West Enterprise Case Studies

He decided to move himself, his career and his family to Co Clare and set up Interventions, a Business/HR Management/Psychometric Assessment company www.interventions.ie

Adam says, "We now employ six people and we service clients in Ireland and abroad, across the SME, Public and Corporate Multinational sectors. We have also recently launched our flagship service www.execpass.com which is a business to business and business to executive networking/business development service.  The service offers functionalities similar to those available with LinkedIn, forums, blogs, video, job boards but our unique selling point is that all users are validated before they are given access.  Also the service is reserved for progressive businesses (company users) and decision makers in business (executive users). No access is given to third parties such as multi level marketers or recruiters, so the relationships that are developed are exclusively between the Executives who wish to develop their careers and the Businesses that are looking to profile their business or looking to expand their business ventures.  Following our recent launch in Ireland and Canada, we will be formally launching in the UK in 2010.”

Commenting on the changes the current economic climate has brought, Adam says “things are definitely tighter and this is making us more cautious about expanding the business.  Our business is now investor ready so we are looking to raise venture capital in January 2010 to bring www.execpass.com and Interventions to the next level in terms of international traded services, but I am expecting this will be more challenging to do than might have been the case a few years ago.”

However, Adam does not believe his location in the West has had any negative impact on the development of the business, “if anything it has been positive, as rent and the cost of living is less in the west of Ireland so as things have got tighter it has been easier to manage our costs” he explains.

The Coleman's decision to relocate to west Clare was fuelled by a desire to live a more balanced lifestyle, be near the ocean and raise their children in a hassle free environment. Here, Adam finds property significantly less expensive than on the east coast and with a young family, he was pleasantly surprised to find childcare and nights out also considerably less expensive. The Colemans also find that people have a refreshing attitude to life and are more inclined to help one another. Of course, living in Lahinch, one of Ireland's outdoor sports capitals also has several advantages and the Colemans have been encouraged by local enthusiasm for the outdoors.

Moving west inevitably means less traffic. Even when slowed by winding country roads, he happily notes that the traffic keeps moving! Unfortunately having a wide spread of national clients can mean a lot of driving, but on the other hand, having Shannon airport within an easy 40 Kilometres and Galway Airport 60 Kilometres reach makes servicing international clients very convenient. "Shannon & Galway Airports are fantastic — I use these very frequently," he adds.

With less time spent commuting, Adam and his wife have more time to spend with their family, and they enjoy the local beaches and other leisure facilities. They're comfortable in the knowledge that their children have more freedom than they did before as well as better access to education with local class sizes smaller than they were on the east coast.

The Coleman's decision to move wasn't made overnight but they're certainly glad they made it. "When we decided to move back from the UK, it would have been very easy to move back to Dublin where we still had our house, but we made the deliberate decision to move west for quality of life. A move like this takes a leap of personal faith depending on your occupation but the advantages outweigh the disadvantages by miles."