30 years of service to farmers and ground workers
The Early Years!
The business started about 30 years ago when my parents moved to Dorset. Like many businesses it started by chance. I found myself driving for a local agricultural contractor – it wasn’t a huge step to go from there to dealing in agricultural equipment.
I developed the business together with my wife and naturally enough the children (all of whom just happen to be boys) spent time with me while I was going about my work. Not surprisingly, they learnt by watching, whether it was buying or selling, loading or unloading or refurbishing the equipment in the yard. We moved premises more than once and now have our own yard in Semley. It's called Shunters Yard because there used to be a station here which was closed by Dr Beeching. There was a large dairy and trains used to take the milk from here to London.
Here come the boys!
As they’ve grown older and left school, the boys have joined the firm one by one. We now employ our three eldest boys, George, Henry and Edward but Toby, the youngest, is still at school. We deliberately don’t have job titles because we all share the work between us. It’s not that I’m not involved, far from it, we just choose to blur the roles more than they might be in more conventional businesses. George, the eldest, does the lion’s share of the collection and delivery work and is responsible for much of the buying and underwriting. Henry manages the yard and deals with customers while Edward is most involved in the preparation and refurbishment of the stock, making sure that nothing substandard leaves the premises. Kim, my wife deals with all the paperwork and keeps a watchful eye on them all; after all, before they were big enough, it was just her and me doing the lot!
The business has expanded a lot in the last few years as the boys’ manpower has become available. The yard has grown considerably and now we typically have 500 – 700 items of stock ranging from tractors and quads, to telehandlers and diggers and all in all shapes and sizes. We initially set up a website in 2008 to explore the possibilities and having found it to be useful, re-designed it in November 2010. We hope you like it and find it useful!
Quality Equipment, Quality Manufacturers
Tractors and diggers of all sorts are still the largest part of the business but they also deal in many other types of plant and machinery. Seed drills, bowsers, trailers, fertiliser spreaders, muck spreaders, quad bikes, compressors, dumper trucks pickups and rollers, are all part of the mix as well as buckets for diggers and replacement caterpillar tracks.The main manufacturers we use include: Benford, BobCat, Case, Caterpillar, Deutz, Ford, Honda, Ifor Williams, JCB, John Deere, JPM, Kawasaki, Kubota, Manitou, Massey Ferguson, McConnell, McCormick, New Holland, Parmiter, Sitrex, Thwaites, Volvo, and Warwick among many others.
It is very much a family business. We still live together as a single family under one roof and live eat and sleep work. But it isn’t all work, work, work! George and Henry are both members of the local Young Farmers Club and spend most weekends partying hard although Henry is always available for weekend sales.
Henry enjoys testing the various pieces of machinery on the land surrounding the yard He has also recently taken to rearing pigs. He has three Tamworths at the moment as well as two Oxford Sandy & Blacks and is hoping to raise more next year.
Ed is a keen poultryman and has a great sense of humour! He's very keen on keeping us clean and tidy too!
Kim spends much of her spare time riding her horse on the Salisbury downs which are nearby but enjoys spending time with Robert and the boys.
I enjoy spending as many weekends as I can at our house in Cornwall or visiting family and friends but I am passionate about plant and machinery and I am very lucky that my hobby and my work are one and the same!
Thank you for your interest in us and we hope that you find whatever you need here at www.tractorsandplant.com.
Robert McLean