Munster Joinery founder dies

PATRICK (Paddy) Ring — who along with his brother, Donal, helped build up an operation that has become the country’s biggest manufacturer of windows and doors — has died.

Mr Ring, 59, had been ill for a short time.

In 1973, the Ring brothers started their joinery business in a small shed next to their family home at Lacca Cross, about 4km from Ballydesmond, in Co Cork.

The shed has long since disappeared and in its place is the sprawling multimillion-euro Munster Joinery plant that supplies doors and windows countrywide.

At the peak of the building boom, more than 1,000 people were employed in the factory, with employees from north-west Cork, east Kerry and west Limerick, and several hundred from overseas, mainly eastern European countries.

Munster Joinery has also expanded overseas.

“Paddy made a major contribution to the creation of industrial jobs in this area which, traditionally, had high emigration and very little of that type of employment. He was also well liked and respected as a person,” a local community activist said yesterday.

Mr Ring is survived by his wife Maureen and daughters Elizabeth, Noreen and Marie.