The Farmers Mart Oct/Nov 2015 - Issue 42 | Page 38

Mearbeck Farm We specialise in tax, farming and rural businesses Please contact us on 01729 823755 Settle Town Hall, Market Place, Settle, BD24 9EJ www.haworths.co.uk Registered to carry on audit work and regulated for a range of investment business activities by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. In The Courtyard, Settle. LOCAL - SEASONAL - FRESH Weekly specials and seasonally changing menus using the best ingredients, directly from local farms and suppliers. • Local and international beers rotating with the menus • • Wines from Buon Vino • • Cheese from Courtyard Dairy • OPEN DAILY - 8:30AM - 5:30PM THURSDAY, FRIDAY, SATURDAY 6:00PM - 9:00PM 01729892900 [email protected] Twitter - @BrasserieSettle Facebook - Brasserie In The Courtyard www.brasserieinthecourtyard.co.uk BD249JY Goad and Butcher Solicitors for North Yorkshire Caring for our clients for more than 100 years Agricultural – Domestic - Commercial Taking the stress out of all matters Legal Proud to be associated with the Bradley’s Tel: [phone] www.goadandbutcher.co.uk Goad and Butcher, Midland Bank Chambers Market Place, Settle, North Yorkshire, BD24 9DR 38 Oct/Nov 2015 www.farmers-mart.co.uk Blue is the colour – pig meat is the game Chris Berry talks with the Bradley brothers of Long Preston »»“Farmers’ traditional weakness is that we’ve been price takers and not makers,” says Andrew Bradley of Mearbeck Farm, Long Preston where he and his brother, Anthony resurrected their farming business after some turbulent times that saw them having to leave behind their forefathers’ generations of milking cows and even moving away from day-to-day farming for a while. Today they own the 170 acres where they have built up a solid enterprise based upon Andrew’s opening words about being price makers. The farm now runs to cattle, sheep, pigs and a business that has connected them with the general public, called The Blue Pig Company. “We both studied at Newcastle University and when we came back home it was to milk dairy cows,” says Andrew. “Everybody had cows around here. There were two dozen farms with dairy cows that you could see out of our farm window and now you can count those that are left on the fingers of one hand. Our granddad, Anthony had Dairy Shorthorns, our dad, William had Black & Whites and we were milking 100 cows when we were forced to sell up what we had. The milk price was terrible and we had invested heavily in cows, a new parlour, new building and buying quota. We were working all hours and making nothing.” They sold their cows, their equipment, milk quota and their sheep and let out their grassland to bring in one source of income. They then set about earning real money once again through drystone walling, working for builders and, during