The family adding colour to Croker on All-Ireland day: how a US trip inspired a hurley-maker to switch to flags
'As I watched the play, it dawned on me that there were 30 hurleys being used, but among the thousands in the crowd there were only a sparse few homemade flags,' said Mr Daly (75).
'I had been to New York a short time previously on a holiday, and I saw team flags for basketball and American football everywhere.
'I saw them in pubs, restaurants, on the front of buildings and I was very impressed by displays located in the forecourts of car sales rooms. After getting home from that game in Thurles, I put my plan into operation and decided it would be flags rather than hurleys from then on.'
Within weeks, Mr Daly had recruited a few local women in Pallaskenry and bought a supply of different colour material from a fabric shop in Limerick.
'The women brought in their sewing machines and started making the flags. We started with local clubs and as demand grew, we made flags in the Limerick county colours. It proved there was a big demand for well-made flags, and we moved into every county in Ireland,' he said.
He began to expand the variety of flags to such an extent that his home-based operation could not cope. 'We then looked abroad for a supplier and imported from China,' he said.
'The fact that we are backed by the association is critically important'
One of the most popular products has been car flags, hence the naming of his company Team Car Flag Ireland Ltd.
Delivery vans drive the length and breadth of the country every year as the hurling and football championships pick up momentum.
'Last year was mad altogether with Armagh in the final. We had to send extra van loads to the North such was the demand.'
The company has sold about 20,000 flags this year. They retail from between €6 and €16, and the popular car flags sell for €8.50.
'The association [GAA] gets a part of the money we take in. We get big orders from Irish pubs all over the world every year. The fact that our products carry the GAA logo and we are backed by the association is critically important. People want the real thing.'
While most hurleys are now made from bamboo, he recalled the lengths his late father, Patrick would go to when making hurleys.
'He would look around for a good ash tree and we would all dig up the area around the root,' he said. 'When the root was loosened we would pull it out. You could get anything up to 20 hurleys from a good root and tree. We still make a few hurleys, but the clash of the ash is almost a thing of the past given the material used now.'
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