Celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2022, Laois Hire continued its remarkable journey of evolution and expansion over the past twelve months. Having joined Briggs Equipment last April, as part of a continuous growth and diversification strategy, Ireland’s largest plant hire company immediately signalled its intent by investing in an extensive fleet of new equipment.
A household name nationwide, Laois Hire has been providing complete plant and tool hire and sales solutions to the construction industry for three decades and continues to go from strength to strength. Established by Michael Killeen and his wife Maureen in 1992, the company strengthened its position as Ireland’s plant hire market leader in April, 2021 when it joined Briggs Equipment – the UK and Ireland’s leading asset management, materials handling and engineering services specialist who have a turnover of circa €350m.
Briggs Equipment is part of Dallas, Texas headquartered Sammons Enterprises, which was established in 1938 and boasts over $120 billion in assets and annual turnover of $6billion.
Laois Hire developed a significant footprint across the UK after it became part of the HSS Hire Group in 2005 and, through this partnership, had an input into the 2012 London Olympics as well as countless other landmark projects in the UK. A milestone was reached in 2015 when the Laois Hire group, as part of HSS became a PLC and was floated on the London Stock Exchange.
“As of last April, we are now part of the Briggs Equipment Group, which has a turnover of €350m between Ireland and the UK,” MD Michael Killeen confirms. “Their main business is in supplying materials handling equipment and they have the agency for Hyster-Yale forklifts in Ireland and the UK.”
Briggs acquired Balloo Hire in Northern Ireland in 2019 and have since acquired JB Plant Hire, a family run plant and tool business, demonstrating their long-term commitment to becoming the leading plant hire provider across the island of Ireland. Laois Hire will have the financial backing to pursue a policy of massively expanding their product range.
“This has been a fantastic opportunity for the team in Laois Hire in becoming part of Briggs Equipment Group. Briggs are aggressive in expansion and have plans to become a major player as a group across the Island of Ireland within four to five years,” notes the affable Laois Hire founder and managing director.
Since establishing the business in 1992 Laois Hire have become a major brand name, and are one of the most recognisable brands in Ireland alongside the likes of Guinness, Ryanair, Tayto, Barry’s Tea and Kerrygold.
This has been a remarkable success story, Laois having provided vital services to an exhaustive list of Ireland’s key infrastructure projects in recent years, including the development of Ireland’s motorway network (including the M50 and Enniscorthy Bypass) and the construction of the Terminal 2 building at Dublin Airport, DIT Grangegorman, the Children’s Hospital and countless others projects large and small.
As for the secret of this phenomenal success, Michael states: “The business took off from day one. We just grew naturally. We had no idea how fast we would grow and, in the beginning, we had no intention of selling the business.
“In 2005, we were approached unexpectedly by AIB Mergers & Acquisitions Division fronted by Daniel O’Donoghue, now ION Equity, to see if we were interested in selling the business. We initially declined but following a twelve month period of negotiations we decided HSS would be a good partner for Laois Hire going forward.
“Our success has been based around service, personal attention and a phenomenal team. As far as I’m concerned, we have the best team in plant and tool hire in Ireland. The team have matured and developed with us and built up a huge bank of experience.”
With up to 150 cranes visible on the Dublin skyline at any given time, Laois Hire supply a vast array of equipment, both hire and sale, to the majority of these sites serving all the biggest contractors – the BAMs, Sisks, Roadbridges, etc. – on every major project.
“We supply literally everything a builder could possibly need on site from the time they move in until they complete the project,” Michael confirms. “This includes earthmoving equipment, plant, tools, diggers, dumpers, traffic management and we also have a pumping division, a generator business and a site cabin business as well. With depots strategically located in Rathcoole (Dublin), Portlaoise, Kildare, Offaly, Cork, Limerick and Galway, we can supply anywhere in Ireland.
“We’re huge in utilities, including water and sewage schemes and broadband roll-out, and gear-up all the gangs on those long-term contracts. We’re also very busy on wind farms and renewable energy in Ireland and Scotland and we enjoy close working relationships with all the local authorities.”
While Covid has presented obvious challenges to everybody in construction, Laois Hire came through the worst of the crisis largely unscathed. “We kept the doors open and that was the main thing,” reflects the MD. “We supplied a lot of essential healthcare and accommodation projects and did a lot of signage for the authorities and worked on emergency roadworks. We kept working thanks to the great dedication and commitment of our staff during extremely challenging times following all the Health & Safety procedures and kept everybody safe. Income dropped by 30-40% but we recovered very quickly once things opened up again.”
Laois Hire have a bespoke IT system in place and have invested in a state-of-the-art smart hire system incorporating the latest technology to allow users to order plant from site using an app. “The majority of our kit is tracked using telematics and information can be sent back to the customer advising them if the equipment is being used properly, which is important from both a safety and efficiency point of view,” Michael continues. “Everything is numbered and e-coded now and we know where it is and what it is doing at any given time.”
The extensive Laois Hire fleet currently numbers around 750 pieces of plant plus thousands of small kit and a fleet of 70 trucks and vans that deliver the equipment all over the country. As part of their extensive growth strategy, they recently completed a major investment to further expand their fleet, with a variety of new equipment continuously flowing into their branches – a sign of their commitment to offering customers the best machinery. Over €2.3million has been invested into the generation fleet, for example, comprising MacGen and FG Wilson sets ranging from 40kva to 500kva, all fully Super Silent with 24 hour running internal fuel tanks and complete rental set specs.
Other new additions include eco-friendly towable mobile diesel lighting towers; a major expansion of pumps for the pumping division from the new Selwood Eco range (both 4” and 6” sets, which are suitable for a full range of sewage, sewer bypass, over-pumping, water and wastewater applications); new Hamm ride-on rollers; teleporters, powered access equipment and new plant trailers.
Direct employment is generated for a crew of approximately 150. Is there a point at which Laois Hire might reach capacity and start to focus on consolidation rather than growth?
“Our strategy is one of growth going forward – an aggressive growth strategy for the next 3 to 5 years,” Michael confides. “Our intention is to grow all nine of our existing divisions.”
While there appears to be pent-up demand for construction projects, at the same time a possible medium-to-long-term shortage of materials, labour and capacity could potentially drop a massive spanner in the works. What is Michael’s vision for the future of construction in Ireland and what role does he envision Laois Hire playing within this?
“I’ve done a lot of research into this and things are looking good for the next four or five years, especially as a result of the gap left by the recession. There is plenty of demand because we are so far behind. I’m not sure we can continue at the current level with so much activity in data centres, etc., but we are way behind on houses, services, infrastructure and utilities.
“Materials and labour are definitely going to present big challenges. Fitters and drivers are very hard to get so you have to make sure to keep your existing staff on board. There hasn’t been enough training done and there aren’t enough apprentices coming through. Companies in Ireland need to be encouraged to take on more apprentices.
“In the UK, they are looking at giving more incentives to those in construction,” Michael concludes. “They’re talking about giving grants to contractors buying kit and maybe extending that to giving grants to house builders against the cost of hiring equipment. Maybe
we could consider a similar scheme here.”
Laois Hire,
Clonminam Industrial Estate,
Portlaoise, County Laois
Tel: 1800 204040
Email: [email protected]
Web: laoishire.com
This article was published in Building Ireland Magazine, January 2022, Vol 8 No 1
