2018 marks 24 years since Smyth Trailers Ireland Ltd in Co Carlow manufactured its first trailer and, after all this time, it’s co-founder Sam Smyth is as optimistic as ever about the company’s future. Irish Tractor & Agri learned more from the Bagenalstown native.
Coming up on quarter of a century in existence, Smyth Trailers Ireland Ltd has earned itself a glowing reputation for producing high-quality trailers for a wide range of industries from their base in Garryhill, Bagenalstown, Co Carlow.
The company was set-up by Brothers Sam and Clive Smyth in 1994 and to this day the family-run business continues to deliver cost-effective, long-lasting and robust trailers to clients all over the country, as well as serving a worldwide market.
Smyth Trailers Ireland Ltd has developed successful partnerships with suppliers and distributors in both the northern and southern hemispheres. In recent times, trailers have been exported to Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Romania, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.
That’s a far cry from back when Sam and Clive were growing up and working alongside their father, Sam Snr, in his Agri contracting business. However, one could see how it relates.
“Our background was always in Agri contracting,” Sam revealed. “Basically, from when we were kids up to our mid-20s we were working for our father’s business.
“Then in January 1994, on a very wet day, we went and bought a welder to make a trailer or two in our spare time and it just went from there. We set-up the business shortly after.”
All Smyth Trailers’ products (including silage, root crop, dump and grain trailers) are manufactured at a purpose-built manufacturing facility in Bagenalstown.
The team that builds them are expert designers and fabricators, who can either build a standard trailer from their impressive existing range or design a bespoke trailer to exact customer requirements.
“We would sell to a number of different dealers and around 75 to 80 percent of what we are doing here is being exported,” said Sam.
“We go mainly to the UK with our exports. Then it’s Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Norway and South Africa. I’ve been to Norway a couple of times now.
“Everybody we export to found us. I don’t know how they found us because we never did any advertising – it was just word of mouth.”
A top quality product certainly doesn’t hurt your chances of getting noticed and Smyth Trailers certainly have that.
All of the company’s trailers are of the very highest possible quality and finished to an unrivalled standard.
For example, Smyth’s Fieldmaster silage trailers are fitted with a stand holder, sprung drawbar, full RTA LED lighting, a robust chassis, rear door securely locked, handbrake/breakaway brake, safety prop and ladder and a hose tidy, Two-pack polyurethane paint system which is applied after being fully shotblasted is then baked on.
The Fieldmaster has a capacity of 16, 18, 20 and 24 tonne.
Grain trailers, meanwhile, are a particular speciality of Smyth Trailers, manufactured with a strong, robust chassis. A high-tipping angle and full RTA LED lighting giving clients a highly-versatile solution.
Optional extras on the Fieldmaster, grain trailer and grain/silage trailer include a hydraulic grain door, grain chute, rollover cover, swivel hitch, air brakes with load sensing and/or hydraulic brakes with load sensing. Smyth Trailers also fit a wide range of tyres depending on customer requirements.
The two brothers gave up Agri contracting in 1999 – the year after their father had sadly passed away – to focus on solely producing trailers and Sam Jnr still recalls the very first trailer they built for a customer.
“It was a 17ft tandem-axle trailer which we built for John Nolan from Tullow, who is still doing business with us today,” he reflected. “That first one wasn’t easy but we worked on it until 11 o’clock, every night for a month, and we got there in the end.”
From there, things gradually started to grow bigger and bigger for Sam and Clive. The workshop expanded, more jobs came in, and they invested in machinery and equipment.
To this day, all of the company’s trailers are built in-house, from scratch, and can be modified or tailored to the most discerning customer needs
As for the range of trailers manufactured, the co-founder stated: “Grain and silage trailers would be the main ones. We’re also manufacturing more dump trailers again. That had stopped dead in ’09 but has been back again for the last couple of years.”
Indeed Smyth Trailers are always finding ways to embrace new innovation. This year they’ve designed a double steer 24’ Tri Axle Supercube trailer which carries up to 50 cubic metres of grass.
The company also manufactured a four-axle trailer which went to Denmark earlier this year and ended up being featured in The Rural Dairy News magazine in New Zealand.
It’s little wonder why more local clients like Jim Power Agri Sales and Kellys of Borris continue to choose Smyth Trailers first above all other competitors.
The company’s Garryhill workshop is a veritable hive of activity and a trailer is built there every single day.
“We would have trailers in almost every county in Ireland and we focus on quality as an absolute priority, even if it costs a bit more. A high-quality trailer will save you money in the long run” said Sam.
A 25th anniversary is just around the corner for Smyth Trailers and the family-run venture still remains at the very forefront of the trailer manufacturing industry in this country.
Smyth Trailers Ireland Ltd
Garryhill,
Bagenalstown,
Co Carlow
Phone: 059 9157652
Email: [email protected]
Web: smythtrailers.com
Taken from Irish Tractor & Agri magazine Vol 6 No 2, March/April 2018
