Operating out of Blanchardstown, Co Dublin, Cosgrove Electrical Services is a company with extensive experience in all sectors of the electrical industry. Building Ireland touched base with Operations Manager David O’Donoghue to learn about the ins and outs of the company, its on-going projects and plans for the future.
Since its inception in 2000, Cosgrove Electrical Services has built a solid reputation for delivering its clients commercial and industrial electrical solutions.
Today, business is thriving for the company and the plan down at Blanchardstown Corporate Park is to try and keep things that way right through to next year.
Cosgrove Electrical Services is currently close to 100 staff on its books, including Operations Manager David O’Donoghue whom joined the company 10 months and has 15 years’ experience working with the industry.
Building Ireland spoke with David recently to hear more on the challenges the company faced during the Covid-19 pandemic and its double success at the 2022 Electrical Industry Awards earlier this summer.
“Business is good and we adapted to the challenges of Covid. Thankfully, we have a very solid supply chain, so we were able to jump on the back of some elements that were active in Covid,” David outlined.
“We did some HSE work, some critical frontline work that we got ourselves into purely because of our reputation from past experience with various different suppliers and contractors.
“So, it kept our core team going, which was great and we didn’t have too much downtime during Covid.
“I suppose, currently in the market now, we rely quite a lot on repeat business, so we give everyone a good level of service, high standards in the installation and we’re very competitive.
“We understand the business we’re in, the developers we work with and they demand a company that can resource adequately, deliver to a good standard with no snags and come in as well at a competitive project budget.”
At Cosgrove Electrical Services they offer reliability and a high quality of workmanship to clients.
It’s an approach that the company has adopted since ‘Day One’ and one which Managing Director Joseph Cosgrove and his team have viewed as being paramount in protecting and growing the reputation of the business.
Right now, Cosgrove Electrical Services is immersed in various different projects and, as David revealed, the firm has diversified over the past 18 months.
“Rather than staying in one industry such as residential, we’ve mixed it up here in the last year-and-a-half,” he stated.
“We’ve a number of different types of projects with residential, commercial, some mixed-use developments and we’re currently in negotiations with a number of large-scale developments which are really to combat the housing crisis in there at the moment.”
All of that considered, the burning question is what has been the secret to the company’s continued success for more than two decades now?
How has a small start-up grown into a thriving company which now employs some 100 staff and has a golden reputation amongst its clients for carrying out work to the highest of standards?
For David, he credits the staff, management and the relationship they’ve had with many clients from the outset for the success of Cosgrove Electrical Services to date.
“I suppose, it is an aggressive market out there at the moment,” said the Operations Manager. “Staffing is probably one of the key challenges and, while a lot of people would say that material is the key challenge at the moment, but, as I said, we have a good solid supply chain that mind it.
“The good thing about Cosgrove Electrical is that we have retained an exceptionally high percentage of staff. So, a lot of our staff that are with us have been with the company the last eight to 10 years.
“We have a good, solid backbone of core management and they have evolved over time to deliver on our vision on the company’s standards.
“I think the clients like our approach. We’re a down to earth electrical contractor that believes in open communication and early engagement in a collaborative manner to get the best out of projects.
“Where we make the projects work is by starting on time, finishing on time and coming in as close as we can to budget.”
In June, the company’s excellent work was recognised on a national scale when it earned at the 2022 Electrical Industry Awards.
Cosgrove triumphed in the ‘Best Large Electrical Contractor’ and ‘Best Large Commercial Project’ categories, with the latter success recognising its work on the student village area at UCD.
The company first started carrying out projects at UCD 12 years ago and the latest one was “exceptionally challenging”, according to David whom also outlined that it was a “really great result” once completed.
“I think it surpassed the clients’ expectations for the vision they had for a commercial mixed use students village area and, by all accounts, it has been very well received by the students,” he stated.
“Both awards were great recognition for the staff within the company and are really are a summary of what each and every person within the company has done over the past number of years to deliver the standard that Cosgrove Electrical has.
“Right down from purchasing, accounts, estimation, projects, quality, our apprenticeship scheme – all of these factors have combined and built to what is judged by the panel as quite a solid company that can stand up to challenges in the industry and come out with a really good result.
“Winning both of the awards, to be honest, it was exceptional. We were blown away by it because there was some fierce competition in the room with many of the ‘Tier 1’ electrical contractors present.
“It was a very proud moment for us all.”
Given its track record, don’t be surprised to see more award success for this vibrant venture in the coming years.
As for the months ahead for the business, the plan is to continue improving the already high standards at Cosgrove Electrical Services going forward.
“We’re building on a number of different factors. Obviously, we understand that quality is key.
“Prefabrication and using digital technology in our day-to-day business are elements are in our vision for the next year or two to develop and utilise on active live sites, so we can finetune our operations and bring it to the exceptional standard of being a Tier 1 electrical contractor,” David concluded.
Cosgrove Electrical Services
220 Block C Blanchardstown,
Corporate Park,
Blanchardstown,
Dublin 15
Tel: +35318855088
Fax: +35318855089
E: [email protected]
This article was published in Building Ireland Magazine, September 2022, Vol 8 No 9
