CAB target’s wife’s Virgo Boutique made €500,000 profit last year thanks to heavy promotion on social media
Mairead Connole’s Virgo Boutique, which employs 18 people according to information filed with the Company Records Office, made €500,000 in profits last year.
She is the registered owner and director of MN Fashions, which trades as Virgo Boutique and has €1.3 million cash in hand, according to the latest financial returns.
Mairead Connole uses social media to flog Virgo Boutique’s clothes and share her gym activities
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The records show she has turned what was a modest clothes boutique in Newcastle West, Co Limerick into a huge online success story.
Ms Connole is a prolific user of social media to promote her company, modelling clothes as well as posting to a separate account in which she showcases her impressive fitness regime.
The company overcame a Revenue bill for €189,000 for underpaid taxes in 2023 to more than double annual profits from €200,000 to €500,000.
News in 90 Seconds – October 5th
The business started in 2014, first operating through VB Style Limited, before transferring to Virgo Boutique Limited in 2016.
In 2017, a new company was incorporated, MN Fashions Limited, which operates as Virgo Boutique, according to its own website.
Business boomed when it transferred to MN Fashions, particularly since 2020.
The Liscannor property belongs to Nash’s wife Mairead Connole
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There were profits of more than €200,000 per year, while the company had more than €500,000 in cash on the balance sheet at the end of 2021, 2022 and 2023.
It also holds over €200,000 of financial investments and there are no records of any loans or external financing.
A hands-on owner, Ms Connole’s Virgo Boutique website features hundreds of photos of her modelling the latest outfits on offer.
She also regularly posts videos to an Instagram account in which she explains various workout routines, some of which are from a beachside location in Spain.
The fashion entrepreneur was previously mentioned in a Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) case against a Limerick car firm, Bawn Motors, which was described in the High Court as being set to up to launder criminal cash for the city’s drugs gang.
Her husband, Mike Nash, was described in the evidence as being one of the men controlling the company which generated €8 million sales in 2018 before the CAB raid.
It emerged in the CAB case that the couple was suspected of having had a run-in with veteran financial adviser to the underworld, Michael Grimes.
Despite being in his late seventies, the financial adviser became involved in two separate businesses with Nash and his wife.
There was a scheme to put the Bawn Motors’ fleet of cars into the ownership of a Czech company controlled by Grimes, which would finance future trading.
CAB officcers at Bawn Motors
Another Bawn Motors Ltd was set up in the Czech Republic.
But there was a falling out, resulting in Nash and his wife being investigated for alleged threats to kill Grimes in 2017.
The DPP directed that no prosecution proceed, according to the affidavit evidence in the case.
A property outside Liscannor in Co Clare was highlighted in evidence as being renovated “primarily” with cash from Nash and his wife Mairead Connole.
The property in Liscannor belongs to Ms Connole, who became the owner in 1994, according to Land Registry records.
Ms Connole had previously applied for an extension to planning permission to allow the renovation of a disused cottage.
The stone dwelling has since been given a modern makeover with an extension that offers stunning views of the Atlantic.
The couple live in Newcastle West in Co Limerick, where Nash ran a separate car firm and his wife had a clothes boutique which is now closed.
Gardai believe Nash plays a role in controlling and organising the importation of drugs into Ireland.
He is also considered a close associate of Rathkeale based criminal John O’Donoghue, who has also been named as a key figure behind Bawn Motors.
Shane Curtin, above and below, Christy Kea
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Nash was described in the CAB case as an associate of mob boss Christy Keane and his ‘trusted lieutenant’ Dermot ‘Plum’ McManus.
Another close associate also based in Newcastle West is Shane Curtin, considered by CAB to be “a significant player” in the Limerick drugs trade.
Nash is a trotting horse enthusiast, a past-time that brought him into contact with other known criminals.
When CAB raided Bawn Motors in March 2019, seizing 111 vehicles, it was one of the biggest such operations carried out by the agency.
Judge Alex Owens granted an application to have dozens of the vehicles declared the proceeds of crime.