Recent Winners
MC COMPACTORS
2023 Senior Category Winner
Our current senior category champions are MC Compactors. Two creative students from Roscommon Community College came up with the winning business idea after seeing people climbing into wheelie bins to try and compact their rubbish manually so they could fit more in the bin. The boys then created a stainless-steel device called the ‘MC Compactor’ which enables users to easily compact rubbish in standard wheelie bins. The steel fabricated device works on all standard household wheelie bins.
CLIP CLOP DESIGNS
2023 Intermediate Category Winner
An enterprising student from Moyne Community School took the top intermediate category prize this year with her eye-catching horse shoe home décor products. The idea came from seeing the number of horse shoes being discarded and a commitment to recycling and upcycling items that would otherwise go to waste. Available in a wide variety of colourful and fun designs, these home accessories are a great example of how repurposing used items can be the basis of a good business idea.
GRASPER
2023 Junior Category Winner
Three first year students from Drumshanbo Vocational School in Leitrim were named as our Junior Category entrepreneurs of the year 2023. After seeing an elderly family member struggling to open a slatted tank cover on the family farm, one of the students encouraged her team to design a lift mechanism that would avoid the user having to bend and lift the cover by hand and would also help them close the cover afterwards.
BARRELDA
2022 Senior Category Winner
Eco innovation won out at the 2022 National SEP Final when two students from St. Patrick’s Classical School in Navan wowed the judges with their re-purposed animal feeder.
Barrelda specialises in taking old blue polyethelene drums found on Irish farms and recycling them to create meal silos and teat feeders. As well as being sustainable, this clever business idea addresses the growing problem of the rising cost of farm equipment.
The two innovative young farmers from Meath have won high praise from eco organisation and farming organisations all over the country. With sustainability and the rising cost of farming being high on the agenda in Ireland right now, the sky really is the limit for our current champs!!!
COPPERCASE
2021 Senior Category Winner
Coppercase, an innovative anti microbial face mask case from St. Macartan’s College in Monaghan, took the top accolade in 2021 at the National Final in Croke Park.
Coppercase was inspired by the Covid-19 pandemic and the issue of keeping your face mask stored when out and about. The award winning student behind the product also noticed the high number of faceamaks being disposed of in the area where he lives. The anti microbial copper lining on the inside of the case ensures the users’ facemask is COVID-19 and virus and bacteria free after just three minutes in the case due to the antibacterial properties of copper.
More information is available www.coppercase.ie
T-SNAPPI
2021 Intermediate Category Winners
T-Snappi, from Summerhill College in Sligo are the current intermediate category champs with their innovative kitchen apron with snap on-snap off tea towels. The innovative product idea was designed by the three students under the direction of their teacher Dervilla Casey to make life in the kitchen easier by enabling the user to keep a tea towel on hand at all times and then simple snap it off and put in the wash when it needs cleaning and simple replace with another tea towel.
More information is available @TSnappi 2021.
GO GREEN
2021 Junior Category Winner
Go Green Now from Salerno Secondary School in Galway are our current Junior Category Champions for 2020/221. Go Green Now is an eco-friendly, Covid-friendly small set up by a very enterprising group of 1st year students at the Galway school. Their winning product is an eco-friendly Go Green Now Tree Kit. The kits include a Coillte top quality acorn seed, a small packet of soil, biodegradable bags to hold the seed and soil, a biodegradable pot and instructions on how to plant your acorn seed! All you need to grow your own magnificent Pedunculate Oak Tree, one of the finest native trees in Ireland.
More information is available at Tree Kit | GoGreen Now
SOFATOP
2020 Junior Category Winners
The team from Ballybay Community College in Monaghan took the top Junior Category prize this year with their winning idea Sofatop. The innovative product is a stylish flexible tray that can safely hold a cup of tea within reach on a couch.
The novel idea allows you to curl up on the sofa and enjoy your cuppa, safe in the knowledge that you can set it down within safe and easy reach on a stylish flexible tray.
AIM IT BOARD
2020 Intermediate Category Winners
The girls from Loreto College, St. Stephen’s Green in Dublin wowed our judges with their ‘Aim It Board’ game. Designed to improve hand-eye coordination, maths and attention, this simple, yet effective, basketball trainer helps players hone their point scoring skills. The product is portable, easy to use and eco friendly.
HANDY HOSE HELPERS
2020 Senior Category Winners
Our current champions in the senior category are two student entrepreneurs from CBS in Thurles. Their winning idea is the Handy Hose Helper – a magnetic hose holder tailored specifically for use at parlour hoses for dairy farmers.
More information is available @handyhoseholder on Twitter.
