Trailblazing businessman whose career mirrored the rise and fall of the boom
Publican and hotelier Hugh O’Regan, who has died unexpectedly at the age of 49, was a trailblazing businessman in Dublin’s social and hospitality scene. One of the most prominent businessmen of the Celtic Tiger era, the self-made O’Regan played a leading role in the growth of the Temple Bar area of Dublin in the 1990s and was instrumental in transforming the traditional smoky Irish pub into the trendy super-pub.
He was found injured on the side of the M11 motorway near Newtownmountkennedy on Monday and taken to Loughlinstown Hospital where he was pronounced dead. Garda sources said the cause of death would not be known until a postmortem is completed.
Super-pubs
O’Regan changed the face of Dublin’s bar scene in the 1990s and 2000s, building the Thomas Read chain of super-pubs and targeting the growing affluence and spendthrift nature of boom-time Ireland.
The Thomas Read chain of pubs included many of the most fashionable venues in the city – Pravda, The Bailey, Ron Black’s, Searson’s, the Budda Bar in Blanchardstown and the 40 Foot in Dun Laoghaire.
The group also had the contract to run the chain of bars at Dublin Airport.
The pubs prospered, mirroring the rise of the economy and the vast level of consumer spending that accompanied it.
O’Regan marked himself out in business by showing his savvy eye for spotting emerging trends coupled with a strong conviction in his business ideas.
One of four sons, O’Regan’s father died when he was four. He studied electronic engineering briefly before joining AIB and completing an English and economics degree while working with the bank.
He studied law but abandoned the course following the death of his mother when he was 22. He used the proceeds from the sale of the family home to buy a house in Rathmines, against which he borrowed to start his business.
He began in the pub trade in 1988 with €10,000 purchasing the Temple Bar pub in Dublin for €190,460 with his brother, Declan, before the run-down area was transformed into the centre of Dublin’s social scene.
He played a lead role in securing European Union funding to develop Temple Bar into a cultural centre in the 1990s to save the city-centre area being redeveloped as a major bus station.
In one of his sharpest deals, O’Regan sold an option on the former Jameson Distillery in Smithfield in north inner-city Dublin, acquired for €63,486, for more than €2.5 million, marking him out as an emerging business figure to watch.
