Mitchelstown Flower & Garden Club are presenting a Floral Demonstration with Teresa Collins on Thursday, April 30, in the Town Hall at 8pm. Everyone welcome.

With a merger of Kraft and Heinz expected soon, entrepreneur-led food firms are wide-eyed with optimism for the future, writes Kyran Fitzgerald.

The Cork artisan food firm sold by hot-pot millionaires Cully & Sully is aiming to increase sales by around 16% this year.

Coca-Cola has held on to its position as the biggest selling brand in the Irish grocery market for 10 years, according to the latest Checkout Top 100 Brands report, produced by Checkout magazine in association with Nielsen.

The Cork artisan food firm sold by Cully & Sully to a US organic products group increased its accumulated profits by over €2.15 million last year.

The determination to succeed was summed up by world champion in the 50km walk Rob Heffernan who received a standing ovation from the delegates at the Offsite business conference in Rosscarbery.

Coke is still it, at least as far as Irish consumers are concerned as a new list of the best-selling brands in the country shows Coca Cola is the most popular.

Some of the leading lights of corporate twitterati gathered at UCC yesterday to discuss the most effective methods of representing a company in the networked world.

A 32% rise in the value of merger and acquisition activity in the Irish food and beverage sector, to €726m, was recorded in 2012.

Celebrity chef Rachel Allen yesterday told young people to trust their instincts if they wanted to be successful in business.

Hot-pot millionaires Cully & Sully are set to launch their products in the US next year where they believe the potential is “colossal”.

Over the last decade, Cullen Allen and Colum O’Sullivan have been through it all: the idea, the start-up, the research, the early days, the success, the expansion, and most recently the sale of their company.

Cully & Sully, the Cork-based artisan food producer, has been bought by an American company in a move which will allow the brand to expand internationally.

Irish company Cully and Sully has been sold to US natural foods company Hain Celestial for an undisclosed sum.

OPTIMISM was the order of the day for the 24-hour Sleepless in Garryvoe Entrepreneur Experience workshop in Cork over the weekend.

WEST Cork food producer Caherbeg Free Range Pork has just won a highly respected French award for its Rosscarbery Recipes White Pudding range.

THEY have been hailed as perfect examples of how Ireland can survive and beat the recession.

A BUSINESS Boot Camp will see 600 students from Kerry and Limerick put their ideas to the test in front of a panel of leading Irish entrepreneurs and business people, as part of the annual Young Entrepreneur Programme and Awards.

Every Saturday during November there is a ‘Fruit Clinic’ from 11am to 4pm at the Country Choice Shop where you can discuss anything about raisins, sultanas and currants. For people baking their first Christmas cake take your list for the best guidance and advice about exact quantities of fruit. www.countrychoice.ie