Established in 2005, Kingdom Structural Steel Ltd specialises in the fabrication and erection of structural steel for the industrial, commercial and agricultural sectors while also manufacturing gates, railings and garden sheds. Building Ireland touched base with its Managing Director Paul Sheehan recently to hear about the company, its current projects and the overall state of business at the moment.
These are busy times at Kingdom Structural Steel Ltd and the plan for Tim and Paul Sheehan, and the rest of the team based in Kilflynn village, Co Kerry, is to try and keep things that way right through to next year.
Operating with 10 to 12 full-time staff, the company has been providing its customers in the industrial, commercial and agricultural sectors with quality buildings for the best part of two decades now.
Founder Tim Sheehan is a man that holds over 50 years’ experience in the business and he remains involved in Kingdom Structural Steel Ltd to this day, with his son Paul now its Managing Director.
Building Ireland spoke with Paul to discuss the ins and outs of the business and its overall hopes going forward.
“Tim is still involved to this day but, I suppose, it was four to five years ago that I took over,” he outlined.
“We have between 10 and 12 full-time staff here at the moment and then we’d be subbing out a bit then as well and, right now, it’s very busy here.”
The range of different services that Kingdom Structural Steel provides its customers is what helps it to stay ahead of the competition, as the company can fabricate and erect any size of building to your design, or assist you in designing it to suit your needs.
Should a customer prefer to erect their own shed, Paul and the team can cut and supply fabricated steel and accessories to order. As an agent for Tegral sheeting, Kingdom Structural Steel stocks a wide variety of Tegral grant and non-grant approved sheeting.
The company also supplies and fits fixings, gutters and timbers and can make aluminium, stainless steel, galvanised guttering and flashings to order as well.
Welding and machinery repairs are carried out within the Kingdom Structural Steel workshop and, since ‘Day One’, only the very best products have gone into the company’s buildings.
Right now, the team based in Gortatoo are immersed in a number of different projects around the Kerry region which Paul was able to provide some details on.
“We’re working in a farm development in Kilfenora in Fenit at the minute and we’re also on a project in Dooks Golf Club in Glenbeigh which is a maintenance shed,” he said.
“We’re also at Tralee Sports Centre, which is an ongoing project we have, it’s a storage unit. Other projects that we would have completed recently would be Astellas in Killorglin and the NCT Centre in Castleisland.
“We’ve done a lot of units at Clifford Brothers in the last numbers of years and, after that, we’d be doing a lot of different bits with various builders in the line of housing, steel and house corner windows and all that.
He added: “Our work brings us all over Kerry. We would travel outside of Kerry a small bit but, more or less, we have enough to do in Kerry so we don’t really need to travel and it suits us fine.”
So, all of that considered, the burning question is what has been the secret behind Kingdom Structural Steel’s success to date?
How has a small start-up grown into what is today very much a thriving structural steel fabrication and erection firm within the industrial, commercial and agricultural sectors?
Paul points to a couple of different factors when the question’s put to him.
“I’d say 70 to 80 per cent of it would be repeat customers for us here,” the MD stated.
“I suppose, it’s down to the quality of service really and Mark (Stack) my foreman would be involved with Tim since the early 90s, so he’d have a good relationship built up with the builders as well.
“We’d always be there to oblige where possible and get someone out of a hole if there was pressure on that they needed steel to facilitate slabs or whatever else. We’d always try and facilitate and won’t see them stuck.”
Indeed, all of Kingdom Structural Steel’s buildings are built to last a lifetime as a result of the company’s quality and professionalism when it comes to each and every project it undertakes.
Looking towards the months ahead for the family business, Paul says that he’s eager to see it continuing to deliver quality finished products and perhaps grow a bit more along the way as well.
“We’d always be looking to expand but I suppose it’s just hard to get the right people at the moment,” he said.
“I suppose the hopes going forward are that we should have enough work and just continue to progress and build where we’re at, and hopefully get one or two bigger projects again and just drive it on into the year ahead.”
Kingdom Structural Steel is a certified supplier of CE marked structural steel to the requirements of EN 1090 up to and including Execution Class 2 (EXC2) which covers the fabrication of all farm buildings and structural steel used in general construction.
Kingdom Structural Steel Ltd
Gortatoo,
Kilflynn,
Co Kerry.
Tel: 066 719 8945
Fax: 066 719 8945
Email: [email protected]
This article was published in Building Ireland Magazine, June 2024, Vol 10 No 6
