With Drogheda continuing to grow as a tourist destination, one local business believes many companies are still overlooking a major opportunity when it comes to connecting with international visitors.
Alphadico, a translation agency based in The Mill Enterprise Hub in Drogheda and owned by Philippine Sikora, works with businesses to help them communicate more effectively with customers from around the world through translation, localisation and multilingual content.
“Philippine says many businesses may underestimate just how international their audience can be.”
Around 404,700 overseas visitors completed trips to Ireland in February 2026 alone, with 40 per cent arriving from Continental Europe. European visitors are also staying longer, with tourists now spending an average of seven days in Ireland.
For Drogheda and the wider Boyne Valley region, that creates significant opportunities, particularly with nearby attractions such as Newgrange, Emerald Park and Slane Distillery, along with the town’s close proximity to Dublin Airport.
According to Alphadico, language can often be the difference between a visitor browsing and actually becoming a customer.
The agency recommends that businesses consider translating basic information, menus or sections of their websites into languages such as Spanish, Portuguese, French, German and Italian to help visitors feel more welcome and comfortable.
Hospitality and tourism businesses are among those who could benefit most from multilingual content, including hotels, restaurants, cafés, museums, galleries, attractions, B&Bs and tour providers.
Among the most common requests received by the company are website translations, hotel information packs, brochures, menus and visitor leaflets.
Despite this, Alphadico believes many tourism businesses are still missing opportunities by not investing properly in translation and localisation.
The company also warns against relying too heavily on automatic translation tools.
“Using Google Translate. Yes, these ‘translations’ don’t make any sense and we can spot them.”
The agency says businesses also often overlook localisation, meaning wording may technically be correct but still sound unnatural or confusing to native speakers.
According to Alphadico, even small language mistakes can affect trust and reduce bookings or sales.
“Many of our clients tried AI tools to translate their websites. Yes, they saw more traffic, but they noticed people were leaving the webpages without converting. The reason was in the small details.”
For businesses looking to become more accessible to international visitors, Alphadico recommends practical first steps such as creating information pages in Spanish, French and German, highlighting multilingual menus or brochures, and using QR codes linking directly to translated information online.
The company also advises businesses with multilingual websites to ensure technical settings such as hreflang tags are correctly configured so search engines direct users to the right language version.
Philippine Sikora says being based in Drogheda is an important part of the company’s identity.
“I chose to base Alphadico in Drogheda because this is where I have lived since 2019. I want to help the community and local businesses grow. We have such a pretty town, full of smart business owners who can make a difference. If we help each other, success and prosperity will be around the corner.”
Alongside translation services, Alphadico also provides content writing, SEO translation, subtitling, transcription, proofreading, and website localisation, with businesses regularly seeking support for document translations, including reports, presentations, menus, and legal documents.
This article is part of a paid partnership with Alphadico.
