Down through the decades, the Cotter family in Cappoquin, Co Waterford has earned itself a stellar reputation for the work they’ve carried out in agricultural contracting all over the local region. Second generation farmer Kieran Cotter told us more.
Since the 1960s, the Cotter family name has been synonymous with excellence in agricultural contracting and two years ago saw the latest landmark for the Waterford-based farming family.
Cotter Agri Contractors Ltd was officially born in January 2014 and is headed up by father and son combination, John and Kieran Cotter, whom have continued the good work that the family have been carrying out through six different decades now.
Kieran has been involved in agricultural contracting practically all of his working life and has followed in his father’s footsteps in setting up his own company, while keeping the same clientele that have stuck with them down through the years.
“We’re in Aglish, Cappoquin, Co Waterford and my dad would have been at this since back in 1966,” explained Kieran.
“Cotter Agri Contractors officially started up in January 2014. We have four staff here, which includes myself, my dad and my cousin David. Michael is the fourth fella here then and he would be working with my dad for more than 35 years now.”
Through 50 years of farming, Kieran’s father John has built up invaluable experience in the industry and passed it down to the family, with his other son Sean also involved via maintaining their machinery through his own company.
Kieran himself explained that the Cotters have never strayed too far away from the two core aspects of the business, which Cotter Agri Contractors Ltd are now firmly concentrating on.
“We are mainly agri contractors and the work that we do would mostly be in beet and maize,” he explained.
“We’ve been growing maize for years now and we’ve over 250 acres of land here which is leased out, so we’re definitely kept busy with what we’re doing here. Summer is upon us again now and that brings even more work for us with silage and that.”
The busy times come down to the thousands of man hours that his father has put in, according to Kieran, with customers unwilling to go elsewhere when it comes to their agri contracting needs.
At the moment, business is good and it’s about to get a whole lot better again with the summer months and silage season fast approaching. For Kieran, he can’t ask for much more than for him and his staff to be kept busy in what is undoubtedly a tough period for farmers across Ireland.
“I’d be happy with it at the moment. So far as our customer base goes, we have a serious list of clientele that deal with us for their agri needs,” he said.
“We have a great relationship with our customers here and that goes back to the work that my father did for them all down through the years. All of our customers would be within a 20-mile radius and we’d do a lot of work for them in and around Dungarvan.”
So what’s the secret? Why do Cotter Agri Contractors’ customers come to them first ahead of other agri outfits?
For Kieran, it’s about the way in which they carry out their service and the relationship that they have established their customers.
“I’d say it comes down to our work. We take wicked pride in the work that we do here,” he said.
“The first thing is to do the job right and in a professional manner. I’m dealing with lads that are sons of the lads that may father used to do work for, so we’ve definitely developed a good reputation down through the years, you could say.”
While Kieran himself is a popular figure within the local community, having played inter-county football for Waterford and currently holding the managerial post at the local Geraldines club, he insists that it doesn’t put on patch on what John Cotter has down around Aglish and all over the county.
“My father is 72 years old and is still working with us here every day,” Kieran beamed.
“John and his brother Tom started the business from scratch and built it up to the point where they were cutting 3,000 acres of silage with only two machines, which is remarkable really.
“I take great pride in what he has done. He has worked hard for everything he has and the man is still at it!”
So far as the company’s fleet is concerned, the Cotters have tended to stick with the New Holland brand, which they’ve always found highly reliable.
“We have seven tractors here altogether and we tend to stick with New Holland when it comes to our machinery. We recently got a Volvo L70H, which we’re very happy with,” said Kieran.
“We would do a bit of grass silage and the main thing for us in the summer months when it’s very busy is that the machines don’t stop.
“We know a lot about New Hollands and find them a very reliable machine. Cavanagh’s in Fermoy supply them for us.
“We’re also running Claas triple mowers on a New Holland T7 250 and we purchased a new Claas 860 last year with a new eight row maize head. All of our Claas gear is bought off McCarthys in Carrigtwohill in Co Cork.”
As aforementioned, Kieran’s brother Sean has his own agri sales and services outfit in Aglish.
The company is called Blackwater Agri, which was set-up by Sean in 2006, and has been of great benefit to the family business ever since.
“Blackwater Agri is owned and ran my brother Sean and he’s a serious asset for us. He helps maintain our fleet and supplies us with second hand tractors as well,” said Kieran.
“The Volvo we bought was off Pat O’Donnell and we get our oil from East Cork Oils. They have a depo in Aglish and they’re the only crowd that I will deal with when it comes to oil.”
Overall, the Cotters look to be in good shape for years to come, with this summer set to be another busy one, according to the co-director of the company.
“I’ve the same lads with me every year when it comes to silage for the last 15 years,” said Kieran.
“We have been flat out setting up crops for the last few weeks and we’re cutting 350 acres of maize at the moment. We were harvesting 200 acres of beet in 2015 and it will be the same again this year, if not more.”
Great to hear.
Cotter Agri Contractors
Aglish,
Cappoquin,
Co. Waterford
Tel: 087 6227677
Taken from Irish Tractor & Agri magazine Vol 4 No 5, June 2016
