Rita Shah starts every day the same way – with a trip to see her horses on her farm close to Castleblayney.
“What’s important is to go and say: ‘Well, how are you lads?’ You know?” she smiles. “And give them a scoop of feed. And then that makes me content and charged up for the day.”
A day that could include any or all of her roles as an entrepreneur in the Irish plastics and recycling industry, a racehorse and resort owner, a skincare entrepreneur, a charity fundraiser – and even a cattle farmer – with over 200 people employed.
It’s a lot to get through in one interview, so Irish Country Living can only imagine what one day in the life must be like for the Kenyan-born, but Co Monaghan-adopted business woman, who wears a sari in tribute to her Indian heritage for our shoot at the historic Balyna House on the grounds of the Moyvalley Hotel and golf resort in Kildare; just part of her portfolio.
Kenya To Castleblayney
It’s certainly a long way from her native Nairobi, where her late parents, Mulchant and Lalita, ran a coffee farm. Although Rita explains that she actually owes her first name to an Irish missionary sister, and despite being Hindu, was educated in Catholic school.
“It almost seems like I’ve come to pay my penance here,” she jokes.
After finishing school, Rita moved to the UK to study economics but while her parents were able to support her comfortably, she showed a willingness to work hard for herself by taking a part-time job in catering at Gatwick Airport, buttering loaves of “Mother’s Pride” sliced pan.
Rita Shah, pictured at the historic Balyna House. \ Philip Doyle
“It was very little money but it was my money,” she stresses.
“The first day I went in, I think there were 12 loaves and I said: ‘God, I’m going to get through them quickly.’ Little did I think there’d be another 12 coming. So I did them and the next thing was the next tray came. And the next tray…”
Still, being no stranger to hard work would stand her in good stead when her father asked if she would move to Ireland for a few months to help an associate and friend of his, the late Oliver Brady – perhaps best-known as the larger-than-life racehorse trainer – with a start-up business printing plastic bags.
“Start-up” being the key phrase, as far from the state-of-the-art facility it is today, Shabra Plastics began in a horse stable, with Oliver and Rita hitting the road in a transit van to drum up business.
“He says: ‘Rita, we’re going to paint the van with signs written as if we are in Hollywood,’” she laughs.
“We’d have my maroon briefcase, a calculator, an order book, a pen, a cheque book and a lodgement book… and off we went.”
Rita explains that in the early days in Ireland, the two things she struggled most with were the weather and the local dialects – and perhaps some preconceptions – as she relates an anecdote of how she closed one particular deal with a customer in Donegal.
“He says: ‘Young lady, the day you can speak a few words in Irish, I’ll certainly fill your order book,” she recalls. “So I was determined – hungry to get an order book – I said to him: ‘Conas atá tú?’”
(Needless to say, she got her order.)
From the beginning, Rita only intended to stay in Ireland for a short time, but as Shabra Plastics grew, so did her commitments in the country. Sadly, it was the tragic murder of her mother during a home burglary that saw Rita return to Kenya for a number of years to be with her family – but she explains that it was Oliver’s support during that difficult time that convinced her to return to Ireland to build their business partnership.
“Oliver was one person who actually supported our family, in his laughter, in his jovial way, in his spiritual way of saying, ‘Bhabhi (her mother’s nickname) is here, look she is smiling,’ all those little words,” she explains. “It was our way of saying thank you to Oliver.”
Overcoming Challenges
By then, the business had grown from just printing to manufacturing, with Oliver and Rita buying in waste material from overseas at considerable expense to make their bags, as they could not source it in Ireland at the time.
Until Oliver had a brainwave.
“We were getting it (the material) from France and one day we couldn’t get it in time and we let our customer down. But just as we were travelling in the car, a big load of plastic blew across and I said: ‘Look at the plastic we have!’ And he said: ‘Rita, we’re going into recycling,’” she explains.
The pair invested £2.5m to develop a state-of-the-art facility, but were faced with another challenge when the then Minister for the Environment, Noel Dempsey, introduced the plastic bag levy in March 2002, which Rita only discovered a week before when she saw a headline in a newspaper while visiting a friend in hospital.
Race horse trainer Oliver Brady built up Shabra Plastics and Recycling with Rita.
“We had nearly two million of stock into the warehouse,” she recalls. “I actually remember where I was stood in our offices and I said: ‘Oliver, this feels like the ground is going to open and we’re going to be buried.’”
Gathering their team together, however, Rita and Oliver focused on diversifying the business – for example, if they were supplying black bags to a catering business, to source and supply other products they might need, like foil.
However, it was leading the way in Ireland by reprocessing post-consumer plastic bottles and plastic film that proved Shabra’s salvation, and today the company reprocesses 10,000t of plastic waste a year. This is used by Shabra to manufacture recycled bags, while PET/HDPE bottles (eg drinks bottles) are sorted, washed and reprocessed into a substance known as flake, which is sold locally and worldwide – for example, PET flake is used to make products including carpets, fleeces and nappies.
But at a time when we are being urged to cut down on plastic use as a society, how does Rita feel about the issue?
“It’s not waste, it’s a resource. It’s such a valuable resource,” she maintains, explaining that she feels the key thing is to respect and recycle the plastic that people do use; for example, rinsing a bottle before recycling it to avoid the risk of contamination further down the line.
“If you have a bottle and you’ve used it – let it be a milk bottle, a Coke bottle, a mineral bottle, a water bottle, any kind of bottle – my perfect advice is rinse it, respect it, recycle it and be proud that it’s recycled in Ireland,” she says.
Horses To Hotels
Of course, as mentioned earlier, Shabra Plastics and Recycling is not Rita’s only business interest.
While Oliver was well known as a horse trainer, Rita also shared this passion, with notable winners over the years from the Shabra Stables including Balapour, Gazalini, Ebidiyan and, most recently, Alhajjaj. She currently has 16 horses, with trainer Anthony McCann taking the reins.
“He’s brought me many times into the winner’s enclosure,” smiles Rita, who admits that while it is an expensive business to be in, “if you have a horse and it wins, you can’t buy the thrill”.
She is also involved in the hotel industry, buying the Moyvalley Hotel and Golf Resort in Co Kildare in 2014 as part of a consortium, with about €2m invested in upgrading the property and grounds to date as a wedding venue and leisure break destination. Meanwhile, she manages Urban Wellness Ltd, a natural skincare brand, and as if that was not enough, rears cattle at her farm in Monaghan.
As Rita talks through her various business interests, it is clear that Oliver is never far from her thoughts. His death from cancer in 2016 was devastating, as Rita admits that initially she wanted to “close the doors” on the business.
“I don’t think I’ll ever see another person like Oliver in my lifetime,” she says, explaining that as business partners they challenged each other to be the best they could be.
“One would say no, the other would say yes,” she continues. “But we got the best out of it.”
Charity Work
What has helped, however, is focusing on Shabra Charity, which has raised €1.5m for schools in Nigeria and Kenya, as well as medical facilities in Ireland, including for the first gene sequencing facilities in Ireland at the Mater hospital, given a promise that Oliver made towards the end of his life.
The facilities will allow testing in Ireland for conditions such as the “faulty” gene that can lead to Sudden Adult Death syndrome. To date, this expensive testing has been carried out abroad, with the results taking between 18 months and two years to be returned.
With the new facility, it is hoped to reduce this wait time to just two weeks at a fraction of the cost and facilitate more accurate diagnosis and targeted treatment, with testing to begin later this year.
“We will have fulfilled Oliver’s wish,” she smiles.
People are joking and saying: ‘Are you heading off to the Áras now?’
Given Oliver’s colourful character, Rita had always been happy to stay out of the spotlight, and explains that it took two years after his death before she found her voice as a business person in her own right.
In recent months, however, she has grown in confidence and was honoured to receive a “Distinguished Fellowship” from Athlone Institute of Technology, following in the footsteps of former president Mary McAleese, as well as being named “Business Woman of the Year” at the recent Irish Women’s Awards.
“People are joking and saying: ‘Are you heading off to the Áras now?’” she smiles, describing the honour as “the greatest thrill” to receive from her adopted homeland – and the Irish people – who have supported her since first arriving in Castleblayney.
“They accepted me, they were lovely and they were generous, they were willing to embrace me,” says Rita, “and I’ll not forget that.”
For further information, visit www.shabra.com and www.shabracharity.com
Rita Shah starts every day the same way – with a trip to see her horses on her farm close to Castleblayney.
“What’s important is to go and say: ‘Well, how are you lads?’ You know?” she smiles. “And give them a scoop of feed. And then that makes me content and charged up for the day.”
A day that could include any or all of her roles as an entrepreneur in the Irish plastics and recycling industry, a racehorse and resort owner, a skincare entrepreneur, a charity fundraiser – and even a cattle farmer – with over 200 people employed.
It’s a lot to get through in one interview, so Irish Country Living can only imagine what one day in the life must be like for the Kenyan-born, but Co Monaghan-adopted business woman, who wears a sari in tribute to her Indian heritage for our shoot at the historic Balyna House on the grounds of the Moyvalley Hotel and golf resort in Kildare; just part of her portfolio.
Kenya To Castleblayney
It’s certainly a long way from her native Nairobi, where her late parents, Mulchant and Lalita, ran a coffee farm. Although Rita explains that she actually owes her first name to an Irish missionary sister, and despite being Hindu, was educated in Catholic school.
“It almost seems like I’ve come to pay my penance here,” she jokes.
After finishing school, Rita moved to the UK to study economics but while her parents were able to support her comfortably, she showed a willingness to work hard for herself by taking a part-time job in catering at Gatwick Airport, buttering loaves of “Mother’s Pride” sliced pan.
Rita Shah, pictured at the historic Balyna House. \ Philip Doyle
“It was very little money but it was my money,” she stresses.
“The first day I went in, I think there were 12 loaves and I said: ‘God, I’m going to get through them quickly.’ Little did I think there’d be another 12 coming. So I did them and the next thing was the next tray came. And the next tray…”
Still, being no stranger to hard work would stand her in good stead when her father asked if she would move to Ireland for a few months to help an associate and friend of his, the late Oliver Brady – perhaps best-known as the larger-than-life racehorse trainer – with a start-up business printing plastic bags.
“Start-up” being the key phrase, as far from the state-of-the-art facility it is today, Shabra Plastics began in a horse stable, with Oliver and Rita hitting the road in a transit van to drum up business.
“He says: ‘Rita, we’re going to paint the van with signs written as if we are in Hollywood,’” she laughs.
“We’d have my maroon briefcase, a calculator, an order book, a pen, a cheque book and a lodgement book… and off we went.”
Rita explains that in the early days in Ireland, the two things she struggled most with were the weather and the local dialects – and perhaps some preconceptions – as she relates an anecdote of how she closed one particular deal with a customer in Donegal.
“He says: ‘Young lady, the day you can speak a few words in Irish, I’ll certainly fill your order book,” she recalls. “So I was determined – hungry to get an order book – I said to him: ‘Conas atá tú?’”
(Needless to say, she got her order.)
From the beginning, Rita only intended to stay in Ireland for a short time, but as Shabra Plastics grew, so did her commitments in the country. Sadly, it was the tragic murder of her mother during a home burglary that saw Rita return to Kenya for a number of years to be with her family – but she explains that it was Oliver’s support during that difficult time that convinced her to return to Ireland to build their business partnership.
“Oliver was one person who actually supported our family, in his laughter, in his jovial way, in his spiritual way of saying, ‘Bhabhi (her mother’s nickname) is here, look she is smiling,’ all those little words,” she explains. “It was our way of saying thank you to Oliver.”
Overcoming Challenges
By then, the business had grown from just printing to manufacturing, with Oliver and Rita buying in waste material from overseas at considerable expense to make their bags, as they could not source it in Ireland at the time.
Until Oliver had a brainwave.
“We were getting it (the material) from France and one day we couldn’t get it in time and we let our customer down. But just as we were travelling in the car, a big load of plastic blew across and I said: ‘Look at the plastic we have!’ And he said: ‘Rita, we’re going into recycling,’” she explains.
The pair invested £2.5m to develop a state-of-the-art facility, but were faced with another challenge when the then Minister for the Environment, Noel Dempsey, introduced the plastic bag levy in March 2002, which Rita only discovered a week before when she saw a headline in a newspaper while visiting a friend in hospital.
Race horse trainer Oliver Brady built up Shabra Plastics and Recycling with Rita.
“We had nearly two million of stock into the warehouse,” she recalls. “I actually remember where I was stood in our offices and I said: ‘Oliver, this feels like the ground is going to open and we’re going to be buried.’”
Gathering their team together, however, Rita and Oliver focused on diversifying the business – for example, if they were supplying black bags to a catering business, to source and supply other products they might need, like foil.
However, it was leading the way in Ireland by reprocessing post-consumer plastic bottles and plastic film that proved Shabra’s salvation, and today the company reprocesses 10,000t of plastic waste a year. This is used by Shabra to manufacture recycled bags, while PET/HDPE bottles (eg drinks bottles) are sorted, washed and reprocessed into a substance known as flake, which is sold locally and worldwide – for example, PET flake is used to make products including carpets, fleeces and nappies.
But at a time when we are being urged to cut down on plastic use as a society, how does Rita feel about the issue?
“It’s not waste, it’s a resource. It’s such a valuable resource,” she maintains, explaining that she feels the key thing is to respect and recycle the plastic that people do use; for example, rinsing a bottle before recycling it to avoid the risk of contamination further down the line.
“If you have a bottle and you’ve used it – let it be a milk bottle, a Coke bottle, a mineral bottle, a water bottle, any kind of bottle – my perfect advice is rinse it, respect it, recycle it and be proud that it’s recycled in Ireland,” she says.
Horses To Hotels
Of course, as mentioned earlier, Shabra Plastics and Recycling is not Rita’s only business interest.
While Oliver was well known as a horse trainer, Rita also shared this passion, with notable winners over the years from the Shabra Stables including Balapour, Gazalini, Ebidiyan and, most recently, Alhajjaj. She currently has 16 horses, with trainer Anthony McCann taking the reins.
“He’s brought me many times into the winner’s enclosure,” smiles Rita, who admits that while it is an expensive business to be in, “if you have a horse and it wins, you can’t buy the thrill”.
She is also involved in the hotel industry, buying the Moyvalley Hotel and Golf Resort in Co Kildare in 2014 as part of a consortium, with about €2m invested in upgrading the property and grounds to date as a wedding venue and leisure break destination. Meanwhile, she manages Urban Wellness Ltd, a natural skincare brand, and as if that was not enough, rears cattle at her farm in Monaghan.
As Rita talks through her various business interests, it is clear that Oliver is never far from her thoughts. His death from cancer in 2016 was devastating, as Rita admits that initially she wanted to “close the doors” on the business.
“I don’t think I’ll ever see another person like Oliver in my lifetime,” she says, explaining that as business partners they challenged each other to be the best they could be.
“One would say no, the other would say yes,” she continues. “But we got the best out of it.”
Charity Work
What has helped, however, is focusing on Shabra Charity, which has raised €1.5m for schools in Nigeria and Kenya, as well as medical facilities in Ireland, including for the first gene sequencing facilities in Ireland at the Mater hospital, given a promise that Oliver made towards the end of his life.
The facilities will allow testing in Ireland for conditions such as the “faulty” gene that can lead to Sudden Adult Death syndrome. To date, this expensive testing has been carried out abroad, with the results taking between 18 months and two years to be returned.
With the new facility, it is hoped to reduce this wait time to just two weeks at a fraction of the cost and facilitate more accurate diagnosis and targeted treatment, with testing to begin later this year.
“We will have fulfilled Oliver’s wish,” she smiles.
People are joking and saying: ‘Are you heading off to the Áras now?’
Given Oliver’s colourful character, Rita had always been happy to stay out of the spotlight, and explains that it took two years after his death before she found her voice as a business person in her own right.
In recent months, however, she has grown in confidence and was honoured to receive a “Distinguished Fellowship” from Athlone Institute of Technology, following in the footsteps of former president Mary McAleese, as well as being named “Business Woman of the Year” at the recent Irish Women’s Awards.
“People are joking and saying: ‘Are you heading off to the Áras now?’” she smiles, describing the honour as “the greatest thrill” to receive from her adopted homeland – and the Irish people – who have supported her since first arriving in Castleblayney.
“They accepted me, they were lovely and they were generous, they were willing to embrace me,” says Rita, “and I’ll not forget that.”
For further information, visit www.shabra.com and www.shabracharity.com
This is a subscriber-only article
SHARING OPTIONS: