Oonagh O'Hagan
THERE HAVE been some developments at the business of Goldhawk’s favourite ‘celebrity pharmacist’, Oonagh O’Hagan, with a big injection of moolah from her hubby following hefty losses in the group.
As usual, the never not busy Oonagh has been posting energetically on her own Instagram account, with lots of news for her 63,000-plus followers. There were the trips to the Galway Races and Waterford’s All Together Now music festival last weekend as well as a tie-up with Ireland Fashion Week, for which her Meagher’s Pharmacy chain is the “official wellness partner”.
Needless to say, the Raglan Road, D4-based entrepreneur has not shied away from promoting the UK-manufactured gut supplement Symprove. Oonagh is very familiar with this product, given that she happens to own Symprove Ireland Ltd, the company that distributes the product here (see The Phoenix 28/1/22)
A recent post on her Instagram account featured O’Hagan dancing and lip-syncing (to oh so trendy Lola Young) in her kitchen while preparing to imbibe her beloved supplement.
She asks her followers: “Are you part of the Symprove family? When you know… you know”, with a heart emoji added for extra impact.
The good news for any Meagher’s customers interested in a little gut action courtesy of Symprove (“designed by scientists” no less) is that the pharmacy’s website currently has a €199 special offer, which gets you a 12-week course of the product – ie with four weeks free.
The Meagher’s business and Symprove Ireland have been 100%-owned by O’Hagan through parent company Batavone Holdings Ltd, where she was the only listed shareholder.
A few months ago, however, a chunky €½m worth of redeemable preference shares were acquired by Oonagh’s other half, senior counsel Ronan Kennedy (who may be best known for being part of the defence team for one Graham Dwyer).
Kennedy’s significant injection of cash comes after Batavone reported on its financial year to the end of August 2024. These figures show that turnover at the pharmacy group was up almost 10% to €29m but a hike in interest payments on increased bank loans, as well as a €½m-plus unidentified “exceptional item” pushed losses for the 12 months to August 31, 2024, to not far off €1m.
This still left Batavone sitting on accumulated profits of a gut-friendly €4.6m, although the “aggregate remuneration” for key management dropped 46% compared with the previous year.
Given the scale of the hit to O’Hagan’s bottom line, maybe some painkillers were in order.
