The Growth of Industry in Galway
Connacht Tribune, October 3, 1969.
Supplement October 2—5, 1969.
In April of this year Mr. George Colley, Minister for Industry and Commerce officially opened a Government sponsored industrial estate as a further step in the promotion of the economic health of Galway. The stimulation of industrial growth through Government intervention speeds up considerably a development which has been taking place through private enterprise for many years. But until the coming of the estate this growth was almost entirely in commerical, financial, educational, health, social and administrative areas. Now advancement is taking place in all fields.
The first factory to come to the new estate was the Standard Press Steel factory. Others quickly followed. Standard Press Steel is a branch of S.P.S. International of Pennsylvania and produces industrial fasteners for export.
Bruno (Ireland) Ltd. manufactures quality shirts and blouses and its neighbor 3 D. Moulds Ltd., makes shoe injection moulds. Lep (Ireland) provide packing services and warehousing services from their factory on the estate.
Galway firms too were quick to see the benefit's the new estate offered and so far two of the city's oldest firms are housed there.
The long established Dooley's Industrial Engineering Service Ltd., took on one the new factories because of expanding business. The other city firm to move was Messrs. S. Fallers. Their move was prompted by the need to meet space demands of a growing export trade in high class jewellery and crystal glass.
Two new factories now in process of being launched are the German owned Groschopp and Co., factory which will employ 200 and the American owned Hurletron Incorporated, Illinois, which hopes to employ seventy by Christmas. The German factory will specialise in making while the other will manufacture a wide range of sophisticated electronic control and web guiding equipment for printing and paper making industries.
Also on the estate there is an Industrial training centre and it provides training in a wide range of skills.
When the estate is completed in 1976 it will have up to forty two factories housed in an area of sixty acres.
Beside the estate is the thriving American owned factory of Crown Controls. This factory in which mechanical handling equipment is made was established by a German firm Steinbock of Moosberg who disposed of it to Crown Controls.
Nearby is the Royal Tara China factory and beside it the ill fated Potez factory where industrial and home heating units were made and which is now closed.
Few of the old industries of Galway survive but the city has a wide range of industrial activity that had its origin within the past half century.
One of the relatively old factories is the hat factory of Les Modes Modernes which was established some thirty—three years ago. Another factory established around that period was Irish Metal Industries and they have their premises at Nun's Island. It manufactures shotgun cartridges and agricultural chemicals. In 1935 the bitumen emulsion making factory of Cold Chon was established at Oranmore. Four years later Hygeia opened their factory which makes disinfectant and sheep dips.
Boat building is also an important industry in Galway and recently Hickey boats built Ireland's biggest sea angling boat — the Queen of Aran. This was followed up with a £200,000 order being placed for 1,250 dinghies with the Irish Inflatable Boat Company. This company operates from Moycullen.
Other important industries include Micheal Anthony's clothing factory and the making of copper cylinders and prams.