Landpower recently opened a new state-of-the-art agricultural retail hub in Christchurch.
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After almost five years in the planning, Landpower’s new state-of-the-art agricultural retail hub in Yalhurst, Christchurch is officially open.
The day included a welcome and MP address from Hon Nicola Grigg – Associate Minister of Agriculture and a plaque unveiling.
Among invited guests were Cathrina Claas-Mühlhäuser, Chairperson CLAAS (Germany), who with three of her senior executives, made the long haul to be at the opening.
Built by Apollo Projects, based in Christchurch, they took this project from concept to completion, finishing on time and on budget.
Landpower is showing real commitment and economic investment to the Canterbury region, giving an opportunity for more staff to move to the region for training and career progression.
At a time when many businesses are having to make some tough decisions, Landpower Founder and Director, Herby Whyte, has kept his founding philosophy the same since he started in business.
“Investing back into the community.”
Herby and his wife started their working life in Invercargill as potato growers.
Wanting to purchase a potato harvester from overseas, Herby made an appointment to see the then Minister of Agriculture, Sir Brian Talboys, to get a licence to import one. This was the beginning of Herby’s love of machinery and the start of Landpower.
The newly opened agricultural hub represents the next phase - “Investing in the future of New Zealand agriculture”.
This reflects the progressive and developing world of Agtech and comes as Landpower heads into their 50th year of business in 2025.
The Yaldhurst facility is the centre of operations for Landpower who operate successfully from New Zealand whilst maintaining a large Australian footprint.
Parts, shipping, distribution, training, accounting, IT support, sales, etc, are just a few of the operations from this site that support Australasia.
With three of their Canterbury teams moving into this purpose-built facility, (support office, Templeton branch and training team), it is an exciting time that will enable staff to support farmers in a more efficient, collaborative, and easier way.
Under one roof, they can achieve a better customer experience offering more options.
For New Zealand to succeed in agriculture, Landpower realise they need to partner with international machinery specialists and be able to provide parts, service, and technical advice readily for customers.
With more automation and technology being introduced worldwide into new agricultural products, training and development for service technicians has become a large part of Landpower’s focus.
Service technicians now need to be more than just diesel mechanics, they need to be analysts and IT specialists and the move from their old premises where they only had one indoor training garage, will open huge training opportunities for the technicians.
The new premises incorporate six workshop bays, two purpose-built 120sqm training bays, a custom-built training room to enable their service technicians to be fully supported, as well as a parts distribution centre that will hold in excess of 30,000-part lines.
Landpower view getting their technical staff up to a level of proficiency as a long-term commitment and investing in an employee package that retains staff is key for them.
They know that trained staff and the tools for them to efficiently perform their job is vital to make Landpower grow into the future.
Gone are the days when technicians are huddled in a tractor cab with a small iPad sorting out the machine’s diagnostics, now it can all be sorted from the comfort of a large screen in a roomy training bay!
Understanding that continued training of their staff is essential, they also know the importance of sending senior staff to Germany to extend their knowledge.
Landpower also runs an apprentice exchange with England and Germany, and their training rooms are fully booked till December with training programmes for both technical and sales staff.
Whyte said, “Training and innovation is where our big advantage is over the next five years “, and he expects Landpower’s training facility will be a huge part of their company’s future.
With technology, farms are becoming more automated, and this means farmers are starting to change the way they farm.
Farming is demanding and it is 24/7, so at peak times like harvesting, farmers need to know that they can have their machinery up and running as to avoid loss of crop and cost escalation.
Landpower understands this and has the facility, staff, and knowledge to get farmers and their machinery back on the job.
Landpower’s brand partners are hand-picked from world-class manufacturers that specialise in the farming sector in Australia.
Such brands as CLAAS, Amazone, JCB, Vaderstad and Grimme.
They understand the power of relationships – with colleagues, their customers, local communities and within their own team.
These core values shape their culture and the way they do business.