For the Hawkes household, greens aren’t small potatoes. In truth, potatoes play a pivotal position of their Victorian farm and produce enterprise situated in Boneo on the picturesque Mornington Peninsula.
“Our enterprise includes three elements. We’ve got the farm itself the place we develop quite a lot of greens and promote wholesale to grocers and eating places,” mentioned co-owner Georgie Hawkes.
“Then we now have our farmgate, together with our on-line retailer, which is a direct-to-public retail shopfront after which we now have what we name ‘Hawkes Produce’, which is the processing facet of the enterprise.
“We’ve got a facility the place we grade, wash and bundle up produce prepared for market, the vast majority of which is potatoes. Whereas a few of this produce is our personal, we additionally course of potatoes for different growers who don’t have these amenities.”
It’s a various enterprise mannequin that has confirmed efficient for the farming household.
In keeping with Hawkes, the farm’s success and development may be attributed to a mix of excessive yield farming follow and vertical enterprise integration, the Hawkes’ develop, pack, and market their very own product.
“My husband Richard is a six-generation vegetable farmer. His dad initially purchased the farm right here within the Seventies, however he comes from a protracted line of veggie growers,” mentioned Hawkes.
“He understands what’s required to make sure the soil circumstances are optimum, similar to crop rotation for top yields.”
Richard started rising potatoes within the early 2000s, initially trialling some on a small patch of the household farmland. Now, potatoes make up their largest line.
“That is adopted by Dutch carrots, and we additionally develop spring onions, radishes, kale and parsley,” Hawkes continued.
“We lately had a contract for laundry a big amount of carrots, so we upgraded our tools.”
The improve concerned the acquisition of latest washer machines from abroad.
Though state-of-the-art, when the group at Hawkes assembled the machines at their facility, the bearings didn’t seem to suit accurately.
“It wasn’t fairly proper, so Richard contacted BSC, which is our go-to service supplier, urgently concerning the elements wanted,” mentioned Hawkes.
“I don’t know the complete particulars of the alternate, however I perceive that the blokes from BSC went above and past to assist us out.”
Leon Stefanec, BSC’s nationwide enterprise improvement supervisor for meals and beverage, was the one who took Richard’s name.
“Richard referred to as our after-hours service line on a Saturday afternoon with an pressing enquiry about bearings. The brand new processing tools he’d bought from abroad had points with the bearings – maybe they didn’t match accurately, and had been of inferior high quality,” mentioned Stefanec.
“The washer was essential to Hawkes Greens having the ability to fulfill a big carrot washing contract that they had. Richard was conscious of the significance of the contract. That they had a strict timeline to stick to and wanted to course of a big batch of carrots in a really quick timeframe, in any other case the greens would spoil.”
Because the Hawkes’ household wanted a big amount of high-quality bearings, and shortly, Leon instantly contacted NSK.
“They had been up towards it, and it was uncommon for us to obtain an order for such a excessive amount of bearings and housings out of enterprise hours, so I principally rang NSK immediately,” mentioned Stefanec.
“NSK have a fantastic after-hours course of and repair and their department shouldn’t be too removed from BSC Frankston, which is the native department to the Hawkes’ household. Richard was insistent that he wanted a very good high quality bearing model, so I elected to go along with NSK figuring out the significance of the contract to them and never wanting the produce to spoil.
“We had been in a position to assist them out, with myself and one of many Hawkes’ upkeep employees assembly on the NSK warehouse in Dandenong to satisfy the order.”
When Stefanec adopted up on Monday, all was nicely on the Hawkes’ carrot processing entrance.
“Once I adopted up, they had been delighted with the NSK bearings, every thing had match completely, they had been proud of the standard, they usually’d managed to begin manufacturing over the weekend,” Stefanec mentioned.
“There was no lack of manufacturing or produce, they usually had been in a position to meet their deadline. An awesome consequence that we had been glad to have helped obtain.”
Importantly, the NSK bearings that Leon advisable have particular options that make them an acceptable alternative for produce washing purposes.
“This specific bearing is a triple lip with a large internal ring. The triple lip seal is famend for working nicely in meals and beverage kind purposes the place there’s plenty of water, whether or not that’s within the processing similar to vegetable washing on the Hawkes’ facility, or with excessive strain washdowns within the hygiene course of,” mentioned Stefanec.
“The bearings are very suited to the Hawkes’ software, not simply on the washer however probably on their conveyors too, because the bearings will probably be uncovered to plenty of water and chilly circumstances within the cool room.
“The triple lip seal works nicely to maintain the grease in and contaminants out.”
For Georgie Hawkes, whereas the bearing high quality is paramount, it’s BSC’s service that makes a key distinction to the household enterprise.
“Our household, and this goes again actually to Richard’s household earlier than me, have been working with BSC for many years now,” mentioned Hawkes.
“We’ll proceed to work with them as a result of they supply nice, dependable service and all of the merchandise they advocate carry out nicely. On this current instance, I heard one of many guys serving to out missed his child’s soccer recreation.
“We don’t need anybody lacking soccer video games, so we positively recognize them serving to us out to such an extent. It was an pressing scenario, they usually actually got here by way of for us.”
Stefanec mentioned many farming households on the Mornington Peninsula depend on the BSC Frankston department for tools elements.
“We play an vital position in servicing the peninsula, each for agriculture and meals producers,” he mentioned.
“The farming group on this a part of Victoria is numerous and have numerous necessities, however they’ve one facet in frequent, high quality. And we offer high quality manufacturers and repair above all else, which fits a great distance on this a part of the world.”
