For more than three decades, Greg McGovern has been providing farmers in and around beautiful Ballyconnell with first-class agricultural contacting services. We travelled to Snugborough at the foot of Slieve Rushen Mountain to meet the straight-talking Cavan man and discuss his love of machinery and a life of contracting, with the emphasis very much on local service.
The genesis of Greg McGovern Agri Contractor dates back to 1988, when the eponymous Greg returned to his native Ballyconnell after a spell working in the United States. He grew up on the home family farm, where his brother Sean now runs a successful beef enterprise. Due to his innate interest in and passion for machinery, it was perhaps inevitable that Greg would go down the contracting path…
In ’88, the Ballyconnell man purchased a Ford 7700 and started doing silage with a single chop harvester, quickly extending his services to also include slurry and dung spreading. Today, a complete range of no-frills silage, slurry, hedge cutting and reseeding solutions are provided, quickly, efficiently and with the minimum of fuss to dairy and beef farmers alike within the local catchment area.
Over the years, Greg has developed strong working relationships with local farmers and his reputation for invariably delivering top-quality workmanship culminates in a large volume of repeat business. “Most of the men we cut for in ’88, we are still working for them today,” he confirms. “We culled a few ourselves and we were shafted a couple of times but it’s 99% repeat business.
“It’s a very local service. Most of the work we do, we could walk home afterwards if we had to. I don’t see any sense in going 40 or 50 miles to work … if you look after the work you have close to home, then you are doing well.”
Greg’s attitude has always been that if something isn’t broken, then why fix it and, to that end, he has stuck with the Ford marque. At the heart of his fleet are ten tractors – two Ford TW15s and one TW35, plus one Case MXM140 while the rest are New Hollands.
“The Fords do the job so I stick with them,” he notes. “One of those 15s has over 40,000 hours on it and it’s still flying. They are brilliant. They’re simple and that’s why they last. They’re not packed with a pile of fancy electrics that you don’t need. I saw a word for myself the other day: technophobe. There’s no need for half of what’s going into tractors these days. Nine times out of ten a wire has fallen off a sensor and the tractor thinks there’s something wrong. Why not keep it simple? If the sensor for oil levels goes wrong, then you are going nowhere … whats’s wrong with a dipstick?”
Greg looks after all the servicing and most of the maintenance himself and is especially busy in the shed at this time of year. “I have more tractors than I need but if something goes wrong then I always have a back-up,” he states. “Tinkering around in the shed in my hobby and I really enjoy it when there’s time – but not as much when I’m busy and under pressure. That’s why I have two harvesters and two mowers, to take the pressure off.”
Not one to go out actively seeking new work, the Cavan man says he has more than enough to keep him going. “We’re busy enough and I don’t like to take on too much. 2020 was a good year and, to be honest, as long as everybody is safe and well at the end of it, then it’s been a wonderful year as far as I’m concerned.
“I know a lot of people who will go out on Sundays and late at night but, as long as you have enough to keep you going, that’s plenty. It would be a different story if I had new harvesters and tractors still to pay for, but you don’t need to worry about that if you have good-quality, reliable older gear.”
As a rule, Greg will only invest in new machinery if it adds value to his business. In the last while, for example, he purchased a well-kept 2006-reg tractor with 7,000 hours on it. He runs a very busy silage outfit: “We have two John Deere self-propelled harvesters – a 6750 and a 6910 – and mow with two Big Ms. We have six Stanley trailers and a trailed mower just in case it’s a wet year – but we haven’t taken that out in years. We also have a JCB 416s shovel in the pit.
“For slurry, we have pipes there since 1995, a couple of tankers and an agitator. We spread 80% of our slurry with pipes but have a dribble bar as well.”
Hedge cutting is another busy area and Greg runs two McConnel trimmers alongside a saw he made himself. He also does quite a lot of ploughing and reseeding. “The hedge cutting lasts all winter and it gives us something to do at this time of year. Between that and working in the shed, I’m kept busy. During the summer, when things get really busy, we could have seven or eight men working but, as I said earlier, the important thing is that everybody gets home safe every night. Once everyone is safe, the work will get done.”
While there is some excellent land in the locality, the terrain is predominantly wet and hilly, which renders contracting anything but straightforward. With so many hills and slopes to navigate, does Greg modify any of his machinery accordingly? “You just have to be very careful,” he replies.
By offering unrivalled levels of customer service, Greg McGovern Agri Contractor has been catering for the needs of generations of the farming community along the Cavan / Fermanagh border for three decades and counting. At the end of the day, is it service that keeps customers coming back?
“It’s obviously my personality,” Greg quips, before concluding: “I don’t tell them lies. If we say we will do it, we will do it. I don’t ever tell them we’d get something done knowing full well that we won’t get it done. It works both way: I have excellent customers and the people I work with always pay me. The most important thing is to keep them happy. Why would you go looking for somebody 20 miles away when there are good people close to home?”
Greg McGovern Agri Contractor,
Snugborough,
Ballyconnell,
County Cavan.
Tel: 087 6812424
First published in Irish Tractor & Agri magazine Vol 10 No 3, May/June 2022
