Hooked on hurley-making!
Doyle’s services in heavy demand during peak season
CRAFTMANSHIP IS one of the features to be found at L’Ash Go Leor - the home of hurley maker Philip Doyle Junior.
His modern workshops are situated at Breeze Mill on Forth Mountain, just outside Wexford town.
During the peak hurling season, it becomes a crowded path as players and clubs make their way to the workshops to secure their hurleys for the season.
It is at this time of year that Philip becomes one of the most important men in the G.A.A. as his workshop is a must-visit for individual players, clubs, and grandparents seeking to introduce their grandchild to their first hurley.
Since Philip began making hurleys, which are handcrafted to order from planks of ash to the finished product in the workshop, he has become accustomed to supplying the needs of the individual player, with leading inter-county hurlers to the forefront in demand for his now popular sticks.
Hurleys can be customised to suit one’s particular requirements in shape, weight, balance, length, etc.
Tradition is very important to Philip which is why he puts such emphasis on the finished product, while he also provides an excellent speedy service, which is so crucial through the peak hurling season.
While many of the players are household names across the country, the faces behind the ash itself are less well-known.
One could say Philip Doyle is one such man, although he played his club hurling with St. Martin’s and later Faythe Harriers.
Despite working behind the hurling scenes, he has become well known to players inside and outside the county, while he is also the source of visits from club personnel as they seek out hurleys for their under-age and adult structures within the club.
He grew up with a passion for the game, as his late father, Philip Senior, played with Adamstown, while his mother, Brigid (nee Kehoe), is the proud holder of All-Ireland Senior camogie medals with Wexford, so hurling was always inhisDNA.
L’Ash Go Leor are producers of the best hand-finished hurleys, with a team of specialist hurley makers on site to design and craft every hurl with attention to detail and the confidence and knowledge that has been gained over the years.
Their products are staple across all levels of the G.A.A., from the inter-county championships at Senior and Minor level to club teams across the country.
From the young hurler to the adults, their hurleys have played their part in major games including All-Ireland finals. While they strive to serve club and county teams across the country, they have also enjoyed supplying clubs around the world.
The ash for their hurleys is hand selected from sustainable forestry in Ireland and trusted suppliers across Europe. Each tree is hand felled to ensure only the very best cuts go to produce L’Ash Go Leor hurleys.
Expertly milled planks are dried for up to 18 months, after which the very best planks are selected by their specialist team of hurl makers. Only the straightest trunks with the most natual grain will go to produce L’Ash Go Leor hurleys.
Hurley making is an ancient craft unique to Ireland. L’Ash Go Leor honour that craft by ensuring that every hurl is crafted to the highest possible standard by their team of specialist hurley makers.
Philip went through St. Peter’s College and Carlow RTC (now IT Carlow) where he studied applied physics with mathematics, one of his best subjects.
However, he did not love the course enough to make it his mission in life. In the summer of 1989 he signed up to do a business accounting PLC, while at the same time working three, and at one point four, evenings and weekends in part-time jobs.
‘A good work ethic had been instilled in us from an early age,’ he said.
‘I did manage to keep Saturday nights free, however, as it was important to replenish the soul. I knew one thing, and my father knew it too, I would be in business for myself.
‘The problem was, however, I simply didn’t know what genre of business that would be. Years afterwards I remember bumping into our business organisation teacher, Paddy Ryan, and mentioning to him that I regretted not paying more attention in the classroom.
‘He said he always knew I would go into business for myself, and yes, I should have listened.’
By the autumn of 1989, Philip and his brother had started a furniture making business as he always loved working with wood.
‘I even made a few bob when I was 13 making and selling bird houses. My brother had qualified as a cabinet maker so I would earn my qualification training under him,’ he recalled.
‘After six months I decided it was time to go it alone, but it wasn’t to be a furniture making business.
‘About five years earlier, my father, a financial consultant with gifted hands and mind, designed and built a hurley making machine in his workshop for an old friend of his. This planted the seed of hurley making as a possibility for me.
‘He invited his old friend, Matt O’Neill, down to his workshop to show me how to make a hurl. I was hooked instantly. This is what I wanted to do.
‘I loved hurling from a young age. I had grown up on the side of a hurling pitch. My mother won three All-Ireland camogie medals with Wexford, captaining the team in 1969, and I was brought along to the training sessions from an age before I can remember.
‘The upper deck of the Hogan Stand is where we would play hide and seek with our cousins, often oblivious to the Leinster and All-Ireland camogie final happening on the pitch. She was, and still is, a sports fanatic.
‘She was good at everything she turned her hand to - camogie, squash, golf, business, the mouth organ, the accordion - a great woman, a real inspiration, always positive and encouraging. A great role model.’
Philip recalled that initially he worked on a patented hurl which his father had designed. However, very soon afterwards, he purchased a load of hurley ash. And thus, L’Ash Go Leor began.
Ash wood for hurls and the sourcing of it has been an issue for the industry for as long as he has been involved in the business. With supply of raw material limiting expansion, his father headed to the United States to see if he could arrange a steady supply.
‘We imported a number of loads from West Virginia where he had sourced good timber, but the ash made our hurls just a touch too heavy. So he set sail again.
‘He went from the Appalachian Mountains of West Virginia to the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania, Romania, where he set up a saw mill producing hurley planks.
‘He liked the place so much, he even bought a house in the beautiful mountain valley, a place where I would make the occasional trip to help out when extra cutters were required.
‘I also travelled Europe extensively looking for prime quality hurley ash. I made many memorable trips seeking out ash,’ he noted.
Philip said the business grew steadily through the nineties, while in 2003 he set about building his new workshop and sawmills, just a couple of pucks of the sliothar from the home place.
In 2005 they moved into the new premises and right now it’s a busy place for both himself and his employees.
He has supplied hurls to a large number of clubs in Antrim, Dublin, Galway, Westmeath and Wexford, while they have also supplied individual players for numerous counties.
They also supply hurls to both America and the UK, while at one stage he had counted 27 different countries that he had sent hurls to. Probably two of the most unusual ones were Vietnam and Sri Lanka.
Having started hurley making at the age of 19 years, he would sit on the step of the workshop in the evenings, and dream of all the possibilities that lay before him.
Things were good for the first few years in the new premises, but then the recession started. Having been up 5% of the first year of the recession, he felt it would not affect them, but in 2009-’10, years of working capital was wiped out. Hurley sales fell through the floor.
‘We had to change tack so in 2010 we started wholesaling our raw material supply.
‘This was working well until a couple of years into it when the ash crisis, chalara fraxinea, hit. Government regulations were drafted in overnight and just like that all movement of ash wood came to a halt.
‘It was the height of the recession – no working banks, no retail hurley sales, and now no raw material to wholesale.’
For the first time in 18 years he was back to a one-man outfit. ‘Those were years of financial torture. Turnover dropped 25%. It was time to change tack again. We had to deal with it,’ Doyle recalled.
‘In March, 2013, I was able to re-employ again and we concentrated hard on the local market. Hurley makers had popped up all over the country during the recession, so regional sales were difficult.
‘In 2014 we started negotiations with ALDI to supply their chain stores nationwide. This was the biggest contract going, it would be tough, margins would be tight. The wholesale hurley market was not something we had done before.
‘However, we needed something steady, and if nothing else I knew it would be another learning curve for myself and the team in streamlining our production and dealing with large multi-nationals and chain stores.
‘We supplied ALDI for three years and learned a lot,’ Philip said.
‘Currently 90% of our business is in the wholesale market where we supply wholesalers in both the north and south of Ireland, the UK and the United States.
‘We also supply clubs, schools and club players locally and nationally where we feel we can provide a quality product.
‘And there’s the cream of the crop, Lee Chin, Matthew O’Hanlon, Dee O’Keeffe, Jack O’Connor. This is where you let your art shine. This is where you enjoy every stroke of the spokeshave to create your masterpiece. This is what brings a smile to you face.
‘And often [there’s] a bigger delight from seeing the joy in a child’s eye when they pick up a hurl you made specially for them and their face lights up.
‘There’s a real satisfaction to the craft when you are gifted the opportunity of bringing a bit of joy to others,’ Philip added.
‘We are proud to be one of Ireland’s largest hurley suppliers, both nationally and internationally. Our goal is to push the boundaries of the game through constant innovation through our hurl design and production, delivering the highest level of quality in our products.’