Still hungry for more

The Friday Interview:Brody Sweeney is probably too candid to be a politician. Sitting in the Westin Hotel on Tuesday, the founder of the O'Brien's Irish Sandwich Bars chain tells it straight about his flirtation with politics last year.

"I was f**king gutted," he says of his failure to win a seat for Fine Gael in the three-seat Dublin North East constituency in the general election. "I was sure I was going to get the seat."

Sweeney reckons he knocked on 50,000 doors in the two years running up to polling day and spent €80-€100,000 on his campaign. "It just wasn't enough."

The floppy-haired sandwich baron polled a paltry 3,529 first preference votes and went out after the second count.

Fine Gael won a seat but it went to Terence Flanagan, a councillor put on the ticket by party headquarters after a poll nine months ahead of the election showed Sweeney was in trouble.

"I felt it would split the vote," he says. "It wasn't good for me. He was younger and better looking . . . he was hungrier than me."

Sweeney says his rivals told voters that he was a posh bloke from Sandymount who hadn't a clue about the issues affecting a constituency that includes the economically-challenged northside suburbs of Darndale, Coolock and Artane.

"The biggest negative was that it was so public."

So why do it? Having made some serious dough with the O'Brien's sandwich empire, Sweeney thought he could make a difference in the political arena, put something back into the community, be the entrepreneur who gets off his backside and tries to implement change.

"I thought that if Fine Gael got into government I had a reasonable chance of becoming a [ junior] minister and making things happen," he says.

He's cured of the notion now. "I definitely won't go again," he says. "The thought of hanging around for five years and that the out-turn might be no different doesn't appeal to me. I never wanted to be a career politician."

As for Fine Gael, he thinks the party has a "reasonable" chance of getting into power next time round. "They have some reasonable talent now coming through," he explains. "But they still suffer from a tired, old image.

"People surely can't vote for Fianna Fáil again...it will have been the guts of 20 years, it would be too much," he says rolling his eyes towards the sky.

Sweeney believes that Enda Kenny will lead Fine Gael into the next general election. "He's rock solid. The reality is that he's got the whole party behind him."

He says Fianna Fáil did a "great job" of making Kenny look "completely incompetent" in the last election campaign.

"Two weeks before [ polling day] we were gone and we knew we were gone," Sweeney says. "You could sense it on the doorstep. It's incredible that people don't really engage until just before an election. I think it was a fear of change."

Having licked his political wounds, Sweeney is back in business - literally. On Monday, he will launch a joint venture between O'Brien's and the owners of the Cafe Bar Deli restaurant chain, Jay Bourke and Eoin Foyle.

They plan to franchise the pizza and pasta restaurant concept around Dublin. If the concept works, he wants to take it to Britain and other countries.

It's a logical extension of the O'Brien's franchising business, especially as the chain of sandwich bars is nearing saturation in many parts of Ireland. "It should be relatively easy to bolt this on to our existing office operation."

Sweeney has also just finished a book, called Small to Tall, pitched at business owners looking to make a step into the big time.

Sweeney is also behind the Connect Ethiopia charity. Founded in 2005, it aims to involve Irish business people in developing the economy there and building trade links with Ireland. O'Brien's sources 40 per cent of its coffee from the African state.

Sweeney remains actively involved in O'Brien's. Founded in 1988 at a time when most Irish people took their own lunches to work and made a cuppa in the office kitchen, O'Brien's has grown to become a chain of 125 franchised shops in Ireland selling 140,000 sandwiches a day.

Sweeney's first experience of franchising was not a success. Having dropped out of college in 1981, he and his father Frank held the master franchise for Prontaprint for eight years. "We never once made a profit," he admits. "It was a useful learning experience."

He got the idea for O'Brien's on a visit to the United States in 1987, where he visited Subway sandwich chain. "They were quite small then but I liked the model of a minimum cooking and relatively low-skilled restaurant.

"There were coffee shops and sandwich shops in Ireland at the time but nobody had put a brand name on them - that was my Eureka moment."

O'Brien's is now in 16 countries and the combined turnover of franchises is about €140 million a year. Its network stretches from Canada to Australia. The holding company, which owns the concept and has responsibility for branding, marketing and quality control, makes an annual profit of more than €1.2 million.

O'Brien's is not everyone's cup of tea but Sweeney says it has hit the spot with young, health-conscious females, its core customer. The menu has expanded over the years from traditional doorstep sambos, crisps and run-of-the mill tea and coffee to hot wraps, a variety of fruit smoothies, salads and a range of coffees that would make your head spin.

It underwent a major rebranding three years ago. "We have changed hugely," he says, "although I would accept that the perception is that all we have done is stood still."

O'Brien's best sellers are cappuccinos and the chicken and bacon triple decker sandwich - Sweeney's own creation. It's not for the faint hearted.

And Sweeney's favourite? "I'm a smoothie junkie and I love the chicken, bacon and guacamole baguette," he says, rubbing his stomach with satisfaction.

A keen yachtsman in his spare time, Sweeney acknowledges that it hasn't always been plain sailing for O'Brien's. It has quit a handful of shops in Dublin because the rents were too high. "We do struggle to keep ahead of the game. But we're still the biggest retailer of coffee in Ireland by a factor of five."

A failed run at the US market cost about €500,000 and it has had to restructure the British business over recent years, closing about 20 shops. Sweeney reckons O'Brien's has lost €2-€4 million in Britain. "It's a lot of money," he says, adding that it was just too small in Britain for the brand to resonate with customers in the same way that it does here.

The British business has been restructured and Sweeney expects it to be in expansion mode again in 2009.

Last year one of the O'Brien's outlets in the St Stephen's Green Shopping Centre hit the headlines when the Health Service Executive issued an order for closure after uncovering the presence of cockroaches.

The shop is shut and O'Brien's is seeking to gain repossession of the unit.

"It's your worst nightmare as a food business," Sweeney says. "We make 140,000 sandwiches a day and every one of those is an opportunity to f**k it up. That's the horrible thing about our business and it's the thing that keeps me awake at night."

Otherwise, Sweeney declares himself to be happy with his lot. "I consider myself almost retired," he explains. "I'm doing what I choose to do now, not what I have to do. That is how I define retirement."

ON THE RECORD

Name:Brody Sweeney.

Age:47.

Family:Married to Lulu with four children.

Lives:Sandymount and Sligo.

Why in the news: TheO'Brien's Sandwich Bars chain he founded has signed a joint venture deal with Café Bar Deli to open 20 franchised restaurants in Dublin.

Something you might expect:He is a non-executive director of bookmaker Paddy Power.

Something that might surprise:"I've a 100-year-old Galway hooker called Gleoiteog.It's my pride and joy and I keep it up in Sligo.