Maith an Buachalla

Last October, Dublin GAA announced the appointment of Marcus Ó Buachalla as their Chief Commercial Officer, a role that involves the management and development of Dublin GAA’s commercial, marketing and communications activities.

A qualified solicitor, Marcus was Head of Communications & Media with Leinster Rugby for twelve years prior to joining Dublin GAA. He also previously worked with leading Irish PR agency Pembroke Communications (now Teneo) where his clients included the GAA and the LGFA.

Marcus took up the post in early December and used the social side of the season of goodwill wisely. He ensured that he familiarised himself with the staff at Parnell Park and also with those companies that have supported and built close relationships with Dublin GAA in recent times.

Staycity Aparthotels is Dublin GAA’s official sponsor, covering all four codes and are currently approaching the halfway point of a five-year arrangement.  O’Neills are also synonymous with the Dublin blue having been the county’s long-standing official kit manufacturer and retail partner.  Dublin GAA also enjoy partnership arrangements with Go-Ahead Ireland, Ballygowan, Peugeot, UPMC, Bytek and FM104 as their media partner.   

"Our relationship with our sponsors is hugely important to us. With us working together in partnership, it is vital to have healthy working relationships and good communications. So I was keen to meet our partners as early as possible and managed to do this over the Christmas period. I am really looking forward to further developing these relationships in a way that is good for Dublin GAA and the companies that are supporting us.”

“All of the sponsors that I have met want to support Dublin GAA but also want to engage with our clubs, our schools and our communities.  When I met our partners in Staycity we discussed how we could engage more with the grassroots in Dublin GAA. As a result of this Staycity launched a campaign this week celebrating the volunteer photographers that our clubs rely on, across all four codes.  They have more plans to celebrate the volunteers that are at the heart of our games and I look forward to engaging with them on that.”

Bringing Gaelic games to all of our communities in Dublin and ensuring that schools and clubs are centrally involved is a large-scale operation and Marcus has been very impressed with the games development and coaching side of the organisation.

“I’ve been getting to know people here like Ger O’Connor and his team in terms of the work that they do around coaching and games development and the formidable work that the GPOs do in our clubs, schools and communities around Dublin.  There are over 47,000 kids involved in Go Games in any given week and ideally we want them to have an O’Neill’s size 4 in their hands or a sliotar as much as possible. 

“We are competing against other sports such as rugby, soccer, athletics and even Playstation!  We are competing for the hearts and minds of these young people.  The coaching and games side are doing fantastic work and then it falls back on the comms side of the house to raise awareness and to celebrate the great work that the GPOs, games development officers and volunteers are doing on a weekly basis.”

To this end Marcus has also been working closely with the communications team of Derek Ryan, Daragh Cantwell and Ellen Joyce around match day digital story-telling and an increased focus on high quality imagery and video across their social channels.

Those social channels reach over half a million followers across all four codes, and there are also the advancements around DubsTV over the last few years and sponsors have helped to bring these games to a new audience.

“You can also look at what Go-Ahead Ireland has brought to the table in terms of sponsorship of the Dublin club championships, especially what we’ve been able to achieve through the ongoing development of Dubs TV. Working with Asgard on the production side and then Wiistream who broadcast it for us, last year we had 37 club games that were broadcast to our supporters.  That literally opens our games up to a global audience and creates extensive awareness for our sponsors.  It also gives those who can’t attend the game the opportunity to see the brilliant action that’s going on in our championships.”

It is important too that the stars of tomorrow have role models to look up to. Dublin has enjoyed huge success on the field in recent years and have been fortunate to produce a large amount of exceptional players who have been inspirational to our younger generation.

“Sportsfile and Roamer have been excellent for us – the two agencies that we have been working with on photography and video in recent years. It is also fantastic to have the buy-in of our management teams, especially Niall and Ger and their panel of players. They understand that as well as looking to celebrate the amazing players that wear the Dublin jersey week in week out, we want to inspire the next generation of players to pick up a hurl or a football and go down to their local club nursery on a Saturday morning.”

Dealing with the commercial side of Dublin GAA, the marketing side and also the communications side will no doubt ensure a pretty full in-tray most of the time. There are a lot of balls and sliotars to juggle, but Marcus is confident that with everybody pulling in the same direction, much can be achieved.

“As we look at the broader landscape in terms of my remit it’s about what we can do to facilitate our clubs to grow and to develop and to flourish.  That’s not easy within Dublin for a number of reasons but then every county has their own issues. 

“The cost of running Dublin GAA across the board is up by around 9%, whether that be the preparation of our teams or games and coaching development. What we need to do is be able to support our development officers, our coaches on the ground, as best we can, so that they can put their best foot forward in terms of Gaelic games promotion in their own communities. What allows us to do that?  It's about that alignment between our team in Parnell Park, with the teams on the pitch and then with the sponsors, partners and suppliers supporting us and our clubs in our endeavours. If we all get something from this, then we are doing something right.”

Marcus has certainly hit the ground running and I’d imagine if he was wearing a GPS it would be clocking up an awful lot of activity.  And there is no sign of his pace slackening off either …

“My door is always open.  I look forward to building on the tremendous success that Dublin GAA has enjoyed in recent years under Tomás Quinn, John Costello and now Finbarr O’Mahony.  I want to explore the endless potential that is out there and build even more successful and sustainable partnerships that will benefit all parties and ensure that Dublin GAA goes from strength to strength both on and off the field.”