Lessons in surviving loneliness by long-distance entrepreneurs

“I’M BRODY Sweeney and I used to be introduced as one of Ireland’s most successful entrepreneurs. Used to be.”

The founder of O’Brien’s Sandwich Bars announced himself ruefully to a 60-strong audience who had come to City Hall to hear a Dublin Book Festival panel discuss “Setting Up Your Business and Surviving the Recession”.

Some might say he did not survive. With O’Brien’s liquidated in October 2009, he started 2010 “with whatever wealth I’d had wiped out”. He was “not in a great place”.

But spring rolls are the new thick-cut sandwich in Sweeney’s world and his new venture is the twice-renamed Camile Thai Kitchen – “that’s with one l”.

A show of hands indicated that about half of those present were already business owners; some of the others were clearly thinking about joining their ranks.

But how many were there, not for Brody, but for Bobby Kerr? The Insomnia Coffee chairman and RTÉ dragon admitted he was “late to the entrepreneurial stage”, but like Mr Sweeney, he had experience when it came to starting businesses during recessions.

“There’s massive value out there,” Mr Kerr enthused, citing his own experience purchasing Dublin’s Bang Café last year after its previous owners, the Stokes brothers, ran into a little difficulty.

Standing still has little appeal for Mr Kerr.

“Even when I was at the Campbell Bewley group, I felt I needed to do something new every five years,” he said. “It’s not that I have a low threshold of boredom,” he added quickly, just that new things excited him.

Negotiation is a skill that would-be entrepreneurs must hone, the Dragons' Denstar insisted. "My dentist said I needed a crown, and that would be €900," said Mr Kerr. "I said 'I'll give you €500 cash', and he said okay."

“I want the name of your dentist,” said Yanky Fachler, business author, motivational speaker and copywriter.

“In a recession, we’re more in survival mode and we make some honest decisions about who we are and what we want,” he said.

“Emotions are sharpened during a time like this.”

Loneliness, the panel agreed, was the emotion that most often threatened to derail the single-minded entrepreneur.

“You just have this focus that no one else has,” said Mr Kerr.

“Loneliness is absolutely part and parcel of the entrepreneurial experience.

“And it’s one of those things: If you don’t know it’s coming, it will hit you hard.”