Why I’m Building a Second Income Stream — and Why Gaelic Deserves One Too

By bringing both corporate clients and Gaelic learners to the islands, we can blow new life into local Gaelic island communities — creating work, curiosity, and pride where the language still breathes.

Running a non-funded, for-profit Gaelic education business from a remote island is both privilege and pressure. There’s beauty in hearing learners speak their first Gaelic words with the Atlantic wind in the background — but there’s also the constant reality of keeping the lights on, paying suppliers, and sustaining year-round work when most income arrives in summer.

After extended periods without income between seasonal courses, the reality hits hard. Passion doesn’t pay bills — structure does. Despite what the media suggests, demand for Gaelic courses has declined over the years. Many learners now rely on free online resources rather than paying for structured teaching — a pattern that makes it harder for small, independent providers, and even colleges with millions of annual funding, to survive — not because interest in the culture has faded, but because people’s lives and budgets have shifted. That change is forcing all of us who work in the language to rethink how we keep it alive, a pattern that makes it harder to keep professional Gaelic course providers viable at all and relevant. If only 10% of the people learning Gaelic through Duolingo or SpeakGaelic invested in a paid course, it would make a real difference — enough to keep skilled teachers and authentic learning experiences alive.

That gap is what pushed me to design something more stable, without giving up what I love. Creating another income stream isn’t a detour from Gaelic. It’s a way to protect it. A living culture can’t survive on goodwill alone. If we want Gaelic to thrive, the people who build it need solid ground beneath their feet — financial stability (rather than relying on unpredictable funding cycles), creative freedom and a voice in the wider world. Imagine what could grow if Gaelic agencies backed independent providers with real, ongoing support — not just in money-terms, but in structure.

Preservation or Participation?

For years, Gaelic has been treated as something to be saved — stored in classrooms, heritage centres, or policy documents. But languages don’t live in museums. They live when people use them, argue in them, make business deals in them, dream in them.

When Gaelic stays confined to “culture projects,” it risks becoming quaint rather than relevant. The best way to protect it is to make it useful again — in leadership, multilingual communication, and everyday professional life. If there’s no real demand for paid for courses, we risk leaving Gaelic behind — not out of choice, but necessity.

Cultural differences often explain why confrontations have occurred in the past — native speakers fighting to preserve a lived identity, while newcomers fought for the cause of saving and reviving Gaelic itself. Both wanted to protect Gaelic, but from different worlds of meaning.

From Language Teaching to Multilingual Coaching

My work in multilingual communication grew out of the same roots as Love Gaelic. Every language tells you something about how people think. Gaelic teaches subtlety, patience, community. German teaches clarity and precision. French teaches tone and diplomacy.

When I began creating my new training programme for global teams on multilingual communication skills, I realised the lessons from Gaelic were exactly what corporations needed — awareness of silence, emotional rhythm, respect for difference. Suddenly, Gaelic wasn’t “small” at all. It was sophisticated, modern, and essential.

Building a Sustainable Circle

This isn’t about abandoning Gaelic for corporate gain. It’s about building a circle where both feed each other.

• Corporate training supports the financial base that keeps language and culture projects alive.

• Gaelic and the islands give depth, warmth, and authenticity to the corporate work.

• Both together prove that language has value globally — not as decoration, but as skill and insight.

  
  

That’s how we lift the status of Gaelic: not by asking for sympathy or funding, but by showing its strategic worth.

A Call for Integration

We can’t afford to isolate Gaelic from life. It should be in boardrooms, policy discussions, digital design, tourism, diplomacy — anywhere people talk, think, or negotiate.

By bringing both corporate clients and Gaelic learners to the islands, we can blow new life into local Gaelic island communities — creating work, curiosity, and pride where the language still breathes. When you come to the island, you don’t just learn Gaelic — you learn to use it with confidence, in real conversations, among people who live it every day.

If multilingual communication is about connection, Gaelic belongs right at the table. It brings an islander’s sense of perspective: quiet strength, humour in difficulty, and respect for the unseen work that keeps communities standing.

So yes, I’m building another income stream. Not to move away from Gaelic — but to give it room to stand taller on a global stage. www.anndesseyn.com