Dublin City Enterprise Award Winners 2019
The Athleisure clothing brand business ‘Gym + Coffee’ are this year’s winner of the Dublin City Enterprise Award for 2019. They took the top prize of €5,000 and will represent the Local Enterprise Office Dublin City at the 21st National Enterprise Awards, which takes place on Wednesday, 29th May in the Mansion House in Dublin.
Founded by Niall Horgan, Diarmuid McSweeney and Karl Swaine 26 months ago, the brand encapsulates and promotes the lifestyle the founders enjoy, ‘Gym + ‘Coffee’ - being physically active, enjoying new experiences, while socializing with friends.
Combining fashion and function, ‘Gym + ‘Coffee’ have designed a quality range of women’s and men’s hoodies, leggings, t-shirts and merchandise. From their base in Fitzwilliam Square, they already employ 17 people and they are selling both on and offline in Ireland, the UK and USA. The company successfully applied to the Leo Office Dublin City for grant support to secure additional staffing and to research export markets.
Greg Swift with Local Enterprise Office Dublin City said: “Gym + Coffee are already a huge success story. The judges were particularly impressed by their business strategy, the extent of job creation and their success in domestic and export markets. The National Enterprise Awards are a great barometer for what the Local Enterprise Office Dublin City is doing. Every year the standard is getting better and better and we are delighted to have Gym + Coffee representing us in Dublin in May.”
Gym + Coffee will be competing against 30 other finalists from every local authority area for a share of the €40,000 prize fund. Categories this year include ‘Best Export Business,’ ‘Best Start Up Business’ and ‘Innovation,’ in addition to eight regional awards.