how I've come across with you, Don and our Pats of Cross with you
and Ashley and Thomas and the team.
What do you think the future holds with regards to the PR industry?
You alluded to it a couple of minutes ago with regards to it doesn't end
when you press sent.
No, definitely not.
It is very much I know when I walk into an MDL brand launch
wherever it's located, always beautiful locations are in MDL themselves.
Ashley is there to shake your hand.
You're there or Thomas is there and then the MDL team at the wider.
So there's a very much a relationship, a personal relationship
with the motoring media and the brand.
And you're that middle ground to make sure that the message is getting
across and received correctly.
But like you said, Ashley put in the baby to sleep, making sure that
it's followed all the way through because there's a continuous
cycle of new product coming through constantly.
And you have to make sure that it's getting the airtime it deserves as well.
Yes, yes.
Yes, well,
if you're asking in a way about PR and its uses and its future
and a lot of that stuff, I think PR has a future.
People look at me and say, what about AI and what about this
and what about that and so on and so forth?
Look, people are not going to change.
And it doesn't matter about AI, social media, influencers.
None of this matters because people will always be the same.
And and I have great hopes for the future of the business we're in
because people, if they're nothing else, they're inquisitive, curious.
They're curious.
They want to know and they just don't want to know
how many how many miles will I get on a charge?
That's part and parcel of what they want to know.
They also want to know what they're eating.
They want to know what's in the can of beans.
They want to know.
Information and that they don't all want to know the same information.
But across mankind, they all have different
needs, requirements.
What's it like to work in that place?
What sort of qualifications would I need to get a job there?
What's this? What's that?
What's the other?
And as long as people are people, and I think they will be,
there will always be that thirst for information.
There will always be that quest for knowledge.
And in a way, that's where the PR people come into it.
You know, others advertising people can spend their time
encouraging people to buy things with glossy ads
and full pages and this, that and the other.
But fundamentally, what you are, Derek, what we are,
we are in the information business.
We are dealing in the fact business.
We're not dealing with a lot of the window dressing.
Oh, sure, we might use a bit of window dressing now and then.
But fundamentally, behind and underneath and inside,
all of that is fact.
Yes.
Fact and information that people need to know.
People will want to know and as long as they need to know
and indeed the people who supply the equipment,
whether it's food, whether it's a service like a holiday.
You know, what when the holiday until, you know,
what do I need to bring all of that stuff?
What are the customs regulations?
You name it.
It's a hundred and one things that people will want to know
and that an industry will have a need to supply that information
if only to protect their own information out of their own self interest
or to get the right information out there or to get the right information out there.
So if you ask me, is there a future for journalism?
Is there a future for PR?
I have to say there is.
And I have to say this to young people who might be listening.
I know that there are people today that are going mad,
looking for the piece of paper.
You know, they'll feel themselves so incomplete
if they haven't got a piece of paper.
And I suppose in this, to some extent, that may be true.
And I remember when I was a young lad, I used to be told,
now you have to do your study and get your leaving certificate
and so on and so forth.
Get the qualifications.
Get your qualifications and everything else.
Well, the good news to any listener you might have
who finds it hard to knuckle down at night.
I just want to simply say and part of the reason for this
stems in the fact that I'm actually a Northern Ireland man.
And being a Northern Ireland man, I didn't grow up
with the great knowledge of Irish because it wasn't taught.
There were nobody teaching Irish in the schools that I went to.
Come on back now, Don.
It is, of course, because there's a lobby up in Northern Ireland
now to teach in the street names and all that stuff,
but not back in my day.
I take you can take that for granted.
It wasn't part of the curriculum.
So when I come down here, I had to walk very fast
to try and pick up a couple of fuck a last game, if you know what I mean.
And I did my best.
And I regret that I didn't even do more, to be honest with you.
I'd love to be able to speak flu and Irish, but I can't end of story.
I am the product of where I was born and where I grew up.
But but I had that all said, I have to say, don't panic.
If you're not a great study, because I, in fact,
I took my my schooling
down here, that is, first of all, in Lark Hill National School
and the north side of Dublin City.
But after that, in Belvedere College in the pleasant company
of the Jesuit order and and they did their best with me.
But I walked out on them, I'm afraid, in fifth year.
OK. And I got myself a job as an office boy,
would you believe, in a big oil company,
which which will be known to your listeners today
as the Texaco oil company.
In those days, it was in those days, it was called Caltex.
Yes. And I went in there and after
after after six months as an office boy,
and the wonderful boss.
And if I may inject a word or two about my wonderful boss,
my wonderful boss was a man called Sean O'Shea.
And those were the days when the only people who had PROs,
so to speak, by and large, were semi state companies.
One of them was the ESB.
And and and in there, you would have found Michael Colley,
whose son, Declan, is a well-known motoring writer
with the examiner newspaper.
Michael Colley was one, but it's mostly the big semi state companies.
Erling is Captain Jack Miller, people like that.
Joe Jennings are people who remember an RTE in the morning
talking about the traffic and everything else. Joe was in CIE.
And but beyond that, in commerce, as we know it today,
there weren't that many people in the PR business.
But Sean O'Shea, my boss, was one of them.
And the man was one of the most creative,
one of the most inventive, one of the most
humorous people I could have imagined ever having as a boss.
Wonderful man.
And he was the man who designed the Texaco Children's Art,
which is still going and alive today.
Seventy odd years later, the longest running art sponsorship,
the longest running sponsorship, in my opinion, of any kind
in this country and still is popular today as it ever was.
But anyway, in there with Sean and
and I will never forget the morning he
after an electrician had been seen going around
tacking a wire on the roof of the corridor along the corridor
and down into our room and over into his room.
He eventually assembled myself and two other clerks
that he had working with them.
We looked after advertising, sales promotion and public relations
for politics.
Yes, this department, a small group of people,
one of them was Morris Martel, those who take an interest in rugby.
We remember Morris was a was a great Irish captain.
Rugby player, Morris, I think, still alive today.
I know his son certainly is an active
in in finnigale politics, if I remember correctly,
and still active in the PR business.
But Sean, sadly, has passed passed.
And but anyway, the three clerks are never forget the morning
he took us in, he says, suppose you've noticed lads
that I've put in a buzzer system.
And that's what the wire was.
Yes, we did notice that, Mr.
O'Shea, we saw the electrician sticking a wire along the roof.
Yes, well, look, look, it's just I can never remember your phone
extensions, he says. So I thought this was a better way of doing it.
He said, so I'm going to do it now.
And Kevin, I'm putting you in charge of advertising.
You'll be one buzz.
Ian, I'm going to put you in charge of sales promotion.
You'll be two bosses.
Now, advertising was what we know it today.
TV ads, newspaper ads, all of that stuff.
Magazine ads, Celtics would have advertised a lot of magazines.
Sales promotion with things like roadmaps, OK.
Calendars, pens, et cetera, et cetera.
And then, Don, I'm putting you in charge of public relations,
he says to me. Three buzzers.
You're three buzzers.
And he went, I said, thank you very much, Mr. O'Shea.
Now, I actually that's how I got into the PR business.
Three buzzers. I could have been one buzzer, two buzzers.
But it turned out as luck would have it.
We were I was three buzzers.
And that meant that meant that I had certain projects
to look after and manage, you know, they manage them day to day terms.
One of them was the Texaco Sports Star of the Year Awards.
You know, not a small project, Don.
Not a small project.
A wonderful project as an office boy, a wonderful project.
If I'm a quote, Aamon Coughlin,
the great athlete Irish athletes who said, who said,
you know, at the end of the day, with all the awards there are today
and everything else, the Texaco Sports Stars of the Year Award,
he says, is the one we all want to have.
It was the one they are.
They all wanted that one.
And then truth is a lovely award made by a wonderful lady
and her company, All Right and Marshall, Mrs. All Right.
Probably deceased now, I'm sure she is.
In Fade Street, just off Georgia Street,
and they made those trophies from the real stuff, real silver,
real gold inlay, plunked on a solid, marble base,
wonderful and presented in a gorgeous case.
That was one of the little jobs doing that.
One of the jobs.
Then we had the Texaco Children's Art Competition,
which is still running. Very good. It's wonderful today.
And you know, the fascinating thing about that, Derek,
the fascinating thing about that and the talk about social media
and the talk about Tik Tok and this, that and the other.
Do you know if you ask a child back in those days
and remember that that competition started back in the 1950s,
still today, no years missing in between every year.
If you ask a young girl, a young boy of the 1950s
and a young boy or a young girl of the 2000s and 25s
to take a box of watercolor paints
and I want you to paint my mommy.
That's the title.
Do you know my mommy looks exactly the same today
from 1950s as she did in the 1950s?
She's got lovely red, rosy lips.
She's got a big, big shock of hair,
wonderfully curly hair, lovely, rosy cheeks.
She's never changed, which is, for me,
is one of the great hopes for the present and for the future.
And that is what a child sees through their eyes.
Unfiltered. Unfiltered.
And if that competition has any meaning
and it's got many, many meanings,
that's one of the great meanings it has,
that it gives children a chance to paint my mommy,
all my daddy, all my favorite pet,
the way I see it and the way I think it is.
And if you can do that for children,
you can make happiness happen.
So that was that.
And then in the wintertime, we used to go around the country
to the Mocca and the Ferdinand clubs.
These were in the days, you know, when these were in the days
when people didn't have television sets,
not to the extent they have today.
And you had the farming clubs around the country.
And we used to go around there.
We used to set off on a Monday morning
and we'd be back on a Friday.
And then the night time was in between.
You'd maybe go to the Mocca and the Ferdinand club here
and then you'd drive up the way and you'd go to another club there
and you'd put on a show, a movie show,
maybe two and a half hours duration.
And it was fascinating, quite fascinating.
A great interaction into the community.
Absolutely wonderful.
And, you know, even to this day,
I have such cherished memories of some of the things we did.
I'll never, ever forget one night in Cavern.
I'm staying at the Farnham Arms Hotel
and that snow is tundering down outside.
And I'm thinking, and I've got to go.
I had to go even across the border from Cavern.
My journey was to take me out into County Longford.
And I'm thinking, good grief on a night like this,
nobody's ever going to turn up.
But being a dedicated Northern Ireland man
and a persistent and stubborn and dedicated Northern Ireland man,
I set off, I said goodbye to the warmth
of the Farnham Arms Hotel.
And I set off in the snow with the wipers
barely keeping the windscreen clean.
And I made it all the way to this hut.
It was like one of those old army huts,
the semicircular one.
And there it was.
That's where we were to meet that night
and show the movies.
And I will never, ever forget it.
Parked up at the gate into this thing.
And there was nobody there.
No lights on, no nothing.
And it was only about a half an hour to go till it began.
I'm thinking, nobody's going to turn up.
And here I am.
I love to struggle all the way back to Cavern.
But there was sitting there, there was an old fashioned,
the old fashioned gypsies caravan.
And the man in the man of the house spotted me outside
anywhere and everything else.
He heard their crunching on the snow.
And he said, would you like to come in
out of that snow, he says.
And he invited me up into the gypsies caravan.
I thought it was with the other ones with the round roof
on it and now I'll do a little chimney.
And it was, would you like a cup of tea?
He says to me, well, I said, I can think of nothing nicer.
And he had a primus stove going in the middle of the floor.
And he made up the cup of tea and I had the cup.
And I said, listen, I said, I've come out here
to show some movies to these club tonight.
Do you think they'll come?
I says, it'll be here all right.
Don't worry.
I said, it is snowing very heavy.
Not at all, he says.
They'll be here, he says.
So I stayed with them.
I had me cup of tea and truth to his word,
it wasn't long before I could hear a bicycle
being propped up against the wall of the shed.
And soon enough, there was the first man.
He come to open up the hall and light up this big,
one of those hurricane-caped stoves, you know?
Yes, to heat the place.
Yes, and before you knew it,
we had a movie show going, you know?
The snow wouldn't keep the marketplace going.
But listen, my life was full of these experiences.
It was wonderful.
And then in the summertime, we used to go around,
this is all under the umbrella of public relations,
it was wonderful.
We used to go around visiting the agricultural shows.
And you could look at places like Virginia, Baleinac,
Ennis Scott, there was another great one.
We went to them all.
We went to Limerick and Cork.
We went down there too.
And that's still a popular show.
They were all over the country.
We went and we told this big display unit,
big caravan, and we'd open up the sides.
And it was public relations.
It was getting the word out there
of the brand Caltex at the time.
Absolutely.
And listening to what the public are saying to you,
as we talked about before we started recording,
it wasn't just Don and his trailer.
It was the local depot staff.
It was the reps for the agricultural sector.
It was, there was a team from Caltex there
and they knew the public and the public knew them.
Knew them, absolutely.
And those little things, they became a meeting point.
And we were really like a traveling troupe
of entertainers, so to speak.
Because I can still remember people from,
well, one of them was with the people,
Cardi's, the Bath people up in Baileyburg
and County Cavern.
I'll never forget, they had a man called Lynch
who worked with them, you know.
And it'd be a case of, look, see you in Ballinai,
you'd say goodbye, you know.
But you knew you were gonna meet me again.
We'd meet again.
We were right throughout the summer.
It was just quite wonderful.
But you had people like Power Seeds in Waterford.
They were there.
P.J. Carroll was there, all was there.
And as I said, Cardi's of Baileyburg
who made the old metal bath, you remember that?
Made till last.
Absolutely, the big, the lovely big tubs
you could kind of relax into.
And they used to make fire grates.
Very good.
Fire grates as well, they had a foundry up there
in Baileyburg and County Cavern.
And listen, that was life then.
And nobody ever asked me, did I get the leave and cert?
Or the plat that didn't because I didn't even do it.
That's good.
I just showed you, if you've got a passion for something
and you like the industry that you're in,
you never work a day in your life.
And I find that when the world of electric vehicles.
Going back to PR, Dan, before we finish up,
sometimes PR gets a bad rep
and the spin doctor aspect of it
and the negative side of public relations
are the perceived negative side.
I don't think it's fair sometimes that.
Well, it's not.
And it's not.
And I have to say from my knowledge of PR people,
the ones that I meet in the course of the day,
I really couldn't credit any of them
with drawing a reputation of that nature
down upon public relations.
I have to say that I haven't.
I'm sure they're there.
I'm sure there's slight of hand merchants.
Snake oil.
They're always snake oil.
They're always with us.
But I genuinely have to say, and that's a fascinating thing.
It's fascinating because you prompt me to say this.
I have to say all my life, all my working life,
there's a few facts that I can say with.
I'll meet my maker on the back of what I'm about to say.
The first thing I can say is this,
that if I could look back with eyesight so good
that I could see every single day
that I have worked in public relations business,
I would not see even one day that I wasn't happy.
I have been happy for every day I have ever worked
and I still want to do it because nothing excites me more
than the work that I do.
And if there's a young person out there
listening to your podcast who's wondering,
what would I do in life?
Well, don't pass the public relations
if you think you have the ability to do it.
Go and read the books.
The libraries are full of books.
Just take them out.
It won't even cost you and read it from cover to cover
because that's precisely what I did
when I was offered my first work in PR consultancy.
Practical public relations by Sam Black.
Very good.
Drumkondra Library.
Read it and study it.
And if anybody wants to ring me up,
they'll find me on Google.
They can go on Google, www.hall.ie.
That's the website and make contact if you're so wish
because nothing would please me more
than to see good talented people
coming into this business.
That's number one.
The next thing I want to say
is that I have dealt with mainstream media
in all kinds of situations that you could imagine.
Crisis.
Trouble multiplied by trouble.
Difficult scenarios.
Controversial scenarios.
With controversial people in my day,
I have seen it all.
And I want to say this.
The world of Irish media in my experience
is in excellent condition.
I have never.
I won't say that I haven't met some people
who maybe I thought better of.
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But they don't add up to a big number.
I would think so few as to be count them
on less than the fingers of one hand.
Who maybe you would have thought,
I'm sorry they did that.
Because not that they let me down,
I'm not a judge.
But that in my way they let themselves down.
But that's a very, very, very small number
out of a population of media over a long period of time.
Irish media have been exemplary.
Journalists, every day journalists
going about their jobs.
And I often hear people saying,
oh, you know, I was misquoted.
And I've often heard that throwing in
as an excuse for why they're embarrassed
by what was attributed to them in the media.
I can say it without any shadow of contradictions.
Journalists don't misunderstand.
They don't get a quote you wrongly.
In my experience, journalists are excellent in this country.
They're diligent.
And I can tell you something else.
In this world I have never, ever, ever
has an inducement been suggested?
Has an inducement been sought?
Of any kind.
They have been exemplary in every respect.
And I say that also about motoring journalists.
I embrace motoring journalists under that umbrella as well.
Motoring journalists, I'm grateful
to have had a wonderful relationship with them
over the years.
Yes, they are close to the motor industry
because we interact all the time.
We have to.
That's our business.
That's their business.
But I have to say, I have always played,
motoring journalists in my experience
have always played a straight bat.
Yet don't ever have to count your fingers afterwards.
They have been exemplary in terms of their honesty
and also in terms of expressing their opinions.
It has been a sort of, it's a discipline of ours.
When we give a car to a journalist,
we never suggest how they should regard it.
We never, ever try to prompt them in what they should say
or prompt them in terms of the opinion they express.
When a journalist takes a car out of our stable,
they have it and they can write what they like
because that is what's implicit in that action
is the invitation to take it, try it,
drive it.
Report back.
Report back and report back
because you have a listenership out there.
You have a readership out there
and they are relying on you
to give them a supposedly way to inform them.
Yes, all I have is my reputation and the reason people
will watch the YouTube channel or listen to the podcast
is because they value what I think of it.
And if they don't feel that I'm being genuine,
I have nothing else.
And the same with every other journalist,
whether it's written or print or media or online
or offline, whatever it may be,
you build up a following of people
who trust your opinion and how it drives
or how far it drives and all the rest of it.
And some people have different styles
and people will gravitate towards those different styles.
I won't beat everybody's taste
and I'm okay with that as well.
My job is to report on how I found the vehicle
or whatever it may be.
Yes, and I have to say that you
and others in the broadcast sector,
their reviews are excellent.
You're Torah.
You take people around the thing.
You tell them what's in it.
That's what people want on their opinion.
That's what they want.
They want the information.
And that's it.
Before I let you go down.
And very often the information is more than adequate.
Yes.
That's just the point.
A person who gives a prospective customer
the information and the impressions, honest impressions
of that is doing a wonderful, wonderful service
to the listener, to the viewer.
And that service is one which says to them,
depending on how they pick it up,
is to say, well, that's something I must check that for myself.
Or I must make a note of that when I go down to the dealer.
Or that prompts me too, those sort of things.
And that is the great job that the motoring writer does.
And I can tell you, I've met them right back
to the earliest days.
And they've always been the same.
They're doing that job.
What I find is because it's such a big purchase,
people soak up all that information.
And so my style of being factual as to what it is.
Before I let you go down, when you saw me first
coming into the area, you said I reminded you
of a gentleman that reviewed a lorry or a truck
on the afternoon show on RT.
Yes, he did.
He did.
In the sense that you didn't have any knowledge
of this question, I should have been better prepared.
But I know exactly what you're talking about.
This was a review on the afternoon program.
Thelma Mansfield was one of the preventive presenters.
Derek Davis.
Derek Davis, live at three.
And they wheeled this articulated tractor unit
into the studio.
And this dealer, I wish now I could remember,
he was a motor dealer.
His day-to-day job was as a motor dealer.
And he had an outlet, if I'm not mistaken,
up in Churchtown, somewhere up in Churchtown, at least now.
But he did a wonderful job.
Here he was in RTE studio.
And he had the job of telling people about this,
what is the front of a 40-foot truck?
The tractor unit.
Tractor unit.
And he took us around.
He took us up into the cabin.
We could see the little box
where he would have put his drinks.
We could have seen how the bed, how the bed folded down.
And he took us, and you know, if it had been a show house,
he couldn't have done that.
Because, and it was fascinating for the fact
that this was home for so many drivers.
And I was nearly going to say men,
but in fact some of the great drivers are females too.
That's one of the great discoveries I've made
in the course of my life.
I've seen more than a few women now hop up
into the driving seat of a 40-foot truck
and do a bloody nice job at it.
You know, so that's the benefit of power steering,
I suppose, you know?
But it's quite easy to manage these big things.
I've never driven a big truck, by the way,
but I imagine that all of that is very comfortable.
But the whole thing, the living quarters,
and that is their living quarters.
It's their, it's where they live all the time.
I think it was that man.
Is there something in the back of my mind
saying Gus Corrigan or something?
But I'm not sure.
I'll have to go and find this video clip
to see how I reminded you of him
and my style of presenting.
Well, I think you did because you do bear in mind
that a car is, you have to go around a car.
A car, you go around it.
And I'm clever of you to have remembered that
because I was very impressed by him.
And the thing was, the thing that he taught me
that day is that you don't have to be slick.
You don't have to be a Hollywood star.
You don't have to be, you know, off the wall.
Entertaining.
Entertaining.
What you do have to be is informative to tell people
this is what this car adds up to.
And you're Torah at it because I noticed sometimes,
well, maybe sometimes you want a little prompt
as to what my life, particularly when you go abroad,
so look at the car that hasn't arrived into Ireland
and won't be arriving maybe for so many months or whatever.
It's always nice to have a little peep into the story
that you're going to have to tell down the road, you know?
And the extent to which you pick up all these little things
like 360 degree cameras and all the other gizmos
that they have in motor cars nowadays, you know?
But...
Don, thank you so much for your time.
It's been a pleasure.
Derek, an absolute pleasure and...
We'll have you back on again to tell us a couple of more stories.
Oh, indeed, don't talk.
The stories are many.
But I tell you, they're wonderful people, motor people.
I'll say that.
I'll die saying that.
Motor industry people,
it doesn't matter what end of the trade they're in,
they're great people.
And thankfully they're all well motivated.
If you're in trouble,
the motor dealer is a little mojo inside him.
He wants to help.
He says, I want to help that guy.
I get him.
I know there's a fella who'll come out and he'll come out
and he'll take you in or he'll get or start it
or whatever it might be.
They're great people.
And the great thing too about Ireland.
And I hope it stays this way.
I know there are a lot of big sort of heavy checkbook people
now in the motor trade, but the fact is,
as long as there's still a brown family in new markets
selling whatever it is they're selling at the minute,
as long as that, there'll always be local business
to be had because they're the people
that people buy cars from people they know.
In the community.
And people they trust.
So you have your Cahal Duffy's over in Castle Bar.
You know, you have all these characters around the country.
They're Komsky of Cullerville.
You have all these people.
You had the Spooners and Russ Gray.
You know, these are names
that are part of the Irish landscape.
You have all those people and they're still there.
They will be hopefully.
Conn Nyean is another name that springs to mind
down in abandoned.
Another nice guy at the motor trade.
Very good.
And don't mind sometimes if their conversations
are interrupted by a mobile phone call
because you can be sure there's something going down.
It probably has to do with selling and buying a motor car.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, God.
Thank you.
Disfruta más formas de ahorrar en Fred Meyer
como precios bajos en todo pasillo.
Descarga la app de Fred Meyer,
elige tus cupones digitales semanales
y ahorra aún más.
Además ganas puntos en combustible
para ahorrar hasta un dólar por galón.
En Fred Meyer encuentras más formas de ahorrar
y más recompensas en cada compra.
Ahorrar en grande a diario es fácil
con ahorros y recompensas.
Fred Meyer, fresh para todos.
Los ahorros pueden variar por estado.
Aplican resecciones de combustible.
Ve los detalles en el sitio.
There I was scrolling my phone
when someone cracked open a Mountain Dew Baja Cabo Citrus.
I grabbed my own and took a sip.
Next thing I know, I heard a rip.
My friend tried the splits and skinny jeans.
The crew couldn't stop laughing.
But hey, not a drop of Baja Cabo Citrus was spilled.
Have a blast with Mountain Dew Baja Cabo Citrus,
a punch of tropical citrus flavor.
Desde el río, la costa o las montañas de Oregon
estamos contigo.
Ya sea tu trabajo en el campo, el bosque,
la fábrica o en la oficina en casa,
no importa lo que hagas, Safe está contigo.
Ayudando a trabajadores lesionados
a reincorporarse al trabajo
y al prevenir lesiones futuras
haciendo a cada lugar de trabajo más seguro y saludable.
Safe, compensación de trabajadores
que de verdad funciona.
Obtenga más información en sas.com.
Hopefully you've enjoyed that podcast interview with Don Hall.
I really enjoyed it.
If you haven't already subscribed or you're
click the follow button wherever you're listening to us,
please do so.
And if you enjoyed the episode, please leave a rating
and a comment that really helps us out.
It doesn't cost you anything.
And I look forward to chatting to you next week
in the very last episode, podcast episode of the year
where we'll be doing a bit of a roundup of 25
and what we're looking forward to in 2026.
So I look forward to chatting to you as always next Tuesday.
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