Getting ready for Reek Sunday

Name: Damien Gibbons

Occupation: Owner of It’s Tough at The Top

This sixteen-foot shipping container was my father’s originally back in the 90s. He sold tea and coffee with a kettle, a few magnets, chocolate and some hazel sticks he cut himself.

So when I took it over it was a bit of a man cave!

I was living in the Middle East and I was working as store manager for Gucci in Dubai Mall. So I moved home from Dubai in August 2019 and I took over the shop after my father passed away.

Something he used to say to me as a child when you’d be moaning was: “It’s tough at the top.”

Also, when a lot of people come down the mountain, they all say, “Oh it’s so tough at the top up there, the last part is very steep.” So I just think it’s very fitting for where we are, so I decided to make a brand out of it.

I also have my own clothing brand and my own website, ToughAtTheTop.ie, so anything I sell is branded ‘Tough At The Top’.

The dream is to have my own lifestyle and streetwear clothing brand. It’s something that’s always been in the back of my head.

My own background was in luxury brands, and I had probably a really good career and lived quite a luxurious lifestyle in Dubai.

So when I moved home here to the mountain it was a good grounding for me when I moved back from Dubai. This is real life, here at the foot of the mountain.

I re-did the inside of the shop myself when I came home, but it’s still the same original container.

I also put some nice hoarding up on the mountain and put a little history of the mountain at the side of it.

Probably what we’re best known for is hazel sticks and 99s. We sell a good whack of 99s.

We also do a lot of religious souvenirs, rosaries and magnets.

I do go a little bit extravagant every year. We have crystal-encrusted Jesus, we had hip-hop Jesus, we had hip-hop Last Supper. There’s lots of different religions climbing the mountain but just to add a bit of fun to what I sell. They’re a good seller - a bit of bling!

We’re open mainly from March until the October Bank Holiday and then weekends in the winter.

I guess the big day every year is the last Sunday in July, which is Reek Sunday. Back in the day there used to be 20,000 or 30,000 people climbing on Reek Sunday.

It was one day a year that everyone would come back to Croagh Patrick by bus or bike or train and climb. Now everybody is driving.

Now on Reek Sunday we probably see 2,000 or 3,000 people as opposed to the 20,000 people that used to come before.

The day is pretty chaotic. We open at 3am, 4am in the morning and there’s a steady stream of people in the darkness going up the mountain. Most people climb it in their shoes but back in the day they used to climb it in their feet at night.

It’s probably the peak of my year. I have a recurring dream all year round that I don’t turn up on time on the day. That’s kind of how big it is for us mentally.

I might have some family come in to take over for a couple of hours and I’ll go home and sleep and come back again at about 12pm but we’ll open until about 8pm in the evening.

It’s a long day, but once Reek Sunday kind of passes that kind of bursts the bubble for me on the year's trade. It’s downhill after that into the winter.

It’s all-weather dependent, to be honest. Yesterday the sun was out, and we had our best day of the year. Today then it’s overcast and cloudy, so it’s not half of what it was yesterday.

I’d say approximately 80 percent of my customers this year have been Americans, probably because of the Joe Biden visit, and the dollar maybe.

It’s still a religious phenomenon, but a lot of people would climb it for fun.

This year we had a wedding from Australia. Then we had a wedding last week. They were Irish, about 30 of them. The bride went up with her veil on and it was overcast and raining but they still went up and stayed up there for a good five or six hours.

A lot of people would climb it for fitness, charity - everyone’s climbing it for something.

People are also going up to spread ashes and celebrate birthdays and remember somebody that’s died, so it's very sacred.

You kind of have to be aware of who you’re talking to as well because a lot of people can come and they’re mourning somebody or they’re celebrating.

Everyone has a different story. 

In conversation with Oisín McGovern