National Women’s Enterprise Day, Ireland’s largest female enterprise event is a full day programme to promote, encourage and stimulate female entrepreneurship across Ireland. It is designed and led by women and is an annual high point in promoting entrepreneurship to women in Ireland. The Local Enterprise Office along with Enterprise Ireland provide a wide range of help, incentives, training, and development programmes to female entrepreneurs.
While help is available all year round, National Women’s Enterprise Day allows us to turn the spotlight on female entrepreneurship. It attracts widespread media attention. It opens the prospect of entrepreneurship to women who may not have considered it before. It highlights what support is available. It provides valuable networking opportunities and connections with industry experts. And it celebrates the achievements of women in enterprise.
It tackles the real-life subjects affecting women in business. While finance, marketing, innovation, and new product development are important, so too are family, well-being, and mental health and these all have their place in National Women’s Enterprise Day. The programme and the pace create to combine a heady mix of education, motivation, and inspiration.
Dublin Region event (Dublin City, South Dublin, Fingal and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown)
Time: 8.30am - 2.15pm
Venue: Maldron Hotel Tallaght, Whitestown Way, Tallaght, Dublin 24 D24 XC9W
Cost: €25
*Registration and networking start at 08.30am*
This year the Local Enterprise Office South Dublin are hosting National Women’s Enterprise Day (NWED) on behalf of the Dublin Region (DLR, Fingal and Dublin City Council) on Thursday 19th October 2023 in the Maldron Hotel, Tallaght.
This event is a networking event for women in business who are at different stages of growing their business from start up right through to business exporting internationally.
The event will also include four “Leading Light” entrepreneurs representing their LEO on a separate a panel.
Event will accommodate 250 Women in Business from across the Dublin Region.
Meet our Event MC
Elaine is one of Ireland's best-known and loved broadcasters and is currently at the helm of the country's award-winning TV Show, Ireland AM. She began her media career on radio in Cork on Breakfast Radio before moving to TV3 as a News Anchor and reporter shortly after its inception.
IFTA has honoured Elaine by nominating her for Ireland's Favourite TV Personality at their most recent TV award show, and she has hosted panel discussions on the role of women in television for the academy.
A passionate advocate for mental health, Elaine fronted Virgin Media Television's campaign for Mental Health Awareness Month in 2021, culminating in a one-hour prime-time show. She is also passionate about women's health, outspoken about body positivity, and is an Ambassador for Breast Cancer Ireland.
Meet our Key Speakers
Ellen Kavanagh of Waxperts
Ellen Kavanagh founded Waxperts in 2008 as a waxing-only salon in Dun Laoghaire. Having tried every wax on the market, Ellen decided she wanted only the very best for her clients and set about creating her own waxing range.
As Waxperts Salon grew in popularity and reputation, the time came to decide how to grow the business. Waxperts Wax launched in 2012 as a professional waxing brand for salons and spas. It is now Ireland's best-loved wax available nationwide and throughout the UK.
In 2021, having spotted a gap in the market to improve the experience and results for the at-home waxer, Heire (pronounced like hair) was launched. Heire is found online and in over 100 pharmacies nationwide, with its future set on global expansion.
Ellen is also a co-host of Ask My Mentor podcast with her own mentor, Louise Phelan. Ask My Mentor is an agony aunt-style podcast discussing the highs and lows of the workplace. It charted at number 1 in the Careers chart on Apple Podcasts.
Ellen lives in Dublin with her husband Conrad, son Cooper and their two dogs!
Sile Walsh specialises in leadership and organisational development, focusing on inclusion, psychological safety and performance. Her background is in coaching psychology and organisational development, with over a decade of working with clients in Ireland and internationally. Supporting effective leadership so organisations can be high-performing, inclusive workplaces where people thrive and great work gets done.
Based in Dublin and working throughout Ireland, and internationally. Sile designed the Diploma for Women in Leadership for the Professional Academy in University College Dublin.
Sile is the global diversity and inclusion co-lead for the Association of Coaching. Voted in the top 10 coaches in Dublin by Influence and Digest in 2021, and the top 15 coaches in 2023, made the “Women who Break the Bias List 2022” with Diversein.com and speaks on international stages about leadership, inclusion & coaching psychology. Sile’s practice is integrative, psychologically minded, inclusive, and trauma-informed.
Sile is in their 3rd year of a PhD in Professional Practice: Psychological Studies at Canterbury Christ Church University, focusing on the psychology of inclusive leadership. Sile's formal education includes an HDip in Coaching Psychology and MSc in Personal and Management Coaching from University College Cork, alongside additional qualifications in Leadership, Participatory Management, and Professional Supervision.
Sile’s interest and commitment to trauma-informed and inclusive practices originate from her wider experiences of working across society, including with people experiencing mental health challenges, in recovery from addiction, incarcerated, LGBTQ+ community, people with experience in the Irish/UK care system, Irish travellers, early school leavers, neurodiversity, disabilities and others facing systemic barriers.
Cathriona recently retired after 35 years as Managing Director for Microsoft in Ireland, Cathriona had been responsible for driving Microsoft’s commercial business on the island of Ireland. Cathriona represented the Company in Ireland on all strategic policy, corporate affairs and communications issues including overseeing a number of community, education and innovation programmes.
Cathriona sits on a number of Boards including Keelings, Dalata Hotel Group PLC, Beats Medical, FoodCloud, Tap Retail and the Public Interest Body for PWC. Cathriona also sits on UCD Advisory Board, Trinity Business School Advisory Board, and is an industry advisor for ADAPT Centre Trinity. She is a member of the International Women’s Forum, Institute of Directors, Institute of Accounting Technicians (IATI) and is a fellow of ACCA, and a fellow of the IMI.
Cathriona is a qualified Executive Coach and is passionate about Change Management and Leadership Development.
Meet our Leading Lights
LEO South Dublin: Aine Kennedy of The Smooth Company Ltd
Aine successfully created the Smooth Stick™, a unique premium hair taming wand enriched with top quality ingredients including Bition & Vitamin E which will tame flyaways without leaving your hair hard or greasy.
Aine was recently named as one of the Sunday Independent 30 under 30 Irish businesspeople to watch. She was also the winner of the Emerging New Business Award by the Small Firms Association, shortlisted for the Image PWC Young Businesswoman of the Year Award and winner of Irish Woman of the year ‘Young Entrepreneur of the Year’ award.
www.thesmoothcompany.com
LEO Dún Laoghaire: Denise Cullen of Enterprise Solutions
Enterprise Solutions is an award-winning trusted advisor for IT solutions and Managed Services, specialising in the End-User Compute space. Over the past 25 years they have added real business value to their customers. Their aim is to help customers achieve their business goals via IT investment. Nowadays both IT Security & User experience are key deliverables of most companies IT function. Enterprise Solutions offer digital workspace solutions to help our clients give their users the work-life balance they crave while achieving security best-practice via our underlying expertise, solutions, and services.
Denise is a huge believer in modern-day leadership and is passionate about helping people be the best version of themselves so that they can reach their maximum potential. Denise's goal is to ensure that the company’s ethos and vision align, and to look after the overall wellbeing and strategic progression of all employees so they in turn look after their clients.
https://enterprise-solutions.ie/
LEO Dublin City: Laura McCarthy of Drink Botanicals Ireland
Drink Botanicals Ireland is an award-winning Irish business that was founded by cocktail enthusiast Laura McCarthy in late 2017. It all started when Laura was studying marketing in TU Dublin and noticed a gap in the Irish drinks market.
With the growing trend of gin, she saw an opportunity to create a product that would allow consumers to make luxurious gin and tonics or cocktails in the comfort of their own home. She visited many bars that served gin and tonics with botanicals such as juniper berries and hibiscus, but noticed that there was no product available in retail stores for consumers to recreate this “bar experience” at home.
www.drinkbotanicalsireland.ie
LEO Fingal: Giselle Makinde of Cream of the Crop
Cream of the crop is a Fingal-based pioneer food tech company battling food waste by upcycling and using surplus ingredients to produce natural snacks, gelato and chocolate confectionery from “wonky” food that would otherwise go to waste into delicious treats that fights food waste with every bite.
Cream of the Crop has an official sustainability-focused partnership with Fyffes, one of the world's leading distributors of tropical produce and currently Europe's largest importer of Fairtrade bananas.
Since creating Cream of the Crop in September 2020, Thirty five tonnes of surplus food has been rescued from waste, eleven tonnes of which were bananas transformed into Bananitas, a chocolate confectionery product.
www.creamofthecropfood.com