Ransomes Jacobsen Open Days 2012

The Ransomes Jacobsen Open Days again proved to be a great success. The weather stayed fine and visitors were kept busy with educational events, factory tours and practical demonstrations and trials.

The event, which is held biennially, offers the opportunity for the company to show off their complete range of machinery on their own doorstep. This allows a greater flexibility and reduces dramatically the cost of showcasing their wares.

The event took place on and around their three hole pitch and put course which, after five years, has matured beautifully and offers a testing challenge of golf.

For the keen golfers there was a nearest the pin competition, which proved very popular with the five hundred plus attendees, although many did not manage to find the green and had to retrieve their balls from the water hazards. The eventual winner was from Sweden, who came over as a guest of the Swedish dealer Svenningsen, won himself a Barbour Jacket .

The tented village provided stand spaces for a number of Ransomes Jacobsen's industry partners together with their own Parts, Customer Care, Retail and Cutting Edge Training stands.

An historic collection of Ransomes machinery and mowers lined the course from the earliest Budding patents to the current state of the art range of modern equipment.

More than three hundred and fifty people took the opportunity to go on the factory visit enabling them to view, at first hand, the production lines in action and see the degree of investment made. Many I spoke to were surprised at the scale of the operations and the speed and quality of components and machinery being produced.

It was easy to see why the food tent/marquee was popular, with the catering staff putting on a tremendous spread that included breakfast, lunch and afternoon teas.

Gary Mumby from BLEC was onsite building a brand new golf tee, enabling the visitors to see laser levelling in progress, making full use of the east coast's sunny weather.

Henry Bechelet, who recently joined Everris as Technical Sales Manager, was on hand to talk about new fertiliser products. Wiedennman held aeration workshops on the football pitch.

Visitors also had the opportunity to take a shuttle to Trinity Park where they were able to test drive many of the company's large fleet of mowers, as well as using the new Cushman utility off road vehicle track.

Talking to many of the attendees who came on our Pitchcare stand, the open days were thoroughly enjoyed and worthwhile. They went away with a better understanding of the company and the large scale of production on offer.

Don't give up the opportunity of visiting the next one in 2014.