Communicating a passion for gardening

WHEN Carmen Cronin was made redundant from her job with a multi-national company in Shannon, she was stunned. It was her worst moment since she moved to Ireland from Frankfurt in 1999 to study at UL. She was well aware that the recession was biting but didn’t think she would get caught in the economic maelstrom.

“It was devastating. I never thought that it would happen to me. I’d gone to college, done the hard work and some of the jobs I didn’t like for a while. I was in a really good place. I was a marketing manager at the time and I was proud of it. So it was a real smack in the face,” Carmen reflected at her home among the tranquil fields in Maurice’s Mills.

“Marketing is often the first job to go, which I personally totally disagree with. I think it’s more important that people start communicating more in that environment and it doesn’t have to be done in a very expensive way,” she feels.

She returned to her family in Germany for two months, before returning re-energised and buoyed by a plan. Having lived in rural Shannon for a while after college, with her then boyfriend and now husband Noel, Carmen had developed a leaning towards gardening.

“I had a bit of trouble with a very stressful job. I went to visit a herbalist and I started growing herbs out there. That was about 2003. I’m talking about thyme and sage, which you can use medicinally,” she explained. That was her introduction to gardening and when at a loose end a few years later, Carmen hit upon an idea.

“I did a course at the Irish Seedsavers Association in Scariff. It was a herbal course. The day after I finished, I rang them up and asked was there any chance I could come out and volunteer?” she recalled. The vibes were good and Carmen took another step towards learning more about gardening.

“I did six months of volunteering out there, not every day but about two to three times a week. I learned so much about gardening and also about myself. When I was finished doing that, I sat back and asked ‘what am I going to do?’ My first instinct was ‘I’m going to become a gardener’,” she smiled.

Having put a bit more thought into it, Carmen went about combining her interest in gardening with her professional expertise.

“I was looking around and thinking, ‘how can I combine what I’ve learned to love and what I know?’ I saw a lot of small businesses that are working very hard and have a great story to tell but there aren’t that many people who tell their story. What I see myself doing is bridging the gap or translating for the ordinary person what the business is about,” she said by way of detailing how she established a marketing and communications company in February 2010.

“It’s mostly small business and start-ups that I deal with. I make sure that I understand as much as possible about them and then work with them to get the word out and make it happen,” Carmen noted.

Part of her brief is working one day per week with Grow It Yourself (GIY), which currently has five active growers in Clare and 30 in Munster.

“I go out and meet people at festivals or garden parties. If people want to set up new Grow It Yourself groups, I support them in doing that. I talk them through what’s involved and on the day that they’re launching, I’ll do the launch for them,” she said.

As Carmen’s knowledge of the gardening world increased incrementally, she realised Clare didn’t have a flagship gardening festival. That is about to change.

“Through GIY I’ve met a lot of gardeners and a lot of people that are into gardening. I also went to a lot of garden festivals and also we have our own garden. There’s an amazing amount of knowledge in Clare and in other parts of the west. So suddenly the penny dropped. Galway, Tralee and Mallow have a garden festival and I was saying ‘why don’t we do something like that in Clare?”
Carmen set to work and the first Clare Garden Festival will be held on Sunday, July 29 at Ennis Showgrounds, in conjunction with the County Show.

“I have the contacts so I can bring in the expert gardeners and the speakers. The idea this year is to provide information and give talks and demonstrations. It’s going to be short, interesting and hands on,” Carmen predicted, sitting in her rustic house in Mid-Clare, which is quite a contrast to Frankfurt.

“I’m really a city child,” she laughed. “My parents are from the countryside, as is the whole of my family. My father and mother moved into Frankfurt for job reasons and I grew up as a city child. My parents come here every year. They love it. For the first five or six years, I would have been a bit of a tour guide but recently we’ve started dragging them into gardens everywhere,” Carmen chortled.
It’s likely that if Carmen’s parents are in Clare on July 29, their daughter will have them working from dawn till dusk at the Clare Garden Festival.

For more details on the show, visit www.claregardenfestival.com.