![\"Laura](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/5108565_2_articleinline_DK20260516_20NetworkCork_20010.jpg\" "\\"Laura")
Laura Howard of Trinny London who was the winner of Advanced Career Employee sponsored by Partnership International at the Network Cork Businesswoman of the Year Awards 2026. Picture: Darragh Kane<\/p>\nTrust your path and know that what\u2019s for you won\u2019t pass you, but be prepared to put the hard work in.<\/p>\n
So says Fermoy native, Laura Howard, who is speaking from experience, having had to leave college in her first year of Arts in UCC to unexpectedly make her way in the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cDue to personal reasons, I had to abandon my BA in Arts a few months in. I remember I was furious at the time, even if I know now that it was a blessing in disguise,\u201d said Laura.<\/p>\n
She got a job in Sofa So Good in her home town where she fell in love with retail and \u2018the psychology of selling\u2019.<\/p>\n
Today, Laura is regional sales manager for Trinny London, leading retail across Ireland, the UK, and the US, and managing 14 stores, including in London and Saks 5th Avenue in New York. She is responsible for a team of up to 50.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe job involves people management, sales strategies, profit and loss performances, HR, marketing and more,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou never know what will happen on any day,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n \u201cYou have to be resilient in retail, at any moment, there could be an issue you never saw coming.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
And there usually is! Before our call, Laura was making sure a team in a London store had sufficient fans to deal with temperatures of 33 degrees. But it\u2019s all in a day\u2019s work for Laura, who has vast experience to support her in the often demanding role.<\/p>\n
After Sofa So Good, she became the store manager in the country\u2019s first Pandora (Jewellers) on Winthrop Street, and later progressed to Retail Operations Manager, managing 15 stores in Ireland from 2010 to 2019. After that, she moved to a sales and education role with Est\u00e9e Lauder Companies, where she was over seven brands, including Tom Ford Beauty, La Mer, Bobbi Brown, and Le Labo, and supported the launch of Balmain Beauty into the Irish market, which she\u2019s especially proud of.<\/p>\n
Laura Howard of Trinny London who was the winner of Advanced Career Employee sponsored by Partnership International at the Network Cork Businesswoman of the Year Awards 2026. Picture: Darragh Kane<\/p>\n
\u201cIn that job I was backstage at two successive London Fashion Weeks in 2023 and \u201924 as we did the show for Erdem, and my claim to fame is that Anna Wintour walked past me \u2013 twice!\u201d<\/p>\n
She started with Trinny London in February, 2025, and is relishing the role.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo two days are the same, and that\u2019s partly why I love it. Monday and Friday, I\u2019m usually working from home in Fermoy, but for the rest of the week, I could be anywhere. It\u2019s demanding, but I thrive on that,\u201d said the 39-year-old.<\/p>\n
She has huge admiration for entrepreneur Trinny Woodall, who she says is \u2018so involved with the business.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s genuinely inspirational and so passionate about what she does,\u201d said Laura, who is equally passionate but is also protective of her work\/life boundaries to avoid burn-out.<\/p>\n
Living with her husband Danny in Grange, outside Fermoy, the couple are \u2018happily and proudly child-free by choice\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love nothing more than locking the gate on a Friday and relaxing for the weekend. Danny and I are foodies, we love travelling and walking. I also enjoy pole fitness and yoga, and find it a great way to switch off!\u201d<\/p>\n
Laura also returned to education last year, completing an NFQ Level 8 qualification in Leadership and Transformational Change through MTU and Springboard.<\/p>\n
She attended last year\u2019s Network Cork Businesswomen of the Year Awards as a non-member.<\/p>\n
\n \u201cI travel a lot and I wanted to establish a core network in Ireland, so I went along and I remember I was blown away by a sense of female empowerment in the room that night. It was incredible, and I joined straight away. Being part of Network Cork has really spurred on my entrepreneurial spirit. I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll ever not be a member now.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
Winning the award for Advanced Career Employee this year was really special.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was the first time in a very long time that I felt seen and recognised for what I\u2019ve done, and that was so refreshing. It was also quite funny, as last New Year\u2019s Eve I wrote a letter to myself saying that this time next year I\u2019d be walking past my award \u2013 and I am! I manifested it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Laura is a believer in manifestation, but believes it also takes hard work, clear goals, and creating opportunities to turn ambitions into reality.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy career path wasn\u2019t a straight line, and I\u2019m proof that it doesn\u2019t need to be, but you do need to be passionate about what you do, and you must be ready to put in the hard work.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her ultimate ambition is to \u2018work as a retail director for an Irish company\u2026 not necessarily in beauty\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cTrust the process, even when the path does not make sense yet. Some of the best opportunities in my career came from relationships, risks and experiences I never originally planned for. Everything really does happen for a reason, and while I still have big ambitions and goals for the future, I genuinely feel like I\u2019m on the right path and I\u2019m very excited for what\u2019s still to come.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trust your path and know that what\u2019s for you won\u2019t pass you, but be prepared to put the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":493216,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,58299,61,60],"class_list":["post-493215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-dr-michelle-o","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=493215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/493216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=493215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=493215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=493215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}