I live in Kilbrien, Co Waterford. So I’m near the Comeragh Mountains. My grandad had the farm and then he passed it down to my dad.

My dad is milking dairy cows, so we’re flat out calving at the moment. It’s going well now. The cows are calving left, right and centre.

We’re training all the calves to go onto the feeder. We’d all be helping out. At the moment I’m feeding all the calves. My dad there last year ended up getting an automatic feeder. It’s just a way better job.

Lucy Fraher has bred and sold some tri-coloured sheepdogs. \ Donal O'Leary

My dad has a good few Blackface ewes up on the mountain there too. We’re going to be lambing in April, so we’ll be really busy with those too.

He has horses as well, two draught mares and one thoroughbred mare. They’re all in foal. I’ve a Connemara pony, Misty. I put her in foal there a while ago, so she’s due to foal in May. There’s a lot going on down the farm.

My dad loves racing, he’s in a racehorse syndicate. Molly Wedger is her name. She’s owned by the Kilbrien Syndicate.

Business brains

I feel like I’ve always been an entrepreneur. I’m only 16 and I’m not turning 17 until the end of November. I’m still very young.

Last May, when I was 15, I put one of the sheepdogs, Sally, in pup. She gave birth to five puppies. I got them all microchipped, I got them all their injections.

They’re not just any sheepdogs, they’re tri-coloured sheepdogs. So they’re black, white and brown. They’d be kind of unique.

Lucy Fraher started her own clothing line KHL (Keep Her Lit). \ Donal O'Leary

The dog who had them, her mam is a brilliant sheepdog. I sold the puppies and I got a good €880 for them. So that was brilliant, I was actually overwhelmed.

The customers rang me enquiring about the puppies and I just started telling them all about them.

People came from Kildare, Dublin and Galway to collect the puppies. It was crazy, I couldn’t believe it. I’ve always had a business head, if you think of it that way.

KHL

I recently set up my own unisex agricultural clothing company, KHL. It stands for “Keep Her Lit”. I just launched the website a couple of weeks ago. I sell hoodies, hats and water bottles at the moment.

I wanted to start my own business for a long, long time, but I was always trying to think of an idea. When I’d be down the yard, I’d be listening to stuff. I’ve an older brother, he’s 21. I’d be hearing him and his friends and they’d be always messing.

They’d use farming sayings and different slang. They’d all be saying, “Keep her lit.” I’d be thinking to myself, “it’s a popular enough saying, I wonder if I turned it into a clothing brand – KHL, it kind of works.

The idea just came to me then. I always found growing up that there was a major gap in the agricultural clothing market. Most products were marketed towards men.

My grandmother still always goes out farming with us

So I wanted to create something unisex, that boys and girls could wear. That it wasn’t “that’s just for boys” or “that’s just for girls”.

My grandmother still always goes out farming with us. I look up to her because I’m thinking, if she can do it and she’s 80 years old, so can I.

I don’t want KHL to be just targeted towards boys or men. I’d like it to be targeted towards even young girls as well, to give them the confidence to go out farming with their dads or their mams.

Taking the leap

I did this completely myself. I didn’t go into transition year (TY). I just decided to skip and go straight into fifth year. Most young people, if they were trying to set up a business, they would start the idea in TY. So it has been kind of stressful trying to set up the business and do school, but I suppose I found a balance between both.

I was on TikTok – it’s a social media platform – and there’s this girl, she has a clothing brand and she’s based in Cork. Her brand is gymwear. I’ve been following her with months like. I was watching videos about how she set up her company.

You just have to take the risks being an entrepreneur

She set up her company in fifth year too. I was like, if she can do it, why can’t I?

I feel like you just have to have a very wide, broad mind to set up your own business. You just have to take the risks being an entrepreneur.

There’s no point in being closed minded and saying, “Oh it won’t work.” There’s only a percentage of people that have set up their own business, it has been successful and they have made money. You just have to take the risk.

When I leave school I’m hoping to do a business-marketing degree. That’s kind of what I’m hoping for at the moment or maybe just something in the area of business. I just love that area.

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