EP 301, DIGGING DEEPER WITH DAMIAN MCCABE ,DYMAC MANAGING DIRECTOR

We like a good story, and Damian McCabe, Managing Director of Dymac Global, certainly has one worth telling. From leaving school at an early age to negotiating contracts for large-scale power systems projects across the world, his journey is one built on resilience, determination and an unwavering work ethic.

Like many entrepreneurs, Damien’s path has not always been smooth. Having built a successful business only to see it wiped out during a global recession, he faced the kind of setback that would force many to walk away. Instead, he chose to rebuild.

Today, his story stands as a powerful example of what can be achieved through persistence, hard work and a positive attitude in business. It is a journey that has taken him from humble beginnings to operating on an international stage, proving that determination and belief can carry a person a very long way.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:15

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SPEAKER_01 0:30

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SPEAKER_03 0:37

Um okay, so we'll kick off. Um we're into season three, episode one, um, and of the Machine Removers Ding and Deeper podcast. Who my good friend Damien McCabe from County Tyrone? How are you keeping? I'm good, Brian. How are you? You're all tensed up, Davey. I think tense. You do, you've been like, you might be projecting, Nervyan. You do see some lads come in to do this, like you know, and they're kind of you know, but after a couple of minutes in, they they're they they're relaxed. So you can relax, just two of us having a chat. No brother. How are you keeping? I'm good. Where did you drive out this morning? You came down from Dublin.

SPEAKER_02 1:13

Yeah, I live in Dublin, Brian. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:15

You've been in Dublin a while now.

SPEAKER_02 1:16

Uh I suppose it's almost 30 years now.

SPEAKER_03 1:19

Right, so you emigrated from Tyrone.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

And it was an emigration, I have to tell you, getting across the border.

SPEAKER_03 1:23

Right, yeah. You're you're you you're you and your family are originally from Tyrone. What part of Tyrone is it?

SPEAKER_02 1:30

Uh East Tyrone. Uh beside the Loch Ne shore. Right. Grew up in the engineering, all engineering uh communities, I guess, around East Tyrone.

SPEAKER_03 1:38

Lots of factories building building crushers and screeners, you know? It's uh kind of an epicentre of manufacturing what is it about Tyrone actually? It's um they all seem to be mad for making stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:49

Uh it was I know the the the story the story goes back to the early 70s when they had a quarry in Cole Island and they tipped tipped up the uh screen box to to figure out why it wasn't working and the material when they tipped it up 45 degrees the material went through it ten times faster than it would have sitting flat. Right. And that's how the whole crushing and screening and uh business began in the in Turone. Right. You know, it was kind of a fluke. Right it was it, yeah. It was kind of a fluke, lifted up the screen box and the material went through it ten times faster so they could have more production then. Okay. And the whole ethos of uh recycling equipment and uh machinery was born from that sort of experience, you know?

SPEAKER_03 2:29

Is it is is it a particular mindset of people up there that they were good at making stuff? I I know there were certain people that were very good at making different kinds of stuff.

SPEAKER_02 2:38

Well, back in the day you you had no choice but to try and knock something together in your backyard because you didn't really have much opportunity, I guess, growing up in in the era of you know of troubles.

SPEAKER_03 2:48

Yeah. Right. So do you do you remember any of that too? Oh, I do, yeah, I grew up in it, yeah. Right, yeah. And uh what was that like?

SPEAKER_02 2:54

Well, I didn't know what it was like until I crossed the border at 21. I actually figured out that it was a very intense place to grow up. Because when I crossed the border at 21, I didn't realise when the I didn't realise I had stress in my life when the the stress left left my shoulders.

SPEAKER_03 3:09

When you came to the south?

SPEAKER_02 3:10

I came to the south, it was a whole different world. It was like entering into some foreign country. Yeah. It was the same island. So that's why I kind of stayed in the south.

SPEAKER_03 3:17

But you were growing up with that state of mind that was normal to you, was it, that kind of hypertension and it was yeah, you grew up with um with a ri you grew up with a kind of a you had to look over your shoulder and figure out where you were in the world, you know? But look you you look you being a kid now in those times, like you're you're you're similar as terrifying myself, you're in the five leader club now. I'd say you're kind of mid-50s at this stage. Um actually uh early fifties, Brian. Early fifties, yeah. Um but so I was saying like thirty years ago you were growing up in that environment. But look you as a kid, like like what would there be like what would you be afraid of? Like what would the was it the police, was it the soldiers?

SPEAKER_02 3:55

Uh I don't know if you're afraid of anybody really as a kid. I mean you're pretty bulletproof, you thought to yourself, you know. That's right, yeah. Uh but um what we did in the summertime is we brought in the hay and we brought in the turf and we, you know, uh dug the drills, the potato drills, and we were sent out working as a young fourteen-year-old, fifteen, sixteen. Right. You know, it was you know, hard work getting a few quid in, you know.

SPEAKER_03 4:17

Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 4:18

And we didn't really pay much attention to what was happening.

SPEAKER_03 4:20

Of course, yeah. I think that's you know, like I s everybody thinks about Northern Ireland and think about, you know, troubles and people killing each other and blowing each other's marines. But like in the okay, and that that's an important part of Northern Ireland and its history. But there was like uh for most people, they just were getting on with life as best they could.

SPEAKER_02 4:42

I think we we grew up in a in an era where we didn't realise we were growing up in the troubles. Right. It was natural so when you're born into it and you you grew up on it and you see the British soldiers walking the streets, it becomes a natural part of life. Okay. Um so you don't really question it much, you know. You come home from school and That's just the way it is. That's just the way it is. You come from school, you see the news, and someone killed two miles away. It's you get what do you what do you do? You get on with it.

SPEAKER_03 5:05

Right. You get on with it. You get on with it, yeah. Right. And it's just an acceptable thing that this is stuff that happens here.

SPEAKER_02 5:13

All my teenage life it was it was the way the world was for me, and uh I c again, you know, coming back out across the border and it was a different experience, and something about the South of Ireland really attracted me, you know, and I s I kind of stayed there, you know.

SPEAKER_03 5:24

Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 5:25

At twenty-one years of age, you know?

SPEAKER_03 5:27

Yeah. Um when I met you up in Cole Island 20, 25 years ago maybe, um you were um you had a company back then called AutoGen. Uh-huh. Was w like was that your company or was your dad's company?

SPEAKER_02 5:42

It was a very small, it was a very, very small business my dad uh had managed to maneuver himself into. He used to build uh generators for Finlay block machines. And there was about four to five people uh in a small company that he managed and uh he got a contract from it was actually a Tyrone firm, Finlay Block Machines, and uh he would build maybe up to ten generators a month.

SPEAKER_03 6:07

Uh what would the generators go into going into the stuff that Finleys or make them?

SPEAKER_02 6:11

Yeah, it's a block machine. Right. And the block machines went up and down the breadth of Ireland into every quarry you could imagine. Right. And uh the name Autogen became prevalent in the quarry industry in Ireland. Okay. And uh so I was out, uh I I got a job in Powerscreen with 20 22 years of age. There's about I don't know, 40, 50 people in for the interview, and uh two people got the job and I was one of them, you know.

SPEAKER_03 6:34

And why did you what do you think you because you had that experience?

SPEAKER_02 6:37

I kind of lied my way through the interview. Good man, yeah. And uh told them that I sold all these generators and never sold a generator in my life before 22, you know. And plus the fact uh that you had to be a GEA player to get into the the tur uh into the the top uh offices of PowerScreen. All right. Yeah, back in that day you you were you know, you only really got a job if you could play a better football.

SPEAKER_03 7:00

That's right. But PowerScreen was synonymous with uh, you know, the other sides, you know, the Catholic side, which wasn't. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:07

Well Kevin McCabe was uh big name back then, he was an all-star for Tyrone. Who's Kevin? Who's Kevin McCabe owns HarpScreen? Right. Uh he he was kind of one of the earlier fellas in the Powerscreen era. Okay. And his name is synonymous with my name, McCabe. So I think he put a good word in for me then, you know.

SPEAKER_03 7:24

Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 7:25

And uh so I got I got the job for Powerscreen and I you know I became a salesman uh uh in my in my young early teens or early twenties, and you know, uh five four four four or five years in I got a few quid together and I bought my father's business.

SPEAKER_03 7:40

You bought the business off your dad?

SPEAKER_02 7:41

I bought my dad yeah, it wasn't given to me. Oh, was it not? No, no, no.

SPEAKER_03 7:45

Yeah, no, I did. I I thought that that this was gonna pass pass on to you.

SPEAKER_02 7:49

No, no, my dad got in a bit of uh trouble health-wise. Right. Him and his partner uh kind of weren't pulling along very well, and my brother called me one day on the phone and he said, Look, Damien, uh, what do you want to do with this business? My dad, you're obviously her dad wasn't well. He wants to I said, Yeah, I'll give it a shot, you know. Right. Right. And uh went ram ramming forward with that idea that I could grow this business into something good, you know.

SPEAKER_03 8:21

And what was your what was your business model, Damien?

SPEAKER_02 8:24

What was the my dad's business model was he assembled generators. He bought the engines, the alternators, and you know, put them together and put them into canopies and containers and we I kind of had that understanding that I could sell these across because uh my background is sales, and I had been a welder in PowerScreen in my earlier, you know, 14, 15 working in these factories, you know, metal bashing and so I kind of had this in my DNA at some somewhere. And I c I know I could take this product and and s you know, m sell it in Ireland and possibly even more. Okay. At a young age.

SPEAKER_03 9:03

So 27 years of age, I'd so even an engineer's mindset, like what were you like at school? Like, did you you left school fairly did you do probably left school?

SPEAKER_02 9:12

I I was there but I wasn't present from like age 14 and a half. You couldn't wait to get out. Well, I was just you know, school wasn't for me, really, you know.

SPEAKER_03 9:20

But it's a it's kind of a theme that I find with doing this podcast when we're talking to people. Um people who are working for themselves, they're self-made, but school wasn't for them. Um see there's some people they progressed and that you know that they they've done very well for themselves too. But the predominant theme of most people we've interviewed in the podcast is that they went to school, couldn't wait to get out of school. Either their father was a farmer or he was an engineer, they were making something, or had a construction company and couldn't wait to get out.

SPEAKER_02 9:52

Yeah, pretty pretty much that. Um, you know, I kind of yeah, it was pretty similar to that experience. I couldn't wait to get out. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 9:59

And uh how how do you leave school though? How do you leave school and you know migrate from that?

SPEAKER_02 10:05

You kind of make you kinda make noises and and and and get yourself expelled, basically. Or suspended.

SPEAKER_03 10:10

But but like the technical know-how, like you know, working with your hands trying to because you Well I was I was I was pulling starters and alternators apart.

SPEAKER_02 10:20

My dad has a mechanic background and an electrical background, and at 13, 12, 13, 14, I was pulling starters apart, putting brushes and amateurs into them, cleaning them, putting them back together, and my dad was making 40, 50 quid on alternator refurbished, you know, and I was doing that at twelve. Okay. He put me underneath the bonnet of a car uh to take starters off at at 13.

SPEAKER_03 10:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:40

So some work it's into you. Okay. That kind of understanding. And I remember actually funny th funny story, I didn't realise that I had a sort of a a brain for design, but I I uh when I got into the power screen job, I had a a trial period. I think there's about 37 or 40 lads in the room, power screen salesmen from uh my age of 22 to 50 to 50, and the room was full of all these uh experienced fellows. And I I remember them putting a snapshot up on the screen, and it was a drawing of two crushing and screening machines. And I looked at the two drawings, and the question came down to the room from the fellow was was you know holding the meeting, and he said, Can anyone spot the difference between the two machines? And I looked at the two drawings and I was relatively I didn't know anything about the the power screen product. I just had been given the the job and I was in a trial period and I seen that the two drawings were different. And I seen my hand rising up, and I like I would never raise my hand in school. I was never interested, but in this particular instance, I put my hand up and I I I spotted the the error in the drawing, and I spotted that before all these experienced fellas. And at 18 years of or at 22 years of age, that happened to me, and I thought, wow, that's for me. I took something significant from that.

SPEAKER_04 12:03

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 12:04

And from there, I had this belief in myself that I could design stuff. Okay, I didn't had a mindset that I could design. Even looking at the power screen machines, I could see in an instant that the drawings were different.

SPEAKER_03 12:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 12:15

And that was the question to the room. Okay. And I seen people looking around going, How did he know that?

SPEAKER_03 12:22

I could read the room, you know. Well how about you? Obviously, they give you the.

SPEAKER_02 12:25

Well, I always like I grew up in turmoil, I grew up in the troubles, I grew up, my father was, you know, distracted, we were all distracted as young kids. I grew up in a lot of turmoil. But that experience said to me, you know, I've ha I've I have something natural. And I all as I moved through my life, I relied on that experience. Okay. I uh you know, learning how to believe in yourself that you can design and move forward. And that was one of the experiences that stood out to me. Right, yeah. You know.

SPEAKER_03 12:54

Well I I find with engineers, um, particularly more so in Ireland, and i it it's kind of funny what you said there that you were growing up, um, there wasn't a lot of money around, and you have to this thing with engineers you talk to most of them is that they say we asked them how did they get started? And they say, Well, look, I went to such and such an engineering company and I asked them could they make it could they make this for me and they said no. So he says, Well, I just went back to my own yard and I made it myself. So a tailor-made solution. And what you find with engineers up and down the country, like you look at Ireland as a very, very small country in the grand scheme of things. And um but you you you look at like every country road, somebody's making something. That's right. You know, they're rooting at something, making something, and then you see obviously like going back twenty, thirty years ago, you look at the explosion of companies and Tehran that's making stuff now and the uh uh you know, not just for the local market. Uh I some would say that they're probably very little interest in the local market because it's not very profitable for them, but it's turned into a global kind of uh empire for and just with that mindset, people like your description there of how the crushers and screeners emerged was by a kind of um something happening, do you know? Yeah and it was like the light goes on. We've discovered this, we've worked this out, and now we can mass produce machines that can crush and screen rock. Yeah. You know, because before that it was very rudimentary kind of machines and systems for breaking rock, wasn't it?

SPEAKER_02 14:31

Well, if you look back in the on the era of Northern Ireland, you know, the Protestants uh were given the best land, they were given the best jobs. So the Catholics had to go into the muck. You're left with the stone. They had to go into the muck and the stone and and they had to figure something out. So we were left with, you know, um which was perceived to be the the dirty jobs, you know. But out of that they obviously you just mentioned they they created an empire. Right. Out of muck. Yeah. Muck muck shifting and recycling. Okay. You know, and it's a bit, you know, out of every sort of uh perceiving um disappointment, there's a something ha positive can happen. Right. You know, you you look at the all the farmers in Northern Ireland, they've all got the best land. Even even to this day they still do. But if you look at the Catholics in uh Northern Ireland, they're kind of on the on the They dominate construction, don't they, now? They do, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:21

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And uh but so yeah, so you just think that the mindset of an engineer um i it starts off on a very simple basis that he or she thinks that, well, I have a problem here and um um I can tailor make a a situation here that'll solve my problem, but surely there's going to be other people thinking the same way. And uh you know, so um so you you m you moved on from that, Damien, and you so you took over your dad's business um autogen. And I remember you back in those days, you were like it was uh kind of had a description in my head of you of plane trains and automobiles, like you were right. You're flat out. I was, yeah. You know, you were very young. Yeah. Um success sometimes for young people is probably not such the best thing that sometimes success best comes slowly. Like what do you think of that?

SPEAKER_02 16:13

Well, I think that with 27 years of age, I I if I was to look back and s see one of the is one of the items that was an issue was I was too young. Because when I was going into the arena of selling large uh generators, I wasn't probably given the respect because I was too young. You know, you're trying to go into a boardroom table with men in their fifties when you're 27, trying to convince them that you can build uh usually case of Schwab as you know. Exactly. Yeah. So I moved out of the Ireland market and I went to Middle East.

SPEAKER_03 16:46

You went to the Middle East.

SPEAKER_02 16:47

Yeah, at the 30 years of age I was uh going into the Middle East and uh winning business and winning business in Kuwait and different places where where I where I I had seen the conglomerates uh were building generators but they were you know supplying them very expensively. Okay. And I could see how to break the product down into into different pieces and uh become more competitive, and that's how I won business in the Middle East.

SPEAKER_03 17:11

What was that like like for a 27-year-old guy?

SPEAKER_02 17:14

Well, 30 years of age it was pretty, you know. I just believed it. I kind of had a belief in my in my ability to sell stuff. And all operating at a coal island. All operating out of coal island, yeah. We we we took a contract out of the Middle East for 50, 500 KBS. It was an absolutely extraordinary order. Um yeah, it was it was, you know, you must have thought at that time, well, I've hit the jackpot here. Well, i it's not only that, I thought that I could get the business into a a serious production line of the same product.

SPEAKER_03 17:41

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:42

So I I had for the first four to five years I was bashing around making this and that and trying to service the market. Whatever the market needed, I would try to fit the gap. And over the period of time, five, six years, I started to see the business forming into serious production lines of the same product. And if I looked across at McCluskey and I looked across at others, McCluskey started his crushing and screening business tw 20 years after Power Screen. And he what I know about McCluskey's business, he it took him 14 years to get into manageable production lines with the same type of product. And I had I had remembered as a as a young man hearing from my uncle uh that there was a business school of thought in was it Harvard or Stanford in America, a guy called Michael Porter who said to start a business you should always be the second player. Meaning let the the first company pave the market. Right. And I had realized that McCluskey had kind of been the second player in the world markets to to Power Screen. And I had seen how he the Power Screen had paved the way of all the crushing and screening machines. I I see McCluskey becoming super successful as being the second dominant player in the market.

SPEAKER_03 18:57

But you said that took that took Pascal 14 years to get it up to scale. Because I see you do see that in Northern Ireland actually, where a lot of new companies come up come up out of the ground but they're gone just as quick. Because they can't seem to be able to migrate to that, and it's all to do with finance. Um so they can't migrate. So they're making a machine or two and they're making five or six of them. But in order to make that step up to the next bit of mass-producing stuff, it's a huge jump and it takes a long time, you're right.

SPEAKER_02 19:27

Well, I spent a lot of money in those four to five years on prototypes, and that sucked a lot of cash out of any money that I made in the first four to five years, which is very, very hard to make in the generative world, it it the cash that I had was put into prototypes because I had seen that if I build these prototypes, I could see the gap in the market that that I needed to serve, and I had to spend money to prove to the market and the customers that I had the right product, and I had sort of sort of understood where I was going. At some level, I understood where I was going, and I wanted to get to a place where I could start serious production lines. Okay. So that so the the the profitable business was in production lines and efficiencies.

SPEAKER_03 20:07

Well, I look I often thought about this, particularly back in those days for you, Damien. You had a homegrown market there. Uh you know, because you'd all these manufacturers, they're all making crushers and screeners, and all these machines were making it, did they needed engines to uh to power them. Like what happened with you there?

SPEAKER_02 20:28

Um what happened was again I sp I I I spent a lot of my energy designing machines that fitted the gaps in the market. Now bearing in mind I was playing in a market which you know there's hugely established businesses.

SPEAKER_03 20:44

So you said that that market there, because that market there, look, you see those machines, was it dominated by cat, by scan?

SPEAKER_02 20:51

Yeah, F. G. Wilson, Commons, Caterpillar, you know, and this small big beast to compete. Yeah, big beasts, but I had seen the gaps where they were not uh serving the market, and which I was serving the market quite well. Unfortunately, by the time my business started to mature, and it w really was maturing into a sort of a f a a place where I could get into Sears production lines, the financial crisis hit. Right. And we were in a position where we had spent a lot of money, we were leveraged a lot, and we had engines sitting in the factory floor which needed financed and we were doing business in the Middle East which is is letters of credit. So the the b you know, uh it's all finance. And so on the cusp of the of my business scaling into a massive organization the financial crisis hit and took the wind out of the business. Oh, absolutely, took the wind out of the business and stalled when you take the auction out of the room, it's very hard to breathe, right? So I so everything's became very hard to manage. All of the supply chain, all of the cash, paying customers and uh unfortunately when I looked Look, it's been a long time, Brian. It's been fifteen years. And it is probably one of the most painful and best experiences of my life.

SPEAKER_03 22:08

Right. And did did so you just go back to that crash then. So just before the crash, like where were you at your four and all cylinders?

SPEAKER_02 22:19

I had Commons Internet, Commons Engines, the biggest engine company in the world. We're speaking to di my company, Autogen. We were going to be getting up to 800 units a year to package for into containers. Because I had I had designed a container, a generator container.

SPEAKER_03 22:35

That's right, I remember that.

SPEAKER_02 22:36

Yeah, it's called it's called the power box. That's right. So you you you take the in the radiator off the engine and you put fans in the roof to cool the engine in 50 degrees ambient temperature.

SPEAKER_03 22:46

Why did you get the idea for that?

SPEAKER_02 22:48

Well I just copied. I just copied somebody else and I made it better. Right. All of my business uh put I've just copied every others. Yeah. I've seen how I can improve another person's product. Yeah. I've always had that eye like looking back on that board and seeing the two crushers and one of the drawings was.

SPEAKER_03 23:02

I can make that, I could, but I could do it better.

SPEAKER_02 23:03

I can there's something wrong, I can make it better. Right. That was my mindset.

SPEAKER_03 23:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

And I was foolish enough to to to go into it without any real experience of how much cash I needed. But I did it anyway.

SPEAKER_03 23:14

But did you you know if you look back at the history of businessmen, you know, and how they got started. And it's not some um like some flashlight went on and they were uniquely inspired. They would say to you, well, we just copied somebody else. Yeah. And uh we just said we can make that better.

SPEAKER_02 23:34

I don't do better. I I don't I don't have any problem saying that. Yeah. You know, because we're all just sort of emulating others really. You know, I look at the best businesses and I try to emulate them. And now I'm in a business where um I have a range of products which are, in my opinion, are top class.

SPEAKER_03 23:49

And and and no more so than Northern Ireland for that, where you have manufacturers because you look crushing and screener, in my head they're all pretty much the same. What do they do? They crush rock. One's green, one's blue, one's orange's orange. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:06

Yeah, they're all different colours.

SPEAKER_03 24:07

I haven't seen any I haven't seen any orange ones.

SPEAKER_02 24:09

There is orange ones, yeah. Finley. Yes. But they're orange men. No, that's a joke. That's okay. We we love them all. But uh this adopstad stuff. Is that Irish or is it German? Oh, uh that's a good one. I think that's it's not Irish anyway. I don't know. It could be German. But but but I'm trying to say to you, they're all more or less the same.

SPEAKER_03 24:28

I think so. Yeah. Yeah. I think so. It's like Pepsi and Coca-Cola, isn't it? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:32

I mean they're both black drinks.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

Right. So people are saying, well, my one's better than yours. They're more or less all the same. They're more or less all copied power screen. That's what I'm trying to say here. Yes. You know, and uh but you go into a lot of people and they say, Glick, what's your preference? What's your choice? Do you know? Most of them say to you, Well, look, you just if I'll have the money, I'll buy a power screen.

SPEAKER_02 24:55

Yeah, well, McCluskey built his Viper was uh the business before McCluskey. That's right. And Viper was known for Viper was I you I worked for Viper for a while. And uh I worked uh you know with Willie Doyle and he was uh the sales era sales guy in that era for for Viper and Viper was known as a very good sand machine. That's right, yeah but it wasn't actually known as a good robust crushing or uh lock screening machine. But what what McCluskey did he came in and he he he he he put that machine under st put steroids into it basically. He made it a strong, robust, and McCluskey's name was then beginning to get good reputation because it was a strong robust machine like the power screen. So it was the second alternative.

SPEAKER_03 25:40

So back to your to your um unit that you were making for transporting um the generators. What would you call them, Dora?

SPEAKER_02 25:49

Uh well it was it was a 1000 kva um one megawatt power box and what what what Cummins were doing in the UK were were sending engines into my small little factory in Northern Ireland and I was packaging them into power boxes. And they had um seen well I was the very first company one of the very first companies in Ireland to package generators for data centres. So I packaged uh what's it two seven two thousand seven hundred KVAs for Grange Castle data centre 18 years ago. My my. And the generators were 54 foot long, fourteen foot high, and twelve and a half foot wide.

SPEAKER_03 26:27

You must have thought at that time you're getting all this business of comments, I finally made it. It's you know what?

SPEAKER_02 26:34

I was what I was saying, 32 or 33. I it was a very tough time. Even though I was winning these contracts, I needed him to come into production lines.

SPEAKER_03 26:46

Because I remember you like when you were in your twenties, you were easily I could easily enough get hold of you, but as time moved on, yeah, like you had gotten so busy that it was it had gone bananas for you.

SPEAKER_02 27:00

Well, I was flying to China once and uh I was going through too many so many time zones. I I I I woke up in China one morning and I thought I woke woke up in Dulgan. I was get going, you know, I was going outside to get my car and I was I was in I was in China. And that's happen that's that's how that's how busy I was. I was extremely busy. I had 40 people working for me. Right. I was about 30 years of age, 32. And um what was that like?

SPEAKER_03 27:24

Did you ever say to yourself this is?

SPEAKER_02 27:25

It was chaotic. Yeah. My business was generators, and I got a phone call in the middle of the night that one generator blew up, you know, in from a quarry in Ireland. It was there was a lot of chaoticness in it. And and that's I needed to get past that chaoticness to production lines and more smoother operations. And I was when I look back, I was I was almost there.

SPEAKER_03 27:46

Like Pascal McCluskey, you know, he you were getting that phone call when somebody else in your company should have been getting it.

SPEAKER_02 27:51

Well I yeah, I was I what I needed to do was get the company into a structure, and I hadn't I was building prototypes and testing, and prototypes go wrong, and you know, things customers don't are not happy. And so there was a lot of sort of turmoil at times, you know, to try and get this business into a a sort of a production schedule business, but again, look the financial crisis came in and it seemed it seemed to be the worst time of my life then, but it it actually was a gift.

SPEAKER_03 28:20

I was just thinking that it was kind of a gift that listen to you there now that this is because it's so chaotic. Yeah. Um a lot of good stuff happening and uh exciting stuff, but um you were um doing a lot of good stuff, but it seems that you didn't have the background support.

SPEAKER_02 28:37

I did no guidance plan. See, my dad wasn't well, yeah, he wasn't around. There was no kind of mentors in my life. I was thinking this all up on my own, which is you know, that's just the way it was. And I often looked at other people and gone, oh well yeah, I can see that he he's surviving because he's got a father that has done it before him, or he's got an older brother, or there's a family support now.

SPEAKER_03 28:57

He's got that experience, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:58

Just my myself, uh in in what I was doing, it was um I was kind of the lone wolf, you know.

SPEAKER_03 29:05

What you were missing was a calm, steady hand in the background.

unknown 29:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:09

Yeah, I was trying to achieve too much too quick. Yeah, yeah. And I remember one of the lads working for me, Emmet, it was a great lad down at Taggard. He would kind of try to pull the reins back a bit. I was too eager and too um optimistic, I guess.

SPEAKER_03 29:22

Is people like you and me, Damien, say yes to everything. Probably that and give very little thought of how am I going to manage all of this. That's right. Yeah, yeah. So you hit the wall then. So the crash came when for you in 2008.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

I think 2010, it took me about uh two years to wrap the business up, take all the balloons down, all the plate plates were spinning. It took about two years to wrap that business up, and then it took another oh six, seven years to pay all my debts. I didn't actually go bankrupt. And in hindsight, I probably should have. But I sat down and I paid them all the local guys.

SPEAKER_03 29:56

And it took a noble thing to do.

SPEAKER_02 29:58

Well, I I feel I feel it was I had a choice and some someone appeared in my life that helped me to make that choice. And the choice was to actually do the honest thing or to do something that, you know, wasn't kind of totally honest. And I decided to try to do the honest thing by paying back the all the people that kind of were owed money during that crisis of uh money being the banks closing closing down the business. And it took me about seven years uh to but but you know, at the end of all of that I I I there's I don't look over my shoulder, I can face anyone in the eye and I can uh be proud of what happened, even though it was kind of at that time it perceived to be very shameful what happened. You know, losing a business. And especially that there's no shame in that. Well, there's no shame in it, but you know, if you if you lose if you experience it yourself, you can be perceived by the community as losing.

SPEAKER_03 30:59

A failure.

SPEAKER_02 30:59

A failure. Right.

SPEAKER_03 31:00

And that I I had to The Irish don't do failure though, do we? Well, I I think the real success story is somebody who fail who like their business crashes and stuff, you know, they they they they're flat out and they've no work and they've no money, but they get started up again.

SPEAKER_02 31:15

Yeah, it's a funny thing, isn't it? When you get it's when you're in when you're in the experience, this the voices come into your head that you've that you're a failure. Yes. You have to try and do the right thing and the right thing commits. Well the right thing for me to do was to to quell those uh demons of failure is to actually sit and look at the person in the in the eye and say, I'd pay you back.

SPEAKER_03 31:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:35

So that's how I kind of I say, you know, out of the emblems of the ashes, I I was able to meet all of those people over a period of time and pay them back. Okay. And that allowed me, I guess, to move into the next chapter of my life. Right. And that and I remember someone said to me, you know, Damon, if if you if you do this again, you probably want to not do the manufacturing yourself. Yeah, of course, yeah. And it kind of stuck with me, you know. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 32:00

It's it's I like because I remember like we we look um I recently met you, I hadn't seen you for a long time and I ran into you there. I didn't know where I ran into you, but I ran into you somewhere. And when I saw you, I said, by the way, I'm doing this thing, will you do it? And you said yes. But um uh look you've done like your story, Damien, is inspiring to me because you went through that experience and you've you've told, you've shared with me personally like the the implications and personally for you and what you went through. But I like you've moved on to to newer things and uh new um new opportunities. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 32:40

I mean that experience uh was as I said earlier, it was quite a tough experience um for for a period of my life. Uh I was actually I'll tell a little story if you might if you mind, if you don't mind. I actually remember the very last day of that business. My I remember my sister calling me and saying, Damien, we don't have money to pay the wages. And it was a kind of a Wednesday. What was that like? And well it was very scary. And I picked the phone up and I I sold my Jeep to a fella and I got a bag of cash off him. And I was able to hand it to my sister and go in and pay the lads on Friday and and and they and tell them that there was no job on Monday. This is the last uh salary, just salary. Yeah, and it was very it was very interesting how that I picked up the phone and got that cheap sold and got the cash and was able to walk in and pay the lads that worked for me for all those years and uh say our goodbyes basically. So I was very grateful that I could actually meet all those fellas and pay their wages, you know. Because that was for me, that was one of the most important things was to be able to pay those fellas that worked for me. And then I went, I remember I got a I got the train to Dublin and I went on the double. My my I know.

SPEAKER_03 34:00

Because if you don't mind me saying, I now like like a lot of lads who do well in business, there's a certain lifestyle that goes with that, you know, and there's the you know um you know, it's the holidays, it's the Jeeps, it's the places we live, um, all of that. And you know, to do I don't say you get used to that, but um it it must have been a come down for you.

SPEAKER_02 34:29

So um yeah, I was a young man, I was uh, you know, living trying to trying to live a dream about having an international business. Um and here I was then a few years on going on the dole. Uh it was very humiliating. Um but there was something about the whole experience that I guess that needed to happen. Right. Um when I look back I I learned a lesson that's it's for granted. You know, I took the risk um and maybe took too many risks by building too many prototypes and putting too much cash out. So I what I really learned, I guess, was cash is king. Protect your cash. If you make money, protect it. Spend it wisely, don't spend it all.

SPEAKER_03 35:16

There'd be plenty of lads willing to tell you how you should invest it and well well you know, what I learned was I business is fun fund when you get business up and running a little bit, you need to protect your cash flow.

SPEAKER_02 35:29

And I had no reserves um back in AutoGen. And because of all the prototypes and my crazy ambition to build these uh really fascinating products that fill the gaps in the market. Right. But because I was young, I probably didn't have the experience of how to manage cash and preserve it. And now I know I know this in my core. The first thing I do is protect the cash before I build prototypes.

SPEAKER_03 35:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:57

So that that's what I learned.

SPEAKER_03 35:58

We all need that. We all need that person in the background saying no, you can't do that. Exactly. Yeah, or no, that's too much of a stretch, or you're taking a risk there. No step back and uh but so you're you're you're now so you went through all of that and um you uh you get started again. So I saw you recently there with DIMAC. Yeah. What's what's DIMAC?

SPEAKER_02 36:23

DIMAC is well the name DIMAC is it was was going to be DMAC, as in Damien Mac Cabe, right? So I couldn't get the E so I used the Y in the letter Y, so DIMAC is kind of my name in a Did you think about that name in the pub? Um You know what I'll be honest with you. You know what one of the Were you watching the darts or something, didn't it? Well uh it's a good question because it actually was Dyson can be a global business. Why can't and you know what? It's I know you're laughing, but I actually thought hard and well about that name. Is it a strong name? Does it roll off the tongue well? If you look at Dyson, it's a very strong brand because it comes off the tongue very strongly. Okay. And DyMac was I said that's it. Right. Because it's all it sounds like Dyson. And if you look if if you if that name is so easy to roll off the tongue, it can be remembered.

SPEAKER_03 37:17

It's it's it's sometimes very simple, isn't it? Because uh last year um um and I I know I'm gonna go to Farrell slags on Chris Moore now for saying this. Chris Moore runs the executive horror show in the UK. I know Chris, yeah. We we we run the CQMS show for all its trials and tribulations, it can be very difficult and wicked stressful. But Chris came over to CQMS last year and he said um he says, We're thinking of doing a rent show in Ireland, and uh he says, uh you need to get your skates on, he said to me. And I because there's been people here in Ireland been asking me to do it for years. Yeah, friends uh like here that I have here, Rory O'Connor, Brian Conney, you know, ex um managing director of Swan Plant were saying to me, you need to get on with lads in 3DR. So I I it was slow, the slow burner, but I sat down one night after Chris kind of gave me the nudge and just the name just came like that, Higherland. Brilliant. Do you know? It's a good name. I have to say it's a very and it's catchy and it comes off the tongue. Yeah. It does Higeland. So and but a couple of people said to me, You obviously thought of that in the pub. No, there's nothing that don't know us very well. If you work with plant or heavy machinery, you know how important proper training and safety and compliance are. That's where AM Site Solutions comes in. Their team provides top quality, accredited training, side audits, and safety advisory services, all tailored to the construction and machinery moving industries. I've seen firsthand how professional they are, helping crews stay compliant, confident, and safe on site. So if you want peace of mind, knowing your people and equipment are covered, including GA1 certification for plant and lifting equipment, head over to amsite solutions.com. AM Site Solutions, your partner in safety, compliance and confidence on site. Right. So you um so you're back up and running now with IMAC. Yeah. And uh from what I see, Damien, there is uh some of the old stuff, the experience and it's gener it's power-based, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 39:19

Well, what I did, Brian, was back in my auto gen days, I had developed a fuel tank, storage, a fuel storage tank to uh to complement the generators um back in auto gen.

SPEAKER_03 39:32

What did you call that at the time?

SPEAKER_02 39:33

Well that was auto auto tank, yes. Uh so auto tank was a business where I was selling fuel tanks into the Australian market.

SPEAKER_03 39:40

Right.

SPEAKER_02 39:41

I was building them in China and selling them into Australia. And it was outsourcing manufacturing, outsourcing my designs that I had created in auto gen prototypes, you know. And I got a nice contract in Australia, I was it probably up to a thousand tanks a year.

SPEAKER_03 40:00

Oh it's so obviously your mindset had changed, you know, that I will I I will create, I would design it, but I'll give it to the Chinese to manufacture.

SPEAKER_02 40:09

Well, I I I met a guy way back in the early noughties, and he was a young man as well, and uh Jack is his English name, and Jack and I have been in business now for over 20 years.

SPEAKER_03 40:25

Um there was a period of time where obviously I stopped with Jack and uh Me and you, Gary, we need to meet the equivalent of the Jack, don't we? We need to meet a Jack, yeah, yeah, to make shit for us and become rich and successful like Damien.

SPEAKER_02 40:38

Well, um I'm not there yet, but I'm getting there. Um so anyway, you know, uh for for me, I was I was um McCluskey gave me a job and I was selling I was an international sales guy for McCluskey, and I was I was getting well paid again, and I was selling a lot of good stuff for McCluskey, and I was trying to introduce my products to Mc to Pascal, like generators and fuel tanks as well. I thought, yeah, I thought to myself, you know what, Pascal needs to expand his range, he needs to get out of, he needs to move beyond crushing screeners, he needs to have a this is my thing, and I'm doing this all in my head. I don't know what's going on in Pascal's head. Yeah, but here's me, right? He needs to be a matlas copco. He needs to expand his product range, and I introduce generators and fuel tanks. And and Pascal wasn't um saying no to it. He was open to it. He was open to it. Yeah. So I said, right, okay, Pascal's my Pascal's my uh man to get these products um up out of the ground, you know. You're a cute hoo, yeah. And well, you know what, he uh doing my stealth one day Pascal woke up and whatever was going on with Pascal's life, he probably was thinking about selling his business. I don't know what was going on. He had enough. Well, he had enough, and so that kind of put that to the back burner. And I had a few sales here and there.

SPEAKER_03 41:51

You you went to America, did you?

SPEAKER_02 41:53

Canada.

SPEAKER_03 41:54

Yeah, Canada.

SPEAKER_02 41:55

But I sold all over the world for Pascal. I went to Australia and Middle East and Dubai and in America, and I sold all products all over the world, flew into Australia and came back with a deal for half a million and stuff. I was good at it. You enjoyed that? Well, it was good, I was good at it. It was tough work. And one day, obviously, Pascal went in a different direction. Obviously, he's a very successful man. So I thought I kind of thought, right, do I hang on here or do I just take the risk again? And it was it was a it was another risk. I said, you know what? I had to put my on the block again, you know. And I've decided, and it it was a fucking major risk. I had a young baby, she's one year of age, had a wife, and we moved into a house in South Dublin, and I needed to pay the bills, and I got an order from Canada, and it made me so many thousand, and it I said that's gonna last me for two to three months, right? And I started again. The wheels are turning again. I started again. I only had a few quid that last me for two to three months.

SPEAKER_03 42:50

But it's thinking we didn't notice Damienya. It's like you're never going to do anything else. Not at all. Like you could maybe work for PowerScreen or work for somebody else. That's only a stop game.

SPEAKER_02 43:00

No, but they all tried own me and I couldn't I couldn't be owned. I just couldn't. I couldn't be owned. I but I'm looking at Pascal and I'm going, if he can do it, I can do it.

SPEAKER_03 43:08

Right.

SPEAKER_02 43:08

You know, if that's why it's I'm not going to be, you know, I I couldn't be tied down. Right. If if if if if I was going to stay with Pascal, it would have to be in a little bit. I know like you know how successful he was, but it had to be some sort of a partnership. You know.

SPEAKER_03 43:24

Um because I couldn't I I admire Pascal actually because and I'll tell you why. He uh took him a while to go on. He got going, yeah, making a a fantastic product. But he knew when to get out. Well he did. Yeah. And that's commendable. And he's got out. And uh anytime I met Pascal, very understated. Yeah. You know, very little flash. That's right. Uh sort of I I quietly reserved, but a decent skin. Yeah, I think so. And uh he was very switched on because I remember we were doing CQMS, start the first CQMS. He called me, he says to run the money there, he says. Prolong, he's a this long over two. And he said uh me and my dealer, which was Alan Fallon at the time, Dunk Alan Plant, he says we'll be very happy to promote and support you with this show. And he did, he true to his word. And Pascal would have been a very busy man, but he came to see QMS, he made sure that he was there.

SPEAKER_02 44:18

So Pascal started with Viper and he ran that uh for a lot of years and he increased that single machine or two or three machines, he just increased them. And then what I seen Pascal doing was developing other products to sell into the same customer base.

SPEAKER_03 44:37

So that's right.

SPEAKER_02 44:39

Well no one ever told me how to grow a business. And no one ever said to me, Well, look, here's the blueprint, and if you do X, Y, and Z you can you can get to the tour you want to get to. All I all I did was I looked at the likes of Pascals of this world and thought, well, how did he scale? How did his business actually scale? How did he get from zero to two hundred and seventy-nine million? Because that's a lot of growth in a short period of time. And what I kind of seen by just looking um and observing and not asking anyone, just observing that business model. And I thought, well, what he's what he's done well is he has tapped into the dealers that other possible dealers that will be competing against PowerScreen, and he sold the first entry product, which was the screener, the soft sand screener. And then what happened from there on, in my understanding, was he created pot products that sold into the same customer base. So it was the same customer not buying one machine, it was the same customer buying ten machines. Yeah. So I I kind of modelled my own.

SPEAKER_03 45:39

That's right. So you can go into a quarry, you see that the quarry has a line of products, you know, from the crusher to the screener to the stacker.

SPEAKER_02 45:47

Well, it's hard to find new customers all the time, Brian. So if you have one custom if you have one customer and he can become successful selling many of the same products, then that so I entered back into DIMAC with the fuel tank. The fuel tank was a very soft entry product for an unknown like DIMAC. So I could gain trust by selling the fuel tank into the markets. And then, and I'm still doing it, I'm adding on the power products, I'm adding on the battery energy storage systems, I'm adding on this and that, and I'm developing my product range and scaling it out, but selling to the same customer base. But I'm I've now farmed out all my products. I've got three factories in China building for me, and I've one factory in India building for me. And I've got 25 engineers working for me in India that design all my products. So yeah, so it's it's it's pretty exciting times, you know.

SPEAKER_03 46:38

Right, right. And so you you're have you moved away from the diesel-powered stuff where you're moving it solar as well.

SPEAKER_02 46:46

My tagline is um integrated products that provide a carbon reduction ecosystem. So I have clean fuel storage tanks that um fuel and provide fluids to a stage five generator.

SPEAKER_03 47:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 47:03

And then this generator charges batteries, energy storage systems, and I've got a solar energy frame. So when I integrate all those products into one ecosystem, they reduce carbon on a building site.

SPEAKER_03 47:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 47:14

So it's a very exciting time. I'm I I I kind of find myself being on the curve of the upward market in low carbon producing products. Previously, I was in my business moving into an area where there was a lot of conglomerates already established. I'm now in an area business is about timing. And I feel like I'm on the right my business is now positioned to the right timing of the markets. So we were we're on an upward upward curve as far as reducing carbon in our planet and products that I am, the product ranges that I'm in, provide that carbon reduction answer to building sites. So I feel it's very exciting times actually. And how's it going? Brilliant. It really is brilliant.

SPEAKER_03 47:59

What's the key change that you've made now? Is it outsourcing the manufacturing?

SPEAKER_02 48:02

Well, maturity is number one. Okay. I've grown up a bit, I've grown up a bit, and I protect my cash.

SPEAKER_03 48:08

Okay. And uh I But no, obviously outsourcing the manufacturing.

SPEAKER_02 48:11

I outsource manufacturing, but I have a design team in India. Right. Don't tell too many people, right?

SPEAKER_03 48:17

But that's no, I know.

SPEAKER_02 48:18

I'm joking, I'm joking. But that's the key. For me, it was like having those engineers, right? Really highly qualified engineers in in my DIMAC engineering business in India, which I own, and they are every day, all day designing, developing, and producing drawings for factories that we are going to bring to the markets. We've got a line of products in the background still coming to the markets.

SPEAKER_03 48:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 48:40

Um so maybe I have this idea that I can be the Atlas Copco of the world someday. Maybe I'm still a little bit naive there, but Right, okay.

SPEAKER_03 48:48

But I enjoy the And what what's the so how long are you on the go now again? Ten years. You're back, you're back for ten years.

SPEAKER_02 48:55

Ten years, where where did it go? 2016. Um it's gone well for you. It's it's gone it's gone really well. Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 49:03

And look, so I've obviously I met you in England. Yeah. Um I met you at different trade shows in England. Um how's that going for you? What type of customer are you dealing with in these?

SPEAKER_02 49:13

I'm dealing with uh actually, you know, if you're not, in my understanding, if you're not involved with the top ten rental firms in the world, you're outside the you're outside the arena where you want to be, in my opinion. So I am now um Who's your customer? Sunbelt Rentals. Okay. United Rentals, the biggest rental companies in the world. Tier one contractors? Uh well, not really, Brian. I would be selling to the biggest rental companies in the world, around the world.

SPEAKER_03 49:38

Why not tier one contractors?

SPEAKER_02 49:39

Because they they hire to tier one contractors. Right, okay. You know, I I still sell to a contractor or or a construction company if they come knocking, but it isn't my go-to market, my business model. My business model is I sell to large uh also I sell to dealers. I have a dealer in Italy, a dealer in France, I have a dealer in Middle East, in in Saudi Arabia, I have a dealer in Canada, a dealer in America, and they then sell my products to the rental companies in their countries. My mind. Which is yeah, it's just fascinating. And I I I you know I I I feel like I'm only getting started. Right. Truth be told, I feel like I'm only getting started.

SPEAKER_03 50:15

And l like that that's a fair amount of success coming from where you've come from and Tyrone. Um taking over your dad's business at you know, in your twenties and going through that kind of shock therapy treatment um when it all went south for you, and to come back from that.

SPEAKER_02 50:32

My brain doesn't stop. I I I just keep I'm designing in my head all the time. Do you switch off? Well, switching off for me is being in my head designing. You know, that's that's my it's my creative time. Right, okay. You know, I'm like, can I get this and can I do that? And can I get this product? You know, but when you're at home now, do you switch on? Like, what do you Oh yeah, it's it's uh with my family at the weekend it's switch off. I'm very much uh present in my family life. You turn the switch off. Yeah, it's it's I don't know where that came from, but the switch has been found. I found it on Saturday evening. So excuse me, I found the switch on a Friday night. Right, right. And I and the switch turns back on the Monday morning. Okay. That's important. It's unbelievable actually. Yeah. Because I you know, previously I didn't know how to do that.

SPEAKER_03 51:15

Right, yeah. And sometimes that can be a failing, you know. I think so. Yeah. So you're trying to do too much and it gets all chaotic and uh it falls asunder. Yeah. Because there's no time for the other things that we should be doing.

SPEAKER_02 51:28

Yeah, it's important, I think, to balance nowadays for me my my uh family life with you know to be present actually. You can be in your family but not present, right?

SPEAKER_03 51:36

Yeah, well you see look, you know, you people can say, you know, about such and such a person, he was a great businessman. But that to me, um if you're not available to your wife and your kids, you're an absolute failure.

SPEAKER_02 51:49

Well, look, business is one thing, but the probably the most important thing in anybody's life is family.

SPEAKER_03 51:53

Yeah, and it is for me brands in soccer, are you bringing them to football, are you going swimming with them, are you listening to their tantrums and uh do you know, being there for them? That's and I suppose my own background, uh my own father, um he worked all the time.

SPEAKER_02 52:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:09

And all the time. And like my old man died when he was sixty, so do you know he had and it's not that he didn't want to have time for us, he didn't have time for us. Yeah. And uh his work was you know, and he felt he had to do that. But it's like it's definitely changed, do you know, that we have to be available to the family first.

SPEAKER_02 52:27

Yeah. And uh Well my wife is uh my wife is the financial controller of my business and she is extraordinarily good at her job. Right. You know, she said to me if she didn't come into m into working with me that she'd probably be in in the area of forensic uh accountancy. Right. Because like she'd call me up and go, uh Damien, did you know that the banks um charge 10 euros for um you know, because I said, Lona, uh I don't know if we're gonna actually need to worry about that. Ten euros. But that's she keeps an eye on it. But that's how that's how detailed she is, you know.

SPEAKER_03 53:02

I would say, David, that's probably not a good, not a bad thing.

SPEAKER_02 53:05

No, it's absolutely fabulous, but that's how that's that's how detailed she is. And what happened to me, I guess, previously was I didn't have that real control over my finances. Right. So to have someone in the business like like her, like my wife, it's absolutely extraordinarily benefit beneficial to be able to look after after my finances and to present to me a cash flow of the next six months. Right. I never had that previously, now I have it. So I can see how much I can spend and not spend.

SPEAKER_03 53:33

Okay. You know. What's the plans for this? You know, I know we're early into it, but um you'll have uh are you doing the hill ahead?

SPEAKER_02 53:40

We're doing Higher Land, obviously, Brian. And we're doing um plant works, actually that's 2027. I just signed it off last week. We're doing a show in the Netherlands, and um I think we're looking at the end of the year to see what we do. I I'm trying to get to at least four to five exhibitions a year now.

SPEAKER_03 53:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 53:57

Um I w yeah, because we we need to stay ahead of the getting our brand out there, you know.

SPEAKER_03 54:02

Yeah, Bama would that comes up. I was at Bama, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:05

Yeah, and we we got an Italian dealer out of my Con Expo? I was at Con Expo. Well see, uh I have a dealer in I had DIMAC USA opened. Okay. And because we appointed MultiQuip, it's a very large company. That's right, yeah. Uh so we we kind of left the Americ we have agreed to leave the American market to them. So they've been to the ARA, they've been they're going to Con Expo and they're exhibiting the DIMAC products. Okay. So they're tied in with me uh for the American market. So you won't see DIMAC at the stand, but you see multi quips stand with DIMAC products on it.

SPEAKER_03 54:39

Yeah. Okay. Well, listen, it's a phenomenal story, Damien. It's great to talk to you and thanks for coming in. I know you're very busy, and I was delighted to run into you when I ran into you. And it's like I said to you, it's always great to see somebody who has come back from getting the crap kicked out of them and getting stuck back into it for plenty of work. Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_02 54:57

Thank you. Cheers. Cheers.