KILKENNY DESIGN

Style Code: RH/047-1
I was in Belfast last summer with my family. It was my first time there and I absolutely loved the place. The Titanic experience was epic and the black cab ride we took learning about the troubles was a sobering experience for a lad born in Cork – far removed from the troubles. As a brand consultant (my day job), I noticed something that tickled me. There were Taytos in Belfast, but Mr Tayto was different. I bought a packet out of curiosity and they was a slight difference in flavour, but delicious. When I got home I immediately went down a worm hole of internet snooping and found out the story.

The southern Tayto for “Free Stayto” was established in O’Rahilly’s Parade, near Moore Street, in Dublin by Séamus Burke. He and eight other staff members are credited with inventing the classic cheese and onion crisp. Meanwhile, up North, another businessman – Thomas Hutchinson – was wondering what to do with a 500-year-old Tandragee Castle in Co Armagh he had just acquired in 1955. He, too, hit upon the popularity of crisps as snacks and approached his crisp-making counterpart in Dublin to do a deal for the rights to the name Tayto and its recipes for outside the Republic. And much like the rest of Irish history, the tale of the two Tayto companies throws up questions of shared and separate identities. We may be different Tayto Snacks and Tayto Group Limited but we share so much more in common.

Additional Info: Sizes: A4 (210mm x 297mm). All prints are digitally printed to 230gsm Archival Matte.