My Day

Mary McKenna

YESTERDAY EVENING I was playing golf with a client at Mount Juliet and stayed over. I got up at 4am and drove to Dublin to get ready for an 8.30am meeting this morning.

I’ve a lunch with a delegation from Visit Florida, a reception at the US embassy at 7pm and a work dinner at 8.30pm. That kind of day happens twice a week. On other mornings I’m up at around 7am. My two-year-old son makes sure I get an early start.

I’ll leave home in Rathgar and cycle to work. It should take about 20 minutes but we’ve an ad campaign running with Dublin Bus so these days I spend my time stopping to take pictures of buses with my iPhone.

I know I must look strange but I email them to our travel partners in the US, to show them what we are up to.

First thing when I get in is our management meeting. We’ll talk about what’s going on and review our marketing to see what is working and what isn’t and discuss how external factors, such as the Budget say, might impact on our business.

We then listen to a random selection of our customer calls. After value for money, the connection a customer makes with a staff member is a vital part of how they view the experience.

After that I’ll walk the floor. I love talking to the sales people to find out what’s going on, what are people interested in, what questions they are asking. If we’re organising a marketing campaign I’ll sit beside the graphic designer and see it coming together. I’m very hands on.

The other thing I do all day is log on to xe.com and watch currency movements. I’m like a trader such is my interest. Every time the euro strengthens our American holidays get cheaper.

I don’t pay any attention to what banks say about currencies because I’ve learnt from studying them closely what actually moves them. I’m obsessed.

Once a week I’ll travel to the UK and once a month to the US because I sit on advisory panels of partners, such as cruise ship companies, talking about the Irish market and finding out how business is with them.

I’ll get my lunch in Arnotts. I buy all my clothes and household goods there, too, simply because it’s across the road and I’m a creature of habit.

Afternoons are taken up with more meetings – with travel partners, press and convention bureaux.

Once I get home I’ll watch the news and any sort of business programme that’s on, and then be in bed by 10pm.

My son will most likely come in during the night but I’m so used to it I hardly wake. I set up the business 16 years ago but he’s by far my greatest achievement.

• Mary McKenna is managing director of Tour America

• In conversation with Sandra O'Connell