A family firm founded at the kitchen table
NEARLY half a century ago a schoolteacher and mother of three young children set out to shift her pregnancy pounds.
Agnes McCourt was determined, smart, and undeterred in both her mission to lose her three-stone gain and her commitment to a healthy lifestyle,
And from a kitchen table in Newry, Co. Down, the iconic and globally recognised
Unislim was born.
Now in her 80s, her daughter Fiona Gratzer, who now runs the company, insists Agnes is still as ‘fit as a fiddle’ and Unislimming her way through her best life.
‘My mother was a schoolteacher in the late 1960s, she had three children, I was her baby,’ explains Fiona.
‘She taught PE to young children so she wanted to have her fitness and her energy and her health back.
‘There was nothing in late 1960s Ireland, you can only imagine – no yoga classes, exercise classes, no gyms. She went to her doctor and he prescribed her diet pills which she refused to take.
‘She went home and was very upset and crying to my dad so he said to her, “Look, why don’t you try and get a couple of friends together and set up a little group, you know about fitness and healthy eating.”
‘So she set up a little group, of friends together, and they met and weighed each other every week.
‘The local priest gave her the parish hall and there were nine of them, friends together.
‘So, it was really teacher-cumpupil, she was helping them, they were helping her and in 12 weeks she lost the weight.
‘They all lost their weight, thought it was fantastic, done and dusted.’
News of the women’s success soon reached the ears of Co. Armagh broadcaster Gloria Hunniford and Agnes became an overnight success that has endured half-a-decade.
‘A newspaper picked up on the story about this woman in Newry who could literally “talk the weight off people”,’ Fiona said. ‘Then Gloria Hunniford, who was working in BBC Radio Ulster at the time, picked up the newspaper article and she wanted to interview my mother.
‘They loved her, she was full of energy, drive, so enthusiastic about her new healthy lifestyle and the phone was going crazy with people looking for her to set up classes; so that’s how UniSlim started.’