Leslie O’Brien’s story starts out like many others back in 1999 . He faced unemployment having been made redundant but with a young family to support, the dole queue wasn’t going to be an option.
He took a chance at going it alone and founded his contract cleaning company Mobiclean, which today employs a number of full-time and part-time employees.
Initially the business concentrated mainly on the domestic market but over time, has grown to become one of the leading cleaning companies in the South East, servicing pharmaceutical plants, food industry factories and corporate businesses.
With a keen interest in all aspects of cleaning technology, Leslie and his team developed a lot of their own cleaning equipment and techniques. They also have a vacuum tanker for emptying and degreasing of greasetraps servicing the hotel and catering sector and for which they hold a waste permit.
But while industrial and commercial contracts are very much part of the business, Leslie hasn’t forgotten the domestic market who were so supportive of him when he started out and he continues to offer the best value for all domestic work, including drain cleaning, high pressure cleaning, gutter cleaning, window cleaning and carpet cleaning using state of the art equipment.
A keen sportsman Leslie has competed at inter county level in both athletics and hurling and played soccer with Ferrybank A.F.C. for many years. Nowadays he still likes to run regularly to keep fit. He’s a proud Ferrybank and Waterford man, however in the O’Brien household it can be a bit controversial at times as Leslie flies the blue and white of Waterford while the rest of the family fly the black and amber of Kilkenny.
Leslie’s advice to anyone starting out in business, “don’t listen to negativity, just plough ahead and follow your dreams.”