By Frank Craig
reporter

An enterprising Ballyshannon man has come up with an innovative, and possibly lucrative, way of solving one of the biggest concerns for fishermen on the rough north Atlantic seas.
Larry Dolan took this year’s Fish Ireland exhibition in Killybegs by storm with his revolutionary Force 10 shrimp pot – a design that could very well remedy the battering that both the fishermen’s pots and pockets were previously taking due to damaged and lost pots.
Mr Dolan teamed up with John Fenton from JF Mouldings in Ballyshannon to manufacture the product, which is about half the size of other pots and easier to carry and store on board.
Both men invested €60,000 to produce the pot. “It has the potential to be a massive export,” said Mr Dolan. “There’s already interest from across Europe. We hope to export it to every country that uses shrimp pots.
“It’s already in for patent and at the moment we’re in production since Thursday last. It took us months to get the moulding right. We’re determined to keep it local to Ballyshannon and continue production here.
“I could have went to China and got them to ship it over here – but that’s not the way we want to do things. Everything will be done here in the town from design, moulding and production.
“They are half the size of your conventional pot. It’s injected mould plastic so its much stronger. It’s set up for easy repair if broken and easy work for the owner. And once the repair is done it’s essentially a new pot as there is no sign of repair- exactly as it would leave the factory.”
When quizzed on whether he had given any thought to appearing on hit TV show the Dragons’ Den with his invention prior to this Larry quipped: “I wouldn’t give it to Dragons’ Den, no way! I wouldn’t entertain them at all. They’d try and take the hand of you for nothing!”