Born July 4th, 1958
Died August 27th, 2024
Frank Hayes, the former director of corporate affairs at Kerry Group, has died following a short illness at the age of 66.
Even though he stood down from his role as director of corporate affairs in 2018 and from Kerry Group in 2020, he remained a highly popular figure within the company.
Hayes worked as a food and agricultural attaché at the Irish embassy in London in 1991, when he met Denis Brosnan, the then chief executive of Kerry Group. At the time the company was at the embryonic stage of a highly ambitious global expansion strategy.
Brosnan was looking to recruit key members for the management team. He offered Hayes the new role of director of corporate affairs. Hayes didn’t hesitate and relocated to Tralee in the same year.
The agri-food business was formed in 1972 as a co-op and became a public limited company when it floated on the Irish Stock Exchange in 1986 as the Kerry Group. It made its first US acquisition in 1988 and its second in 1991. Hayes quickly developed a close relationship with Brosnan. Indeed, he would remain a trusted adviser to three subsequent chief executives: Hugh Friel, Stan McCarthy and Edmond Scanlon.
Colleagues described him as being unflappable under pressure, generous with his time, and always the consummate professional. He steered the global communications strategy from his office in Tralee with a calm efficiency.
From relatively humble beginnings when he joined the company, Kerry Group had revenues of €7 billion; operations in 23 countries and a workforce of 26,000 employees when he left in 2020.
Paying tribute to Hayes following the announcement of his death, Edmond Scanlon, chief executive of Kerry Group, said: “Frank played an integral part in developing and communicating the Kerry story across his almost 30 years of service from 1991 to his retirement from the business in 2020. Frank was responsible for shaping Kerry’s public identity during pivotal years, and we are very grateful that a Galway man wore the Kerry jersey so passionately.”
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One of the first sponsorship deals he signed in 1991 was with Kerry GAA. Indeed, such was his unstinting support for the organisation, it came as a surprise to many when they met him for the first time that he was actually from Galway. “He was a truly great friend of Kerry GAA, always honourable and courteous in our dealings with him and his meticulous planning of post All-Ireland functions was legendary,” Kerry GAA said in a statement following his death.
Francis Hayes was born outside Loughrea in 1958 to parents Tony and Una, one of nine children. His younger sister Elizabeth died during infancy.
Hayes went to the local national school and boarded at Casltemartyr College in Cork for his secondary education. He joined the Department of Agriculture following an agricultural science degree at UCD. From there, he took a secondment to the Department of Foreign Affairs to become an attaché at the London Embassy.
It didn’t take Hayes long to settle in Tralee, which would become his home for almost 30 years. He became the face of the Kerry Group and deepened ties between the company and local community. As well as the GAA, Kerry Group supported many charitable causes and organisations throughout the county, including the Rose of Tralee Festival, Listowel Writers’ Week and the Kerry Community Games.
One former acquaintance says that long before companies started taking the concept of corporate social responsibility seriously, it was integral to how Hayes approached his job. He was popular with the local and national media. One journalist who had many dealings with him over the years described him as a “gent, with old-school values but never out of touch. He would always go out of his way to help.”
He became part of the social fabric of Tralee and developed many close friendships, particularly with past and present Kerry footballers, including Eoin Liston, Mikey Sheehy and Ger Power. He is a former board member of An Bord Bia, Siamsa Tíre and the Crawford Art Gallery Cork. In 2022, he joined the board of Coillte, the State forestry company.
However, his main passion in life was his family. He was married to Gráinne and they had six children together.
Hayes and his wife moved back to his native Galway in 2020. It was there he was recently diagnosed with cancer. “He remained very optimistic and he fought it as best he could for as long as he could. He never complained,” his funeral Mass heard. “He was a truly gifted and talented individual who was denied the years of retirement, a good 20 years ahead, he had hoped for, by being taken much too soon from us.”
Among the gifts brought to the altar included Galway and Kerry football jerseys as a sign of his deep love of the GAA.
He is survived by Gráinne, their children Tony, Anna, John, Joseph, Conor and Emily, three sisters and three brothers, and a wide circle of family and friends.