Plastics & Rubber World - July/August 2019 - 18

plastics ireland

cabinet meeting

Dave Barry shares the story of his specialty cabinet business with PRW,
highlighting that product quality is of paramount importance

Virgin HDPE board becomes bespoke
cabinetry at Dave Barry Plastics

tablet press part storage unit

Shadow board produced by Dave
Barry Plastics

WWW.PRW.COM | July/august 2019

reland has grown into a leading hub for
the European medtech industry. According to IDA Ireland, more than 300
companies employ about 32,000 people
across the country, with nine of the top 10
leading medtech and life science multinationals having in-country operations.
While these companies focus on development and supply of products for
healthcare applications, in turn they require support from external companies.
This has served to develop a network of
smaller operations delivering innovative
solutions specifically tailored to a given
application.
One such company is Dave Barry Plastics. Located in Dungarvan, County Waterford, the eponymous owner has carved
out a niche that sees his team producing
bespoke plastic cabinetry for the medtech
sector.
"I've been involved in plastics for 25
years," says Barry. "After I came back from
some time in Australia, I was involved in a
plastic welding application for car bumpers, doing crash repair. I went on to do
some work with a pharmaceutical company which was having trouble with stainless
steel cabinets, they were too heavy," he
explains.
Moving forward to today, the cabinets produced at Dave Barry Plastics are
primarily constructed using virgin HDPE
board. The material was chosen as it
does not react with the aggressive cleaners used to ensure sterility. "The cleaners
come in HDPE bottles, so you know the
product won't react with the material,"
says Barry.
One of the first products was a series
of shadow boards used to store expensive pharma-grade equipment. That experience led to production of complete

shadow board trollies. Those first units
were assembled by hand, but now the
company relies on CNC machining for repeatability in production and CAD to improve finished quality.
"We did a big job for Sanofi [Irish HQ in
Dublin]," says Barry. "They wanted a series
of vial holders and we built those. One by
one, other companies saw the units and
asked us to build similar cabinets."
Barry says that was essentially the
start of the company, which has grown
from just two employees to 22 people.
The team now supports a customer base
which extends around the world, largely
based on positive reports from satisfied
clients.

BEating tHE comPEtition

Dave Barry says that while the pharmaceutical business is a massive industry, in
many cases he deals with the same people as they move between companies.
Once they have purchased the custom
cabinets, they often suggest that their
new company does the same.
He adds that the specific expertise developed by the company has resulted in
them having no direct competitors. But
that's not for want of trying.
"There was another local company that
saw our work. They tried to copy it, but
they couldn't put it together well enough
and it fell apart. They thought they could
make them cheaper than us. They could
[do that], but the cabinets were terrible,"
says Barry.
"We've built a brand on this work. We're
not cheap, we're expensive, but nothing
goes out of the shop which isn't top quality."
Design is another key element.
"Everything is bespoke, nothing is off the
shelf," he says. "We were recently at Pfizer

http://WWW.PRW.COM

Plastics & Rubber World - July/August 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Plastics & Rubber World - July/August 2019