Douglas bar the South County beat off stiff competition from 34 other entrants to take home Gael-Taca’s annual Irish Language in Business Award on Friday night last. Lord Mayor Cllr. Terry Shannon presented Tom O’Connor of the South County with the Award, and a prize of five thousand euro worth of advertising with Corks’ Evening Echo newspaper.

The judges were also suitably impressed with a number of other entrants – awarding 2^nd place to Griffins Garden Centre, joint third place to last years’ winner Café Anraith and the  2009 Winner – The Sportsmans Barbers in Ballincollig. City Centre Florists, Morans’ took 4^th place and 5^th place was awarded to Cork City FC.

“The judges were extremely happy with the standard in this years’ competition and wanted to extend the prizes to recognise the work many companies had put in” said Áine Ní Shléibhín, Marketing Manager with Gael-Taca. “But the South County were worthy winners, having put an enormous effort into integrating Irish into all aspects of their business – signage, their website and advertising material”.

Lord Mayor Terry Shannon praised all business’ involved in this years’ awards, and their efforts to make Irish visible to the people of Cork. Gradam Phádraig Uí Chuanacháin is named after one of the founding members of Gael-Taca, who passed away in 2008.