Twenty years of David Buggy Motors

Although he is twenty years on from opening his Kia dealership, proud Castlecomer man David Buggy didn’t always have an interest in cars.

However, after first getting a job with the now closed Barry Pender Motors and then spending several years at Michael Lyng Motors, David developed the ambition to go out on his own after a decade of learning the trade.

“It’s always an aspiration to do your own thing and then it came about, we got the chance to do it and we took it,” he said.

“We had to go and get a premises, we had to go and get a proper showroom, do them up and get them ready. The staff was learning who to get so that was a very important job.”

After enjoying the latter stages of the booming Celtic Tiger auto trade during their opening years, David Buggy Motors were soon faced with the difficulties of the recession which followed.

Car sales in Ireland collapsed from more than 186,000 in 2007 to just over 57,000 in 2009, a reduction of almost 70% in two years.

Scores of dealerships were forced to close and David, sitting in his modern showroom filled with sleek, new Kia models, reflects on how DBM came through this strenuous period.

“It was a challenging few years between 2009 and 2012, they were tough, but we’ve come out the far side of it now.”

“A lot of places were closing, a few in Kilkenny, more around the country, the ones that probably overspent at the time didn’t make it. I think it was week-to-week for everyone,” he recalls.

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The Irish auto trade has never returned to Celtic Tiger levels but sales recovered enough to allow the continued expansion of DBM in the following years, mixing a growing staff of new additions with day one veterans of the dealership.

“We started off with about six staff members and members and now we’re at 15 or 16, so we’ve grown a good bit,” David says.

“I have two lads here 20 years, myself and my wife Deirdre are here 20 years and there’s three more here over ten years so we still have a good core of staff,” he adds.

Kia has exploded in popularity since DBM opened their doors in 2005 with sales in Ireland almost tripling by 2024 during a period where overall car sales were down.

With almost 40 Kia dealerships now in the country, the Kilkenny location have demonstrated their quality by consistently being recognised with awards at national level.

“We’ve won Kia Dealer of the Year, we’ve won Service Dealer of the Year and one of our workers, Eamonn Lennon, came third in the Kia World Service Advisor competition.”

“We’ve had different awards at different times, so we’ve got our fair share of them,” David outlines.

Outside of his career in cars, David was a decorated GAA player at both club and county level, winning two Senior County Football titles and two Intermediate County Hurling medals with Erin’s Own, along with an All-Ireland Minor Hurling Championship with Kilkenny in 1993 when he scored 1-3 against Galway in the final.

The Comer man is still heavily involved in club training with the underage and senior panels and has brought his passion for GAA into his business by sponsoring many current and former Kilkenny hurlers.

“We nearly always provide cars every year for different players, we currently have Mikey Butler and TJ Reid and previously we’ve had David Herity, we had Padraig Walsh for nearly a decade, we’ve had JJ Delaney, so we’ve been good to them over the years.”

“They’re down in Nowlan Park and they’re probably putting in 30 hours a week of their own time. It’s nice to be able to give them something to show that you appreciate what they’re doing.”

When asked about whether he might still be in the building for another anniversary interview in 20 years time, David says with a smile that things may have been passed to the next generation by then, but he still enjoys the buzz of sealing a deal after all these years.

“I’m 50 now so I’d say you mightn’t be seeing me here in another 20 years, maybe one of my children, but I come in every morning looking forward to going to work, and it’s still a great feeling to sell a car,” he says.

“I have good staff, I like meeting the lads in the morning. We chat about hurling and whatever’s going on around the world, I always love coming in.”

“If I don’t like coming, then there’s no point in being here. It’s always nice to see your sticker on the back of a car, that’ll never change.”

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