Robert McHugh speaks to Andy Mackin about his career and why he decided to buy a hotel in North Carolina.
The Mackin Group recently purchased the Derryhale Hotel in Dundalk, as well as the Firehouse Inn in the US, both of which form part of Mackin’s newly established Roy’s International hotel chain.
Andy Mackin will now lead the new property division of the group, which includes the Derryhale Hotel, in his native Dundalk, the Firehouse Inn in North Carolina, US, and MackinGO, a range of rural co-working spaces across the US.
In an exclusive interview with Hospitality Ireland, Andy Mackin discusses what drives him and how 21 years in the navy shaped his approach to business.
Mackin Group celebrates 20 years in business this year. What have been the highlights?
The biggest highlight for me is that we are around for that long.
It is not easy in business as everybody knows, there are ups and downs along with challenges, but the big highlights I suppose have been the iteration of change, going from health and safety to recruitment, breaking into the US market in 2014, getting a first multinational client in 2009. Things like that are milestone moments.
We started the business in 2004, I was still in the Navy at the time. In 2006, I was retired and all the safety nets were gone. I was out on my own fending for myself when we got a break in 2009.
We landed a big contract with a client for data centre support on health and safety and that subsequently changed to auditing all their sites across Europe in the space of three years.
We would have gone from a business of doing probably maybe 120 grand, 130 grand a year to our first year of doing European audits where we made over €300,000.
You get exposure from that because you are dealing with different managers in different countries and they all talk to each other, they all give feedback to other managers who will utilise your services within the organisation. That opens up to other things.
In 2009, we went from looking after local clients in Cork and one or two in Dublin, to getting a multinational. That changed the business overnight really.
Tell us about Roy’s International Hotel Chain?
I always had a soft spot for hotels. My first job before I joined the Navy in 1985 was as a silver service waiter in the Grand Hotel in Torquay, England. I was there for about 10 months and ever since then I always had a soft spot for hotels.
I would have frequented the Derryhale Hotel as a young fella in Dundalk. I was sad every time I drove past it and just seeing it falling into disrepair. It will be closed 20 years next January. So when we open it next year, it would not have traded for 20 years.
I made queries in 2018 and the people that were selling it were looking to sell it at the time because it was up for sale but they actually weren't ready for sale. If you know what I mean. A lot of registry stuff behind the scenes had not been dealt with. It was taken off the market after about 12 months and was back on the market again about a year and a half later.
It took us nearly three years to get it over the line. I was chasing it for five years and I got it done the week before the fifth year was up.
The hotel in North Carolina came about because we have our regional East Coast office in a small town called Ruddington in North Carolina, it is about an hour and 20 minutes from Charlotte. My COO in the US at the time was from that town and she said, "There's a lovely, old building here that's up for sale. It would be fantastic as an office."
We bought the office, did it up and when I used to come back and forth, I actually stayed in the Firehouse Inn which was literally across the road. Somebody said to me recently, "You were staying there so often, you decided to buy it!"
It was not quite like that. I had built up a lovely relationship with the owners. Katie was a brilliant woman. She was getting to retirement age and told me she heard I bought a hotel in Ireland and asked would I be interested in buying her hotel. I told her I had not even thought of it, that one hotel was enough!
She wanted to retire back to the ranch and spend some time with the grandchildren and stuff. I said, "Look, I'll be back over in three months and we can have a proper chat."
So we came back and we had a chat, and she basically said, "If we can get a small little bit of a kicker up front and you take over the payments of the mortgage, the deal will be yours in four years or whatever time frame you want."
We had a look at the finances and decided we could do it nice and comfortable over four years. Everything was transferred over. It's an old building, a 1940s converted fire station. Our office is a 1920s garage and workshop synonymous with the town and the West family who were well known. We have repurposed it into an office for ourselves and then the other half of the 2000 square feet area is a service office.
It is like a WeWork space on a small, rural scale. We call the brand MackinGo. You can hire a desk for a day, a week, six months or a year.
It has been pretty much full since we opened, it has been great. We have farmers coming from three miles down the road to do their agricultural reports because they have no wi-fi at the farm.
You are serving a smaller community, it is one of those things where you are not here to make huge money, but you are giving a purpose to a building.
We have different people coming in at different times. Judges come in for court services two or three days a month, they come in and use the office. It's great to see people come in and out.
People like having a place to go to rather than sitting with a laptop at the kitchen table. Not everybody has a self-service office at home. People are living in a one bedroom apartment and working at the end of the bed. If they can get a desk for 19 bucks a day with coffee and snacks, why wouldn't they use it? Companies are giving them allowances for that.
After we acquired two hotels, I thought it was about time to establish a brand. I was sitting in my kitchen one day and thought let's call it Roy's International. My father Roy passed away in November 2022 but he would have known that I was very close to getting the deal done with the Derryhale Hotel.
We got the deal done the following February after he passed. It was a nice way to tip the hat and honour him. It was something to remember him by, not that I would never forget him. He was the director of the company even though he wasn't involved in day-to-day operations, he was a great sounding board for me and we always chatted every day.
Tell us about your background – where you grew up, studied, etc.
I am from Dundalk originally, I have been 39 years in Cork, this year, hard to believe. I am the eldest of eight. My parents were Roy and Rosalene.
I went to the Dún Dealgan Primary School in Dundalk and I went to De La Salle College in secondary school up to fifth year. I left before I did my Leaving Cert and went off to a number of jobs around Dundalk but nothing that really excited me.
I got an opportunity for a soccer trial in England in February 1985. I went over but it didn't work out and there was really nothing in Dundalk in the 80s, a lot of the border towns were struggling for employment.
I decided to stay in England, get a job and see what the story was. I ended up getting a job as a silver service waiter at the Grand Hotel in Torquay. I stayed there until November 1985 when I joined the Navy. I did 21 years in the Navy and retired in 2006.
Everybody says that you have had two kind of careers, which is funny, as you said, the business is 20 years old in October. So I've gone through two 21 year periods, but two different kind of careers. But I always loved it. Somebody asked me recently, "How long have you been working?"
I haven't worked a day in my life because I love what I do and I always have. I try to put a positive spin on everything and see the world for all that it has to offer.
What do you enjoy most about your job?
There is something different every day. I changed my routine in 2020. I get up at 5am, I meditate for half an hour, I read for half an hour. I go to the gym and train every day, Monday to Friday and then I walk at the weekends with my wife. I look after business in the morning, early, I get all my emails done, hit the office around half nine or ten o'clock.
It is very seldom that I would be doing the same thing everyday, unless, I'm bogged down on a project. There is always something different. I love the variety.
Variety is the spice of life. It keeps you wanting to get up in the morning.
Do you have a business motto?
Our number one core value in the Mackin Group is that relationships matter. I am a huge believer in building rapport with people, whether it be the staff or the clients that we are working with.
If you have a positive interaction with people, people remember you. If you provide a good service after that, people remember the service.
Richard Branson has a great quote, "We don't promise what we can't deliver, but we deliver what we promise."
Have you had any mentors that have helped you along the way?
Not in the physical sense. I follow a guy in the States called Darren Hardy and I would consider him as a mentor because I like a lot of the stuff that he does. It is similar to my kind of values.
The likes of Les Brown, Mary Morrissey, Jim Rohn, even though some of them have passed on, I love the materials so I would consider them mentors.
Do you think your navy background helped make you self-sufficient?
You know its funny, I took some of the traits from the navy into business even though I didn't realise it at the time. Resilience and discipline are important to me.
In the early days, if you are a bit despondent or struggling, it is discipline and resilience that see you through. Its about getting to the next day or taking the next step, seeing it through no matter what. If you can persevere with a little bit of resilience and discipline, it will bring you a long way.
I think no matter what you do in life, if you are taking steps forward, whether they are big or small, it has a compounding effect over time, eventually it reaps awards.
What do you see as main challenges in the hospitality sector at the moment?
Finding talent seems to be the big challenge. Obviously, having a talent company, I would like to think that we have ways and means to use our very good global network, but the hospitality industry is struggling to find reliable and loyal staff.
I don't know does that come down to the sector not looking after the people they have or is just that industry itself is transient and people just come in for short periods of time.
If you look after and treat people well, they tend to stay around. It is not always about money, it can be about flexibility and offering people the opportunities to work to the best of their ability.
Dealing with talent, Mackin have a few tricks up our sleeve about how this can be done.
What do you like to do when you are not working?
I read. I get out into the open air as much as possible and spend time with my family.
My two boys are growing up now, but my wife and I enjoy getting out for a walk. The weekends are sacred, so no matter what we have to do, we like getting out and taking a walk on the beach somewhere. It is important to get out of the house and get out of the office.
I like going out for dinner with friends. I don't have an extravagant life. I like to keep things simple. Usually, the simple things are the most enjoyable things.
Favourite restaurant?
Jacobs on the Mall in Cork. I love that place.
The Castle Hotel in Blarney has probably been the most consistent in serving the best food I have had over the last 30 years. We tend to stay local.
Any time I see friends in Dublin, I go to the Green Hen. I love the décor and the atmosphere, and the food is fantastic.
Favourite pub?
Once again, Johnny's Bar at Blarney Castle Hotel. Lovely pint of Guinness. Not that I drink much, but if I am out for the night, three or four pints of Guinness there is grand.
Favourite holiday destination?
Italy. I love Italy because of the food. We go to a place called Lido di Jesolo in the northeast of Italy. It is about half an hour away from Venice on the coast.
It is not a built up area but it has great shops, restaurants and brilliant little cafés. I have a cup of tea, my wife has a coffee and we just watch the world go by.
