In 2013, Marjorie and Kieran O’Malley decided the time was right to rekindle this ancient tradition but also to introduce modern technology into the process.

“My mother happened to be watching a documentary on sea-salt production in the UK and she wondered why we weren’t doing it in Ireland anymore,” says their daughter Maebh.

“By chance, my father happened to be reading a history book at the time about Achill Island and he read that there had been salt flats operating in Achill until around 1800.

“So we realised that there had been a long tradition of salt production in Achill going back hundreds of years, and not just in Achill, you have places like Salthill and Salty Island where they made their own sea salt.

“We decided that we would try and revive the tradition of making salt on Achill.

“We started off by boiling the seawater in pots in our kitchen. We went down to the beach and got buckets of water and just started boiling pots of it.

“That was at the beginning of 2013, and by the summer we had started selling it in our local farmers’ market. It took off very quickly from there.”

The following year, the family built a portacabin outside their house and got to work refining how they processed their sea-salt. The move to the portacabin allowed them to increase production to around 25kg of salt a week.

The salt is predominantly sold to small independent retailers and artisan butchers; it is not currently stocked in any of the major supermarkets.

The company also sells a lot of salt through its online shop (, which also features products from companies who use their salt such as Joe’s Farm Crisps and Lismore Biscuits

. A 75g jar costs €4.

The real breakthrough came in 2016, when they moved to an Údarás na Gaeltachta factory in the centre of the island.

This allowed them to dramatically increase production, including the introduction of a vacuum evaporation system, but also presented some challenges as they now have to haul seawater from the Valley Pier.

“At the beginning we were a bit nervous (about the expansion), we weren’t sure that we’d have a market for it, but it has been amazing — we are selling everything we make and are looking to upscale further,” says Maebh.

“We now collect the seawater once a week with a tanker. The first thing we do is put it through a series of filters to remove any sand and other materials.

“We then evaporate the seawater under pressure, which brings it down to a concentrated salty brine. This brine is then pumped onto pans which are heated gently to allow the remaining water to evaporate and allows the sea salt to form.

“Once the salt is formed we remove it from the pans, dry it out and then pack it for sale. It is all done by hand and the whole process is done in around a week.”

The O’Malley family have lived on Achill Island for generations.

​Maebh works full-time for the company. Kieran has retired from teaching to work on the business full-time, while Marjorie splits her time between the business and her work as an accountant.

They employ three other staff members and have big plans for the future,.

“Our dream is to build our own factory right on the coast. That would save us a lot of time and allow us to scale up greatly. We are realistic, a factory like that could be 10 years away or more,” says Maebh.

“We do have scope for scaling up in our current location, with new equipment​

“We also have an on-site visitors’ centre which is open from June to September. It’s quite busy in the summer and if we were to invest in our own factory we would be looking to expand that visitors’ centre and maybe have it open all year round.”

The process of extracting sea-salt from seawater is relatively simple and could be replicated in a number of locations across the country.

The two major challenges for anyone looking to enter the sector are the initial start-up costs and the expertise to develop a top-quality salt product which could command a premium price.

“It’s a simple process but, in terms of equipment, there is quite a significant investment,” says Maebh. “If you were to boil seawater without the vacuum evaporation, you would be looking at a full day before you would get salt, whereas with our system we can do it in a couple of hours.

“If you are approaching it as a large-scale project, it can be difficult to get it right. It has taken us a few years.

“All sea salt is different. That difference can come from the production methods that you use and from the water itself. Our evaporation pans are on a low heat so we get a slow evaporation, which allows for a soft, flaky salt crystal.

“Some producers will do that much quicker, so you will have a hard, crunchy salt flake, while others will have a much finer salt flake.

“It’s not impossible to do it, but if you are going to do it at scale there is a significant investment there. There is no blueprint for doing it, like you might have with other foods — we had to figure it out ourselves.

“Anyone can do it in their kitchen, it’s just scaling it up and getting a consistent product is the challenge.”

Over the last 10 years the O’Malleys have received support from a number of agencies.

“We did get a lot of help. We are an Údarás client and we rent the factory from them,” says Maebh. “They have been very good to us over the years — helping us out with grant aid and other investments.

“We also got help from the Western Development Fund and some support from our Local Enterprise Office and from LEADER.”

The biggest challenges to growing Achill Island Sea Salt are labour and energy costs. They employ five full-time staff.

The sustainability of the business has been challenged in recent month due to sharp rises in the cost of natural gas, which they use to evaporate the sea water.

“Our location is key to the business but it has its own challenges as well,” says Maebh. “Transport costs can be quite high and it can be difficult to get people [employees] to come and relocate to Achill. It is a very remote spot.

“That’s will be a challenge to us in the future as we look to grow — both in terms of attracting talent to come and work for us and also to holding onto the people that we have. We want to create sustainable, long-term jobs in Achill.

“Energy costs are our highest overheads, and they are quite significant at the moment.

“We are looking into solar panels to see can we make our processes more energy efficient. That is something we are seriously looking at this year.”

‘Ireland has very few food products with PDO status. There should be a lot more’

Later this year, Achill Island Sea Salt could be granted official Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) status by the European Union — joining other heritage foods such as champagne, Greek feta cheese and the Waterford Blaa.

PDO status means that only products produced in a certain area, and following proscribed production methods, can legally be labelled and sold under that product’s name.

This designation is the reason why only sparkling wine produced in the Champagne region of France can be sold as champagne.

The O’Malley family have been working closely with the Department of Agriculture for a number of years, and are hoping to secure official PDO status later in 2023. To achieve this, a product must be shown to have a unique connection to a specific area or an original method of production.

“That application is with the EU. It’s a slow process, we have been working on this for a long, long time but we are in the final stages of it now,” says Maebh O’Malley.

“What prompted us to make this application is our connection to the land and the way in which sea salt has been produced by the farmers of Achill for hundreds of years.

“The mineral make-up of the Atlantic Ocean in this part of the world contributes greatly to our sea salt. Our salt has more than 60 trace minerals in it and that is connected directly to the local seawater.

“Our process of slow evaporation, which creates salt with this soft flaky texture, is another reason why we have applied for this designation. It’s all quite exciting for us.”

PDO status can be a double-edged sword. While gaining the designation is a mark of distinction for a producer, it also means they must list their exact ingredients and method of production with the EU, which could leave them open to local competition.

“In practice, it means that anyone could make Achill Island Sea Salt, so long as they followed the processes and specific methods that are set out in the application,” says Maebh.

“You might think that that might lead to lots of people making Achill Island Sea Salt, but because the process is location specific, it would be quite hard to emulate it.

“It might sound like a strange thing for a company to do, but for us, the status would really highlight the significance of the salt that we make and we don’t really expect someone else to start making Achill Island Sea Salt, but it does allow other people to do that.

“In Ireland we have very few food products which have PDO status. There should be a lot more.”

Ireland has just six PDOs including the Waterford Blaa, Sneem Black Pudding and Timoleague Brown Pudding. Italy has 45 PDOs, while France has 39 and Spain has 19.