The first watch Ruairi Phelan ever made, he did so using an old wetsuit of his. “It’s water resistant and stainless steel so I was wearing it everywhere I went, out surfing and everything, and people kept asking me ‘Where did you get that? Can I get one somewhere?’ That’s how I started selling them.”
Small decisions can have a big impact when it comes to sustainability and many consumers are increasingly seeking eco-friendly options for what they view as essential items. Riding this wave of sustainability is Phelan, with his unique brand Less Watches.
With a background in industrial design – from designing yachts in Texas to medical device design in the Netherlands – Phelan wanted to prove that it was possible to have luxury design while having less of an impact on the environment. With that inkling, a brand was born.
“A lot of the environmental products you see nowadays, such as wooden cutlery instead of plastic forks, they are not luxury, they are not high-quality items, and I wanted to prove that you can get really well-designed and detailed products without this environmental impact,” he explains. “It’s about less plastic and less pollution.”
RM Block
The reality is that there are plenty of “really, really good” environmentally friendly materials out there, Phelan says. “A lot of luxurious brands have put out this message that eco-friendly materials don’t last as long or are more expensive. The long and short of it is that they just don’t want to change their supply chain.”
Phelan has therefore carved a niche for himself, satisfying people who are keen to shop more sustainably. From initial word-of-mouth sales, the brand has gone from strength to strength, despite little in the way of traditional advertising.
“The feedback has been unreal and it has all been organic,” he admits. “Some people have never even worn a watch before, but they just like the idea of it, breaking the mould by having good design with less impact on the environment. One woman bought one for her son and all of his groomsmen for his wedding, so that was five sales in one go.”
Phelan has since moved on from using old wetsuits to craft the watches, and is now using discarded ocean plastic, working with a company to melt down the strands of plastic to create a textile for use in the watch straps. A keen surfer in his spare time, he knows the beaches and bays of Clare, Galway and Donegal well.
“I never used to notice it but recently I have seen bits of plastic floating by me when I am on the waves, which I found really depressing,” he says. “I wanted to address that and do something about it. We were originally giving another life to old wetsuits but we wanted to go a step further and do even more good for the environment.”
Less Watches has already been nominated for two Irish Design awards and the designs have been featured in Wired and GQ magazines. It was also chosen as one of the 10 winners of the 2024 Three Grants for Small Businesses Programme, which sees the business secure a chunk of the €100,000 bursary.
For Phelan, this will help him take Less Watches to the next level. The grant, which is funded by Three Ireland and managed by the small business network and support provider Enterprise Nation, comprises of a €5,000 cash prize, and €5,000 worth of device and connectivity solutions, as well as mentoring and ongoing support from Three Ireland’s in-house business experts.
“For the watches, I did all the 3D CAD [computer aided design] modelling myself and all the sketching, which is done digitally on a tablet.” With the grant, Phelan was able to purchase a top-of-the-range tablet from Three. “This really elevated my sketching as the business begins to grow.”
Many of his sales are currently made online – he has sold watches to several countries – but the Less Watches Instagram feed is like a love letter to Ireland’s coasts. “We have a lot of outdoors-based content on our social media and that has driven a lot of sales. With the grant I was able to buy a phone with a decent camera so now I am really able to elevate my content to align with my brand message.”
Phelan is also thrilled with what he says is an endorsement for the business by winning the grant. “As a small business founder, you tend to experience a bit of impostor syndrome,” he admits. “But these awards and grants keep happening and make me think, no, there really is something in this.”
As he looks to the future with the brand, Phelan sees the UK and continental European markets as ripe for disruption. The grant will help him with marketing his watches but also developing new products.
“It will enable me to be more strategic,” he says. “But there is a lot of scope for new products. I want to redesign products that are seen as everyday necessities but in need of a more environmentally friendly design.”
Phelan sees the appetite for his product as being part of a wider push of getting back to basics. “Everyone is getting into sea swimming and saunas, and people are going hiking instead of going to the pub,” he says. “There is a swell of appreciation for nature and it’s a really nice societal shift.”
For more information on Three Ireland’s grants for small business visit three.ie/business/sme-grants
