Farm Focus

Siddington Farm, started by Charles' father back in the late 1930's, originally comprised or a range of arable and small scale vegetable crops. Soft and top fruit was introduced in the 1960's which started as a side line and has now become the sold product of their business.

Over the 60 years, the Houlbrookes have always managed to change with the times, knowing when to get in and out of various crops. Charles used his grubbing grant to remove his apples and expand the strawberry production. However it was not until the mid 1980's when Elsanta became available, did the fruit business really evolve into a substantial part of the family business. This enabled the farm to sell fruit that gave a good yield, with taste and shelf life.

After meeting Neil Marrick, who at that time was working for GMS, Charles and Debbie were inspired to expand their fruit business. Arable crops were dropped during the mid 90's which enabled the Houlbrooke's to concentrate totally on strawberry production. Neil left GMS and joined AMS to assist Martin Seymour in continuing to develop the AMS operation. Neil was a huge influence on the farm " he opened our eyes to the potential for soft fruit" Charles explained. Tragically Neil died of Lukaemia in 1998. "He is missed greatly - a loss to the industry".

In 1992 they started to supply GMS, AMS and Hereford Fruit - "I thought we would give them each a chance". This mixture of marketing companies continued until Charles decided it was time to simplify life. So for Siddington Farm's class 1 fruit, AMS became sole marketing agent after 1998.

They have also supplied Liverpool wholesale market right from the beginning of their business back in the 1970's. By building up a very strong relationship with the traders at this market over time, they have found it to be a very useful outlet that complimenst their AMS/Supermarket business.

Charles runs the farm and Debbie takes care of all the students, which amounts to around 150 at the peak of production, all living on the farm. She has to be totally on the ball, making sure the rents are paid, wages are right and checking that the caravans are clean.

This family business structure is not unusual for a standard fruit farm,except that this farm is producing around 650 tonnes of strawberries per year. This comfortably puts them in the top 20 largest fruit businesses in the UK. Charles has built a good team around him, Glyn Lewis his foreman, good sprayers and packhouse team, but Charles still likes to be hands on. "It's good for the soul to do the work in a team" he explains. Debbie feels the same, "the students know they can talk to me about anything that is worrying them". SO although they have what must be a huge work load, they both want to keep close to the core of the business.

The blend of crops for 2003 is dominated by Elsanta 40 acres, no change on 2002 and Everest 30 acres. Charles tried a couple of acres of Diamante in 2002, which he is increasing next year - "Big fruit, easy to see and tastes OK - maybe possible to improve on yield by improving in plant propagation techniques?" he says frankly.

The farm also has 4 acres of Alice and Florence which help bridge the gaps in production and he will give EMR 154 another go in 2003.

What are the key factors to their success?

1. Bed formind in the autumn for Spring/Summer planting - soil management is make or break, Charles also likes to match the soil type to the variety. He prefers deep, fine sand (80%) and silt (20%) for Elsanta production and silt/clay coil for Everest. He would rather rent land away from his own farm than try to work soil that does not meet his requirement on his own farm.

2. K.I.S - Keep it simple - Charles has standardised everything. The tunnels are all 7.8 metres, of which he will have 40 acres in 2003. No high beds, "its just another complication to deal with! We would need to change tractors, sprayers; loaders - no thanks!"

3. People - "every year the supervisors change, this process needs a hell of a lot of looking after and can only be done by the right peron, which is usually me!" Getting the best out of people is key - "controlling harvest management is a religion, good-line management is critical".

4. Selecting the right varieties from the righit plant propagator is essential. Yields of 100 tonnes per acre are normal for Charles Everest; one block this year has produced 14 tonnes!

5. Keep "close" to every part of the business.

Autumn 2002