Boost My Business throws a spotlight on a Co Kilkenny craft and design company. Fiona Alston spoke to glassblower Rory Leadbetter about their family run glass studio.
Jerpoint Glass Studio has been a family business since 1979. The glass blowing business in Stonyford was founded by Keith and Kathleen Leadbetter. Keith learned the trade in Sweden and has since passed it down to his son Rory who continues the art.
"Every single piece of Jerpoint Glass is made here on site by either myself or James Long, the other glassblower," says Rory Leadbetter.
"Everything is done on site and we opened up a very small shop in the early days."
They have since expanded the shop and alongside their own wares they stock other handmade Irish crafts which includes an upstairs art gallery. "Everything we have here is all hand handmade in Ireland," he adds.
Customers to the studio can watch the pieces being made, it's a craft which Leadbetter says he’s still learning after 21 years.
"It's a skill that you develop over years and year, there's no set amount of time it can take you to start making good glass," he says, "it's very much a long learning curve."
"When you're learning at the start, you have to be part of a team that's producing so you can't just dedicate all your time to developing your skills," he explains.
"You have to be a productive member of a team at the same time, which means just maybe learning one skill which means that the team can function - as opposed to learning how to actually make glass yourself, that has to come with time," he says.
Something else which has been a learning curve for the Leadbetter family is online sales. The business would ordinarily rely on the tourist market for sales, but when Covid arrived in Ireland the team had to close their glassblowing operation, and shop, during the lockdown period. They had to find a way to generate sales and keep the tradition of their glassblowing business alive during the country’s closures.
"I don’t think I made glass for three and a half months," says Leadbetter. Apart from James Long, the rest of the business is made up of family members who all live close by each other so they could continue developing the business despite the restrictions.
"Kathleen is still very much the boss, but everybody here has five or six roles in the company, no one has just one job," he says.
With the passing tourist trade non existent the business had to rely on online sales, something they were beginning to implement. The close down period proved it to be vital.
"My sister Rosin and her husband Nicholas put a fierce amount of work into the website – they really did trojan work on the on the website and the website is still going very well at the moment," he continues. "To be honest, that kept us afloat along with the Covid payment, which we're very grateful for, just gave us great security at the time. Kilkenny County Council and LEO Kilkenny really supported us too."
The studio and shop are back open again and they’re still getting web sales and are very much looking forward to continuing the tradition of glassblowing businesses.
"We've developed our online presence, we really have done that, and we’ve improved our social media as well," he says. "Our shop is always excellent, anytime somebody comes out here they love the place and that's really encouraging. So yeah, I think going forward, we're as well positioned as we could be considering what everybody in the country has just gone through."
