Every year, the University of Notre Dame selects 50 of its top Students to participate in a Summer internship programme here in Ireland. 3 out of 4 of our Connacht Whiskey Team are Notre Dame alumni and requested we provide an internship, as they felt that Bord Bia would provide a great learning opportunity and that it would also seed an understanding of Bord Bia amongst an intern group who are tipped to be future leaders in their field. And so, this summer we had the pleasure of welcoming Caroline Puntillo a student of business and marketing at The University of Notre Dame here to Bord Bia, for a Summer internship. Before Caroline finished up she briefed us on her experience with our library service and how it helped her during her internship. We are delighted to report that in her own words, she was “Wowed”…
Puntillo, C (August 2016),“Upon arriving in Ireland there were certainly a lot of things that were foreign to me. From the top level one would assume that the United States and Ireland have similar cultures. However, after spending a summer working and living in Ireland I can attest that this could not be further from the truth. The people of Ireland have a culture that is rooted in its tradition and is unique to any other. The first week of work is always full of adjustments, especially when you find yourself in a foreign country. One of the first people I was introduced to was Mairéad Mc Keown – Librarian & Information Specialist at Bord Bia. Mairéad explained the concept of the library and the plethora of information the library team were able to access. The first thought that came to mind was, Wow, this would be nice to have when I have to write papers for school.
Throughout the course of my time spent with Bord Bia I was fortunate enough to help the Insight team at Bord Bia on a multitude of projects. The one team who remained constant on every project I partook in was the library team. Whenever, there was information that I would be pulling my hair out to find, I would ask the library if they might be able to take a look and help me with my Groundwork. Within a short period of time I would have the exact information I had exhausted the Internet looking for. The library proved to be an invaluable resource that provided me with quality information on categories such as home baking, whiskey, and Mexican food.
The information I was given played integral roles in the final outcomes of several of the projects. Information regarding tour operators was ultimately used as contact information to draw visitors to new distilleries in Ireland. Statistics in regard to an ethnic food industry were applied to help a young entrepreneur decide whether he should enter into the industry or wait for a better opportunity. Data in the home baking industry was used to develop a presentation on trends that was delivered to the food industry through our Insight Briefing on the Home Baking category. In the end utilising the library saved me the headache of scouring the Internet looking for the right statistics and provided me with reliable, accurate, and valuable data that served as the foundation of my Groundwork”.
So, if you’re an Irish food, drink or horticulture producer carrying out Groundwork and recognise a need for consumer, market, category or channel information keep the Bord Bia library “top of mind” because we’re big on helping our library users save time, make more informed decisions that help generate commercial results and ultimately grow the success of the Irish food & horticulture industry.
Click here to request a tailored “Groundwork Search” from our team of professional librarians
Source: Bord Bia – Notre Dame Intern “Wowed” by the Bord Bia Library
