Yeah.

And...

People think this is a new phenomenon, but it's not.

I remember clearly when we got in sixth class, the local school was St. Mark's Secondary School and we had a really good football team.

We'd won the primary school cup and we were all buzzing about getting into playing in the secondary school.

St. Mark's was going to win it, you know.

And then on a day, I'll never forget this, on a day you got envelopes.

know you're always positive and you're always looking at the positive side of things, but do you see a crash coming of some way, shape or form?

Uh, Pete the Builder, Pete is with me here on the program today, because you're- you recently converted to solar panels, Pete, is that right?

Yeah, that's correct, Andrea.

Um, o- so I thought about it for, for a good bit of time before I, I went for it, and obviously being in the industry, it's something that has emerged, um, a lot over the, the recent years.

And then I, I got a couple of companies to come out and to assess my, my house and, and in terms of what we could gain by, by giving, by getting solar panels.

And in fairness, the both companies gave me really good, uh, information back on what the, the, the best system t- to go for would be and what the returns would be, and then we, we committed to it, and we, we went through the grant system and got the 1,800 euros for the grant, and then paid for the rest of it ourselves.

So yeah, and, and since then it, it has been very beneficial.

How do you feel about that?

Yeah.

So why do you think you're experiencing? Is your-- Is it the product offering? Is it, uh, the clients? Is it something else?

Let me say that we have, over fifteen years, grown both by acquisition and by just pitching and winning lots of new clients.

We've made, I think, thirty-six acquisitions since our launch.

But again, we, we pitch clients constantly, constantly winning new clients.

So the, the growth has been a combination of the two.

The past three years have been slower for us, too, but we've been flat.

I think this year we're gonna be up, uh, maybe five million dollars.

... where you would land.

How have you found maybe they're the same and different?

The differences are easy because in the for-profit world, you're focusing every day, making sure that you're generating more money than you're spending.

The not-for-profit world is the opposite because you have to raise money, but our not-for-profit is in the arts, and every single arts program that we run operates at a deficit that has to be covered with donations.

But there are some important similarities.

One, and I mentioned this earlier, is collaboration.

That I could not have accomplished what I did within partners without joining forces with strong individuals who had skills that were different from mine, but were very important to the success of the organization.

Exactly the same is true for Castle Mountain Foundation.

Wow.

years ago i was on a panel of judges for a teen film competition called real teens and barry care put his heart and soul into that right so i really i smiled when i read that he and lyndon nichols were part of the origin story for the catskin mountain foundation and that was about the time that the movie theater was being purchased so can you tell me about those interactions and how that developed into an idea for a full-on foundation

Yeah.

A friend of ours, Sean Byrne, started the Hunter Foundation.

He and I met because he saw our renovation of the Red Barn and so appreciated what we had done.

He came to introduce himself to me, told me he was thinking of starting a not-for-profit organization, which ended up being called the Hunter Foundation.

And it was all going to be about buying vacant buildings, renovating them, and turning them into useful assets for the community.

So I became one of the founding board members for the Hunter Foundation.

How has your business background, your lifelong business background, shaped what takes place up here in the Catskills?

So what is your room for negotiation and margin, if you will, for difference when it comes to these are my values, let me see yours?

So we have done a lot of acquisitions.

I think we just completed our 38th acquisition in July, over 15 years.

And the acquisitions have been all over the world.

And every time I have the first conversation with a firm that we might be interested in acquiring, the first meeting is usually an hour.

We do not talk about numbers at all.

I give a presentation about FinPartners, and it's all about our values and our culture and the kinds of clients we won't work with.

What's the value of a painting that's not perfect like a photograph? What's the value of a theater where people stumble on the words as opposed to cinema where it's perfect? How do you evaluate what role beauty and art play has in our society and how much more do we need that can be done in a way that's sustainable? Because obviously that sustainability factor must exist.

Kids absolutely love them.

Love it, and it just, what it does is it attracts nature into your garden, and that can mean like a big massive garden or a very small garden.

So the advice I've been given is you can go for your structured stuff that you buy off the shelves and make it, and you can kind of see them in some of the industrial, um, gardens or industrial centers when you're driving in, you see the bug hotel, which is a nice thing to see.

They're very structured.

What you can do is be a little bit messier with it, and a log is a great thing to start off.

So get a log, stand it up straight, and drill into the side, not into the top.

Put different size holes in, and it'll attract different size bees, different size wasps, starting from 2 ml up to like 10 ml.

[laughs] If you are going to do it, uh, what tools would you definitely need to have so you wouldn't have to be, like, stopping in the middle of the job and saying, "Oh no, I, I need to go off and get something."

information, Pete?

Yeah, yeah, you're true.

Exactly what Tony just said there.

Most solar panel systems, I'd say pretty much every solar panel system that you've installed these days would have their own app and it can tell you exactly how many kilowatts of energy you're generating that day.

It'll also tell you how many kilowatts of energy your house is consuming and how many kilowatts of energy you have used from the grid.

So all of that information is there, it's stored, it's really easy to go back in your app and see what you used and what you sold to the grid.

Tony said, and Charlie said as well, at the moment you're being paid half and sometimes less than half for power that you're supplying to the grid than what you're actually buying from the grid.

they not say that, you know, the grants that are available with regards to solar panels, is that not the incentive?

That would not be the kind of swimming pool you'd want to swim in.

No, absolutely not.

But look, again, you know, that was a bit of fun.

And again, it is certainly something you can use to get some inspiration from.

And there's no doubt about it.

You can certainly, you know, create images that you would like to achieve.

But you really do need to speak to a specialist for lots of reasons.

My immediate thought was, does this ultimately sound the death knell for interior designers and for architects? Will AI take over those roles?

I wonder now, have dads stopped passing down those skills or maybe their sons and daughters aren't interested in learning them anymore?

Yeah, it's probably a little bit of both, you know.

I think we used to, I think needs most as well, like whether we like to say it or not, the reality of it is that we live in a time when most people have got a lot of luxuries around them and we've become used to those luxuries whereas back in the day the thoughts of paying somebody to do a small job in your home just wasn't even part of the thought process it was that's what people did whereas these days you know people like to get everything done for them and look again you know the level of craftsmanship and the level of work that we've got done with what we do in Ireland I'm very proud of it and again like people have very high standards in terms of what they want to get done at their home.

So they sometimes say, look, I'm not going to try that because I wouldn't feel as though I'm going to do it to the right standard.

But, and again, you know, if you're talking about like, you know, a big load of fitted furniture or something like that, or fitting a full kitchen or wardrobe set, I'd be saying, okay, that's not a DIY job that should be taken off your first DIY job.

But, you know, there's lots of jobs out there that we can do and we should be learning how to do it.

And again, why not pass it on it's like I have three daughters and I have them helping me all the time and they actually really love it they can all use measuring tape and they can all use the screw guns and again I keep it safe with them but like you know they can't wait to come out and help me do my bits and pieces around their own home and I even bring we do a daddy daughter day individually with them where they come on a Saturday with me and work for the day you know

Yeah.

I just wonder, is it the vendor supplier benefits as opposed to the customer? Apologies for the glass FMT attitude.

Well, I think he's answered his own question.

He has the glass half empty, but there's probably a bit of truth in that as well.

You know, when a grant comes out, and it's a government grant, people are obviously sceptical for lots of different reasons.

The world we live in at the moment, with so much going on, conspiracy theory-wise and everything else, Everybody is sceptical but once and every now and then a scheme comes along and literally the only reason is to try and motivate people to get work done and that's what's happened with the grants from the SEAI.

So the SEAI is basically a scheme that's been set up or an entity that's been set up by the government And it's to motivate people to increase the energy efficiency of their home.

And how they're doing that is by offering grants to get the work done.

happening isn't happening?

I just wonder, because I know one of the points or some of the criticism that I've been reading about from students earlier this morning, Pete, in relation to this, if we don't have en suite bathrooms for every single student bedroom or student accommodation in the country, would we really squeeze in many more units if we were to remove the bathrooms?

Yeah, you would.

Again, that's down to good design and obviously that's architecture and that's where you're relying on a good architect to make the best use of a space, but there's just no doubt about it.

If it's a money issue to start off with, there's just no doubt about it, it would be much more cost effective to have a communal area.

But again, it makes sense that if you're not creating a non-suite space in every single bedroom facility, then you're obviously going to be able to create more space for um for for people to to be able to live in a more habitation so in my opinion communal is absolutely the way to go we do need like it's it's obvious it's a problem there's there's a huge shortage of accommodation not just in in student accommodation but in all sorts of accommodation but in student accommodation in particular there's just not enough student accommodation to facilitate the students and the cost of of of rent at the moment is colossal so It makes much more sense, even if you're squeezing in five to ten more units into each accommodation area.

It's well worth doing.

There's no need for an individual.

Like, is that a possibility or what's the complexity with that?

I mean, you too, Pete, have worked with you.

Yeah, we did.

We did one of the Great House Revival episodes with Hugh, and I think the first thing that just came from meeting the man was his character, his presence, his colour, you know, the fun that everyone has been talking about there.

And again, I know that comes across on screen, but that's the way he was off screen as well.

He was very quick to have a quip and he'd put you on your toes very quickly.

But again, from our point of view, working with him, his passion for what he was doing was so evident.

And again, I think it was a little bit underestimated his knowledge as well.