by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua On Products and Brands When Arthur Guinness brewed his famous stout for the first time back in 1759 little did he know that 256 years later 1m people would flock to his factory simply to visit. The same for Thomas Phillips (Bushmills), John Jameson, D.E. Williams (Tullamore Dew) and… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Cool and unusual – these are often the lead criteria in venue selection these days as meetings and events planners seek brand new ways to surprise and delight their increasingly more discerning and sophisticated audiences. Attendees these days demand far more than a simple meeting room or a mere… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Frankfurt is a destination in a neutral grey Hugo Boss suit that waits patiently at the side of a traffic-free road rather than cross the street when there’s a red light. It’s laid out on both banks of the broad Main River, the two sides linked by bridges of… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua As a professional in the meetings industry I get to go nice places, stay in nice hotels, eat in nice restaurants and drink nice cocktails that someone else is often paying for. At least that’s they way it often appears to my family and friends and, frankly, I’ve long… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua The more I travel the more I realise how much a nation’s past constantly informs its present. Some countries more than others – either out of economic necessity, human curiosity, plain colonial greed or evangelical zeal – have tended to look beyond their own borders and set sail for… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Sunset in the desert I was caught in the gaping gap between deep philosophical ponderings, practical commercial considerations and the overwhelming beauty of the moment. I couldn’t get W.B. Yeats’s apocalyptic poem out of my mind as I watched the bearded falconer spin his bait with ever-increasing speed in… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Perfect for Culturally Curious + Social Energisers During the MCI / Ovation years Patrick and I were privileged to work on the annual conference of a Professional Association in Ireland. We helped to stage this event all over Europe but usually in tier two or tier three destinations like… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Under the gloomy skies of a stormy January I was thinking about Louis MacNeice’s poem “Dublin”. Written in 1939, with Europe on the brink of war and Ireland as a nation barely standing on its hind legs, it’s not surprising that MacNeice saw Ireland’s capital shrouded in grey: Grey… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Travelling but not visiting I was miles away. “Sounds of Silence” kept playing on my mental jukebox. I thought how powerful it is as a portrayal of our contemporary culture, plunging headlong into a sort of individualist nihilism: People talking without speaking People hearing without listening People writing songs… Read more »
by Pádraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua Reputation, Reputation, Reputation I haven’t seen the movie “Hostel” (2005) but it does for the reputation of Slovakia and its capital what “Midnight Express” (1978) does for Turkey. To add insult to injury not a single frame of the movie was actually shot in Slovakia but in the neighbouring… Read more »