BIG READ: Sos Beag owners grab a piece of Cashel’s ‘rife café culture’

You could be forgiven for mistaking Sos Beag’s ‘soft launch’ on the Main Street of Cashel earlier this month for a café long-established in the town.

The sound of the coffee machine struggles to be heard over an animated atmosphere of chat and laughter.

Taking the reins in the midst of the chaos are Eoin O’Dwyer and Mary Kate Maher, the brains behind Sos Beag.

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With two small kids at home and a wedding just weeks away, Eoin told the Tipperary Star what a rollercoaster it’s been in the lead up to opening in Cashel.

“Opportunity comes knocking at funny times. Even before we opened Thurles, Cashel was always on our radar and somewhere we kept an eye on over the years. Now we’re nearly four years in business in Thurles and we knew it was time to step back and take a look at what’s next for Sos Beag.

“We started dipping our toe in to see what’s available and it just so happened that Dan Quirke, who used to have the Town House Deli and a staunch Clonoulty man, is a family friend of Mary Kate’s. So we had a connection to the building here on Main Street as well, and we’re delighted with the location.”

Renovating the space and giving it that unique Sos Beag style was always going to be difficult in such a short space of time, but luckily for Eoin and Mary Kate, they had the Thurles blueprint this time around.

“The lift this time around in terms of getting the shop to where it is now was probably a bit lighter than Thurles and we’re blessed in that we’ve already done it so we knew what we wanted to do here, we had l the layout of the shop and understood the dimensions of it all.

“So really it was just a matter of drawing up our plans in terms of table layout, organising equipment, organising our local suppliers and a big drive then for hiring staff. 
We’ve been really lucky with the staff we’ve got already.”

The flagship Sos Beag store in the heart of Thurles has built a reputation over the years of a café that uses local suppliers to craft a unique selection of food and drinks. Eoin is adamant that the new location in Cashel will keep those same standards.

“What we’re known for is our coffee, our açaí bowls, our toasties, and our pots. Mary Kate and the girls make all the pots in-house. Things like overnight Weetabix pots and Kinder overnight oats, which are really popular with local sports teams and the like.

“We source as much as possible locally, for example all of our granola comes from My Tasty in Tipperary Town, they’ve been with us from day one. Our bread comes from the award- winning Mueller & O’Connell bakery, in Abbeyleix, and of course all the milk in all our coffees has to be Thurles milk!”

Café culture across Ireland has run rampant in recent years, particularly since the Covid-19 pandemic and both Eoin and Mary Kate see the importance of providing that meeting point for the people of Tipperary.

“It’s funny, so our new building here, way back when, used to be a pub, and our shop in Thurles used to be a pub and a gun shop.

“I think the world has changed in terms of the pub culture has changed a fair bit and café culture is just rife in Ireland at the moment. But what I find I love the most about the shop is the atmosphere, it’s nearly like a pub, local people meeting up for coffee, chats, and a bit of banter. 


“It’s a lot of local people that come from all over to congregate over a cup of coffee these days.

“Just yesterday the owner of the pharmacy next door sat down with a few other gentlemen at the window bar and were just chatting in Irish for about an hour. There’s just something about that.

“I hope we get to a point here in Cashel where we have our regulars and we chat to them about their day and their families.”
With the Cashel location just taking flight and a wedding in less than two months, it’s understandable that Eoin and Mary Kate haven’t put too much thought into Sos Beag number three.

“I don’t know. I think right now our priority is to get Cashel up and running, get it off the ground and hopefully get it on par with Thurles.

“Of course we want to keep Thurles flying the flag as well because that’s our flagship store, that’s the OG shop.
Right now we’re just focused on Thurles and Cashel and making the two shops the best they can be.”

Sos Beag uimhir a dó is officially open for business on Cashel’s Main Street.

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