INDUSTRY PEOPLE
Another Berti mulcher. There is equipment for every possible situation.
When asked, Scott is forthcoming about these highs and
“In Europe there’s more green areas that these mowers
lows of the business.
and mulchers are used to, but in New Zealand, they often
end up on our tar sealed roads. We’re always “One of the things I have “One of the things I have learned is that I
trying to get in front of our customers to learned is that I didn’t didn’t listen enough to dad.
work out what improvements could happen listen enough to dad.”
“I didn’t listen enough to the advice of that
and where problems could be costing them
generation. It was more about trying to get the business
money.”
to a direction where you think it should be heading and
A typical day for Scott and his father is spent out in the
perhaps that direction wandered away from the original
field with a client, quite literally. The day I speak to Scott,
idea of the original business.
he’s been down to the Waikato talking to dealers. Very
“So many businesses get going and they try to do
little time is spent in the office at all. What gets him out
everything, they get confident when they’re doing well
of bed in the morning is looking after the clients, and
and it’s so easy to get over excited and start selling new
problem-solving.
products or to stray from your original vision. We’ve
If Scott or his dad can’t answer a query, they have a
made a point of not doing that, and in part then, I guess,
range of dealers around the countryside who can.
maybe I did listen to dad after all!
The Farmgard website is furnished with Grandad’s
Promise. The same commitment that he made to the
grader blade now permeates the entire company. Forty
years isn’t a long time in business but it’s enough time to
learn from the highs and lows.
“If you stick to the advice of the older generation who
know alot and have worked hard to keep the business
authentic and true to its original principles, you really dig
down deep and work out who you are. Otherwise if you
stray from this, the business will get into trouble.”
w w w. c a m m a g a z i n e . c o . n z
CAM September 2019
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