Obituaries

Piers White obituary: A ‘born entrepreneur’ and altruist

Dubliner died ‘the way he would have wanted to go – on the side of a mountain’ in Africa

Piers White was a ‘wide-eyed experience seeker who relentlessly pursued the next moments’.

Sat Feb 6 2021 - 01:00

Piers White, who has died aged 40, was an entrepreneur and an altruist, a teacher, sports coach, outdoor enthusiast, friend to many and an all-round catalyst for making things happen.

As word of his death, while climbing in east Africa, spread this week, his friend Mark Pollock described him as a “wide-eyed experience seeker who relentlessly pursued the next moments”.

A marathon runner, he helped initiate the Run in the Dark, an evening jog to raise spirits and funds

His friendship with Pollock, forged at Dublin University Boat Club, proved to be a turning point in his life and brought out the best in him.

Pollock, a Northern Ireland rowing champion, became blind aged 22 and, in 2011, was paralysed from the waist down by a fall. To help support his friend, White gave up a teaching job at Wesley College and was instrumental in establishing the Mark Pollock Trust, where he was head of organisation for 5½ years.

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A marathon runner, he helped initiate the Run in the Dark, an evening jog to raise spirits and funds, which began in Dublin in November 2011 with 2,000 participants and has since spawned similar events in up to 50 around the world involving some 28,000 people.

“In a very dark time, we were filled with hope,” Pollock wrote this week in a tribute to his friend, praising his “organisation, vision and energy in a crisis; his willingness to try things he had never done before. He was a born entrepreneur”.

“Without Piers’s imagination, drive and leadership – his willingness to try – we simply wouldn’t have been able to make it happen.”

White brought the same imagination and leadership to his next major project – that of running Stepping Stone Accommodation, a Dublin-based rental charity with 29 units for people at risk of homelessness.

He died overnight on January 27th/28th, some way below the summit of Mount Kenya, the 5,199m-high mountain, east Africa's second highest

In 2018 and with assets of more than €18 million, he folded the charity into the Peter McVerry Trust, feeling there were too many homeless organisations and that being part of a larger charity would be more effective.

A friend described the move as the most selfless thing any administrator of a charity had done as, in doing so, he effectively wrote himself out of a job.

After a stint as Match Day Representative with European Professional Club Rugby, he joined the management team at Mondello Park as commercial director, a position that was tailored for him.

“Piers had a passion for people, data and business and he possessed a real entrepreneurial spirit,” said CEO Roddy Greene. “He was always looking for new ways of doing things, problem solving [and] working the numbers.”

Piers Henry White was born in Dublin in 1980 to parents Jeffrey and Naomi White. He attended Wesley College in Ballinteer where he was a boarder. He took a keen interest in rugby, the start of a life-long commitment to the sport. He went on to Trinity College, Dublin, where in 2002 he took a degree in information technology.

His first full-time job was with Vodafone Ireland, where he worked for the company’s customer insights team, eventually taking charge of the company’s customer care throughout Ireland and reporting to Vodafone Europe.

In 2006, he followed his entrepreneurial instincts and acquired the franchise for Ireland of myhomeclean.au, an international home cleaning services company. Rebranding it as Pristine.ie, he grew the business from two employees to 20 in under two years and, in 2008 and aged 28, he received the franchisee of the year in retail and service from the Irish Franchise Association.

In 2009, while still running the cleaning company, he returned to Trinity to study teaching, giving maths classes for two years in Wesley as well as being a house master and rugby coach.

Iain Wallace, a former teaching colleague and close friend, commented: “He was a real instigator – be it social events or whatever it was. He was the glue in our group.” Greene said White “had a zest for life that was infectious”.

Their views echoed many expressed by colleagues and friends across the wide range of activities in which he made a lasting impression in a relatively short life, but one that was packed full.

“He was kind and so much fun,” his sister Miranda said this week. “He was witty, loved puns and was sarcastic. He had an infectious smile and was constantly making children laugh, not least his eight nieces and nephews.”

He died overnight on January 27th/28th, some way below the summit of Mount Kenya, the 5,199m-high mountain, east Africa’s second highest. Climbing alone but with a guide, he settled for the night in a hut about 500m below the summit and died in his sleep, apparently from the effects of altitude.

“It was the way he would have wanted to go – on the side of a mountain, camping and in the outdoors,” said Miranda.

Piers White is survived by his parents, Jeffrey and Naomi White, his brothers Jonathan, Vyvian and Richard, and by his sister Miranda.

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