Since the late 1950s, the Aughey's have been major employers to many around The North Monaghan area. While a stinging recession has taken its toll on the family business, the company's current Managing Director, Barry Aughey, sees the glass very much as half full heading into the future.

The Aughey family have been involved in the sand and aggregate industry since Danny Aughey and his brothers opened a sand and gravel pit in Kilymarron in 1958 "Aughey Brothers Ltd". Since then the Aughey family has diversified and grown to become a leading manufacturer and distributor of quarry plant and screening media in Ireland and the UK.
Jim, Joey, and Danny's success was built on the philosophy of providing a better service to the customer. It is on the principles of provide excellent customer service; produce the highest quality products at competitive prices and always deliver products and services in a timely manner that this was achieved.
Today, these core values are still at the centre of how Aughey Group continues to conduct business, as Danny's son, Barry, attempts to uphold his predecessor's tradition of excellence.
As one of the leading quarry suppliers in the country, Aughey understand that quarry operators and contractors have a wide choice of plant and screening media to consider when making a purchasing decision. The Aughey competitive advantage is experience, as their management and engineering team have many years combined under their belts in the aggregate processing industry.
"Aughey Screens Limited was established in 1980 by Danny Aughey the youngest of the three brothers," explained Barry.
Danny got into the quarry business together with his brothers, Jim and Joey back in 1958 and the company (Aughey Bros Ltd) grew from strength to strength, eventually being acquired by RMC PLC (Ready Mix) in 1973. Joey and Danny remained in a management role on the Board of Directors until their early retirement in 1979.
Danny had always recognised a gap in the Irish Quarrying Sector for a good screening media supplier. After leaving Ready Mix he then set about setting up Aughey Screens Ltd to manufacture and supply screen mesh to the Irish quarry sector.
One of Danny's first employees for his new company during the early 80s was former Monaghan senior football player and manager Jack McCarville. Over the years many members of Monaghan's GAA family have worked alongside the Augheys to help the business get to where it is today. Devoted Truagh clubman Denis McKenna currently works for the Aughey screen mesh facility at Rossmore Industrial Estate, Killyconnigan, Monaghan Town.
At present, the group is split into four different locations as four different companies. In Monaghan town, Aughey Screens Ltd employs 22 full-time employees, while the worst effects of the recession has seen Aughey Plant International Ltd in Clones reduce its staff from 56 to 2 employees. Across the Chanel, there are 45 working in the company's Banbury base in Staffordshire and 38 employees in their facility at St Helen's, Liverpool.
Having grown up with his father being involved in the quarry business, and then going on to obtain a certificate in Mechanical Engineering from Dundalk Institute of Technology, it was almost inevitable that Barry Aughey was going to end up in this line of work.
From their large stocks in Monaghan, Aughey Screens provide a quick and efficient service to their customers in Ireland. Their sales personnel will visit the customer's site to discuss in detail all their screening needs.
"Our customer base stretches from Derry to Cork and we would supply almost every quarry to some extent within the island of Ireland." added Barry.
API have designed and manufactured the A8 Mobile Screener, the highest capacity mobile screen in the world. API have also designed and manufactured the A4, a five-way split machine which is unique as no other Mobile Screen manufactured in the world is able to produce five products from one machine." he explained.
Aughey currently have three patents protecting their IP on the Horizon range of Mobile Screeners.
Cement Roadstone Holdings (CRH) invested in a Horizon mobile screening plant, which is a Horizon A8. The machine which has gone into operation at the company's Glenstone site in Tipperary is fed by a Metso 1415 impact crusher.
The Aughey name was ideally viewed, as they had been associated with the quarry and screening business for over 25 years through their production of screening mesh and static screen boxes.
Seven years ago, Roadstone approached Barry Aughey to see if he could build a mobile screening plant capable for handling the output from a Metso LT140 at their Huntstown quarry. A prototype unit comprising a 16 ft x 5ft double deck horizontal screen and metal apron feeder was tested and immediately proved it could produce over 800 TPH in a primary screening application.
A number of engineering changes were required to meet the rigorous demands of the application but Aughey's 'can-do' approach and ability to customize resulted in the development of an extremely robust machine that is still working as hard as ever. A second unit was ordered shortly afterwards.
Glenstone's production foreman John Sweeney believes the Aughey Horizon A8 is undoubtedly the best machine for their application.
"Having already used the Aughey for over two years in the quarry we knew what the machine could do," said Mr Sweeney.
"I've seen many different screens over the years but there is nothing to touch the Aughey for the high volume primary screening. We demoed machines from several other more established mobile screen manufactures, but none were able to match the A8."
The machine is fitted with 65mm screens on the top deck and 45mm on the bottom deck, through which 80-90 per cent of the material is passing, as there is an ongoing demand for this size of product.
Aughey also produced an A4 version of the Horizon which is capable for producing five clean aggregates with one machine. The unit is fitted with two 16ft and 5ft double deck screens with the largest product coming out at the 'feed' end to enable it to be recycled directly back to the crusher giving four clean aggregates.
A growing number of Irish and UK contractors are have realised the benefits of the Aughey mobile screens where versatility and portability are essential, together with the ability to produce well sized products in high volumes.
That's why, even in these difficult economic times, the Aughey Group looks set to prosper into the next decade and benefit again when things take a turn for the better.
"Business at the moment is reasonably good, we are just completing half-a-million euro order to the Lansdowne Stadium in Dublin," said Barry.
"We have secured some nice business in the north part of Germany and a substantial order on the Olympic Village project in London. Poland, the US, South Africa and India, believe it or not, have brought us business and hopefully they will continue to do so in the future.
"The future is bright," he added. "The way we look at things, the glass is very much half full and hopefully the worst of it (the recession) is over from our point of view."
While Barry admits that he is not the biggest GAA supporter, he is quick to say that he is proud to be "Monaghan born and bred". His company's have also gained business from some of the leading sporting projects this country has experienced in recent years.
"We've got some good business from Readymix for Croke Park in the past when it was redeveloped and likewise we were delighted when the main contractor for the new Lansdowne Road Stadium "Sisk" came to us looking for details on our product range.
"Sport has been good to us and hopefully it will continue to do so in the future," he concluded. Tweet

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