Irish business, made practical.
Down To Business treats business as something that shows up in streets, shops, tax figures, bridal boutiques, fuel terminals, and business panels. Bobby Kerr steers brisk conversations with journalists, founders, economists, and specialists toward useful takeaways rather than polished theory.
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Down To Business is a lively Irish business programme built around conversation, not lecture. Bobby Kerr keeps the pace moving with short questions, follow-ups, and practical resets. The result is a show that can move from front-page economics to the inside of a bridal boutique without sounding as if it has changed mission. It is interested in business as lived experience. A fuel crisis becomes a discussion about diesel costs, contracts, surcharges, protests, and who gets exposed when prices jump. Tax figures become a way to talk about Ireland’s dependence on multinational profits, consumer demand, data centres, technology companies, and pharmaceutical investment. Founder interviews bring the scale down again. Louise Whelan’s career story runs through family work, banking, accounts, children, and the homecare business she built. Industry reviews give smaller operators proper airtime. Bridal service owners talk about consultations, social media, client pressure, dress choices, makeup trials, and the reality that a wedding business has to manage families as well as brides. On-location pieces add retail texture, as with Sisterly in Brown Thomas and the pitch for a simple women’s supplement. The show is not confined to balance sheets. Leadership development, AI, human connection, and Artemis II can enter the conversation when there is a business, technology, or decision-making angle. Its strongest habit is translation. Big stories are pulled back toward costs, customers, work, risk, and ordinary judgment. The tone is warm but alert. Guests get room to explain, while the questioning keeps nudging them toward something listeners can use.
Made for: For listeners who want Irish business stories, founder stories, and market context without jargon or boardroom theatre. It suits people who like practical examples more than abstract commentary.
What sets it apart: The show pairs business-roundup urgency with close-up conversations from real sectors, so national economics and everyday enterprise sit in the same frame. It is broad, brisk, and unusually grounded in how business actually works.
Join Bobby Kerr for Ireland's premier business show covering all enterprise-related topics from personal finance to business news. CONVERSATION THAT COUNTS | Ireland’s national independent talk station for news, sport, analysis and entertainment Listen to Newstalk at http://newstalk.com/listenlive | Download the GoLoud app now, the new home for Newstalk
Based on 5 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Bobby Kerr connects Irish economic news with the practical choices facing business owners across sharply different industries.
Bobby Kerr moves between headline economics and the mechanics of running a business, asking guests to connect large forces with their practical consequences.
Tax receipts meet Christmas chocolate, and Bobby Kerr makes room for both on your business radar.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A brisk Saturday roundup of Ireland’s tax strength, U.S. dependence, and Trump-shaped political weather.
This segment uses its Saturday roundup format well, with Valerie Cox and John Isle giving the week’s main business stories a clear, fast-moving shape.
A practical look at a bridal market shaped by trust, timing and too many opinions in one room.
Down To Business gives its industry review to the Irish bridal sector, a market that runs on reputation, precision and trust. It is at its strongest when it stays practical, with Mairead Kennedy, Marina Hogan and Yvonne Marr talking through the shape of a consultation: starting…
Energy use, tourism pressure, derelict property, and a blunt warning on exit.
Down To Business spends the hour on the pressure points beneath everyday business talk: energy use, tourism, hospitality spending, derelict property, and the politics of exit.
A Christmas dinner roundtable where dessert opens up questions of cost, planning, and making good use of what is already there.
Down To Business frames Christmas dinner as more than a meal, treating it as a small business case in planning, taste, manners, and waste. With a master of wine, a chef and author, a pastry sous chef, and an etiquette expert around the table, the episode finds its best texture…
A grounded look at trust, consultations and preparation in Ireland's bridal business.
Ireland's bridal trade comes through as a reputation-led service market where precision and trust matter as much as taste. With Mairead Kennedy, Marina Hogan and Yvonne Marr on the panel, the discussion stays close to daily practice: Kennedy's route from a family convenience…
Short-term rental lessons from the operator side.
Bobby Kerr hosts a panel of experts to review the business of Christmas dinner.
Host Bobby Kerr reviews the Irish bridal sector with three business owners: Mairead Kennedy of MK Bridal, Marina Hogan of Stylicious Hair and Makeup, and Yvonne Marr of Makeup by Yvonne.
This episode discusses the breaking news about Trump's plans for a 10% global tariff following a Supreme Court ruling that he exceeded his authority, featuring analysis from business editors and an economist.
Francis Fitzgibbon says Ireland’s €22.7 billion in nine-month corporation-tax receipts includes payments multinationals brought forward, potentially weakening November and December figures.
Neven Maguire’s One Pan Wins collects 100 one-pan recipes that aim to reduce washing-up, time, and energy use.
Bobby Kerr, Ronan Reid, and Linda Daly review Irish business stories including a £1.2 billion bid backed by Eamon Rothwell to take Irish Continental Group private.
Down To Business examines Ireland's solar expansion from fewer than 10,000 residential systems in 2020 to 190,000 today.
July 4th opens with the U.S.
Louise Whelan discusses her background growing up in a nursing home family business, her career journey from banking to entrepreneurship, and the founding of Pioneer Homecare.
This episode features an interview with Clare Brumby, author of 'Forget Normal, I Want Magic', discussing the importance of human connection and emotional leadership in an AI-driven business world.
Space commentator Leo Enright discusses the significance of NASA's Artemis 2 mission, which safely returned astronauts from a lunar journey for the first time in over 50 years.
This episode features interviews with a personal shopper and the founders of Sisterly, a female-led supplement brand, discussing its benefits and launch at Brown Thomas.
This episode discusses the ongoing fuel crisis in Ireland, featuring analysis from a business panel on government responses, protests, and potential resolutions.
The host turns this Industry Review to the Irish bridal sector.
Energy use is the opener.
A panel of real estate experts discusses Ireland's current housing market challenges, focusing on supply issues, price trends, and advice for first-time buyers.
David McWilliams links the 1974 oil shock, Zaire, and George Foreman–Muhammad Ali to today’s $130-a-barrel market.
This episode explores Ireland's coffee sector through interviews with industry professionals, focusing on the engineering, operations, and technology behind coffee delivery and machine maintenance that customers rarely see.
This episode reviews the horse racing industry in Ireland, examining its performance from funding, attendance, international success, and grassroots sustainability perspectives.
This episode discusses the business implications of a US Supreme Court ruling that President Trump exceeded his authority on tariffs, with analysis from economists and business editors.