60th Anniversary

10 Milestones across six decades of Business & Finance Magazine

By Business & Finance

30 July 2024

Join us in celebrating our 60th Anniversary by looking back at the 10 milestones from Business & Finance Magazine. From our first issue in 1964, these moments have cemented our place as Ireland’s premier business publication.

Which milestone do you think had the biggest impact?

	1964 Launch of Business Finance Magazine Celebrating the birth of Ireland’s premier business publication. Sentiment and Finance are a poor combination. This is the lesson that emerges from the sad story of the Lancegaye-Tipperary Glass episode, told in our business news pages this week. Briefly, the bid by Triplex Safety Glass (a British concern) for Lancegaye depends on hiving off the far smaller Tipperary Glass subsidiary, which employs some 25 people. In order to help along the negotiations, Senator J. J. Nash, Lancegaye’s chairman, undertook the responsibility for Tipperary Glass himself. However, he hoped to avoid having to put up all the capital required (a matter of £32,000) by offering some of the shares to Lancegaye shareholders.
	1974 Business & Finance Awards Introduction Marking the establishment of our prestigious business awards. The Common Market was having “crises” long before we even heard about it in this country, let alone joined it. It will doubles go on having them periodically, and will as before survive them. The Market will collapse only when it appears to its constituent parts that they are not doing very nicely out of it, thank you. After a year of experiment, the British are closest to this attitude, but they are forgetting their own propaganda. The proponents of entry said straight-forwardly that Britain would not do well in the short term; now that this has turned out to be the case, the prophets seem to be horrified by their own accurate forecasts.
	1976 Business & Finance Enter New Ownership Shifting ownership from a collapsed parent company to the chief editor. Since readers received their last issue – on December 4-Business & Finance has come under new ownership. Our publisher and owner since 1964, the Creation Group, ceased to trade on December 19 last. Three days later, the Jefferson Smurfit Group and the editor of the magazine bought Business & Finance. This raises an issue about which we are naturally sensitive – the question of editorial independence. The Smurfit Group owns 60% of the new company while the editor owns 40%. The arrangement was not workout without considerable preliminary discussion on the nature of the magazine and what the Smurfit Group’s reasons for buying it were.
	1981 First listing of B&F’s Top 100 Irish Companies The start of an annual process highlighting the best business in Ireland. This year’s look at Ireland’s top companies is the most wide-ranging ever undertaken by Business & Finance. In total, 350 concerns have been banked. The list includes private and public companies, semi-State bodies, co-ops and financial institutions. Our leading company is Bord Bainne with sales in excess of £495m. A new category, turnover per employee, is included along with a ranking to corresponds with the findings. State-sponsored bodies showed well in terns of turnover even if their profit performance left something to be desired.
	1989 Cover Story on Tony O’Reilly Highlighting the achievements of Ireland’s first billionaire. The New York Times said of O’Reilly that ne turned Heinz “from a chronic underperformer into a powerhouse.” Its best known product is the ubiquitous ketchup, which has half of the American market by selling 570m bottles (American shrinks have taken to analysing the ketchup phenomenon, with some concluding that it is a symbol of virility!). Heinz itself remains the corporation’s leading brand, but he emerging line has been Weight Watchers which has capitalised on America’s obsession with calories.
	1997 The New 32 Celtic Tiger Special Issue Documenting the people leading Ireland’s massive economic boom. As this week’s cover story points out, many of the country’s leading young entrepreneurs and risk-takers have built up considerable services businesses in a wide range of industries ranging from software to transportation and publishing. Most economists now agree that the Irish services sector has been the key direct source of employment and wealth creation in the Irish economy. According to Forfas, the average age annual increase in employment in the services sector between 1991 and 1995 was 21,600. Despite this the development of the services company in Ireland lags behind that of other EU countries. In fact, successive governments stand accused of grossly neglecting the services industry.
	2005 Tech Titans in Ireland Feature Celebrating Ireland’s emergence as a major tech hub. It’s sometimes easy to forget that, in 1995, the letters “www” didn’t trip off our lips, finding someone who had an e-mail address was a novelty and the idea of applying for a job or buying a holiday online seemed like the ramblings of some US venture capitalist. Ten years on, though, the Internet has become a medium as central to business as the newspaper. John Collins charts the rise of the web b in Irish business, remembers some ghosts from the Internet’s heady past and looks to the future.
	2008 The Great Recession Analysis Offering deep insights on the economic crash and how the country can prepare to make a successful recovery. The multi-billion euro question hanging over the economy is what the true level of impaired loans the banks are carrying on their books. The Government has commissioned PwC to conduct a comprehensive review of these loans and come up with a fair value estimation. It is unlikely that the Government will embark on any recapitalisation programme until this report has been completed. Coinciding with the PwC report, it has now emerged that the Financial Regulator has written to stockbroking firms requesting a one-off audit of their books. The Financial Regulator’s move could lead to potentially legally explosive consequences down the line.
	2014 50th Anniversary Edition Reflecting on five decades of excellent coverage. It was with great pride that we recently hosted out 50th anniversary gala dinner in Dublin to celebrate five decades of Business & Finance and recognise some of our most outstanding business leaders through the 40th annual Business & Finance Irish Business Awards. Indeed, mapping the evolution of the Irish business community in both a local and global context as we look back on the magnificent achievements since Business & Finance first launched in September 1964, as Ireland’s first business periodical, provides a chance to take stock of just how important the Business & Finance brand has been over this extraordinary period.
	2020 Ireland’s WorkForce Evolution How Ireland is going to bounce back from Covid. As we go to publication, the entire country is on Level 3 of Ireland’s ‘Plan for Living with COVID-19.’ It has been a tumultuous few months since our last issue in June when we dedicated the magazine to showcasing the innovation and incredible efforts of the business community was making to reboot the economy after months of lockdown.