"Irwin and Sheehan is a fourth generation can making company which is proudly 100% Australian owned and operated"

Irwin & Sheehan was founded in 1934 by Jack Irwin and John Sheehan. Jack and John were two visionaries who honed their trade at Richard Hughes & Company, a company that has evolved into what is today Visy.
With limited resources these two entrepreneurs established a small can making operation in rented premises in Elizabeth Street, Sydney. The business grew, due mainly to Jack Irwin's ability to play a handy game of golf at a time when many an alliance was forged over the last putt on the 18th!

The boys established a larger operation in 1937 when they built a plant at Joynton Avenue, Waterloo, NSW. This plant still operates today albeit having had a number of additions and upgrades.
Keith Irwin (son of Jack) entered the business at age 22 after completing his engineering qualification and worked his way through the plant until he took over from Jack as Managing Director in the late 1960's. John Sheehan's son (John Jr) also joined the business for a time before leaving to advance his accounting career. Keith's failing health precipitated the arrival of son John into the business in 1979. This was the catalyst for a total recapitalization of the can making plant adopting modern welding and seaming technology still current today. 

2010 saw the arrival of two of John's children to the business. Son James (20 yrs) has commenced in the engineering department and daughter Kelly (28 yrs) is the newest member of the companies administration staff.

Fourth generation family business are a rarity these days, especially in manufacturing. "Good on us" John was heard to say.

I&S purchased the general line can business of Containers Packaging (AMCOR) when they decided to exit the general line side of can making in the early 1990's. This was the springboard for the company to venture into steel food can manufacture with the introduction of standard food can diameters 65 / 73 / 83 / 99 / 127 / 153mm. 

The meteoric rise in steel prices in early 2004 resulted in many customers looking for alternative packaging to steel. In order to protect its market I&S established in 2005 a composite can operation alongside its steel can plant at Waterloo and successfully moved many of its steel can food customers across to composite. The ability to offer "an alternative" has since been incorporated into the company's marketing strategy as I&S is still the only can maker able to offer its customers steel or composite.

An additional string to the bow was added in 2009 with the establishment of a plastics operation in China. The I&S team could see the opportunity to complement it's growing composite business by being able to economically deliver "made to measure" plastic (P.E.T., HDPE, LDPE, PP) containers to its food based customers. The advantage the company offers over local suppliers is the ability to produce individual requirements at minimal entry cost, tool samples for approval and floor stock volumes are held between shipments. Read more...

As John Irwin proudly points out the company he entered has the same family feel and customer satisfaction level achieved over the manufacture and delivery of steel cans but today this now extends over a full range of composite and plastic products.

1934 factory staff photo at the Elizabeth Street location	1960s Management photo
1960s I&S full staff photo