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Fieldays - Advertising and Promotion

John Wanamaker (1838-1922) is most often attributed to the quote "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half”.  We have had many conversations about this over the last year or so.  When Orange Cross was in its infancy the shareholders and directors paid for Fieldays sites and we had no paid staff over the four days. We have a philosophy to keep costs to clients down which means we look closely at all spending that is not going into se...

Price Rise

It has been a long time since we reviewed pricing.We no longer offer coreflute solutions for outside products like signs and we have had increases in costs that we have absorbed through the last two years.  We cannot sustain that so from October 2022 our monthly subscription will rise to $40 plus GST a month.  New Clients only,We are grateful for the clients that have supported us as we have fine tuned our processes and the product.  There are over 600 templates (and that excludes...

Level One - not level None

For many of us, we are just venturing out of AB and for the first time in awhile we are going to more places than the farm store and Vet clinic.   So where have you been in the last 10 days - can you remember where and when you were off farm?The covid tracing app is an important part of the Level One controls.  If everyone uses it and there is a case (which is possible) then any restrictions can be localised and short - because tracing those at risk is easy....

Snap it

Level 2 is the biggest change to farmers in the entire COVID response.   Not because we will do anything differently – but because we will need to track and trace (as with every kiwi).   If you – or someone you know, or a person at a café you went to, or someone who called into the farm store the same day as you…. is found to have COVID19 then you will be contacted and need to tell people where you have been for the last two weeks. Each store has a responsibility...

Hide and Seek

WARNING - THIS IS ANOTHER RANT FROM THE CEO Why stay at home… ?  surely I can just pop out for some ”fresh air” by driving 10 mins down the road??  But we LOVE  that park, walkway etc... This is a national level experience of one of childhoods finest games.   Hide and Seek. We are both hider and seeker. Remember the double back that masters of the game played? you waited till the ‘seeker’ came near you, failed to find you When they moved on, ...

What if we go Level 4

We are not experts in pandemic responses.  We do know a little about business continuity plans and we will do a few  posts about how you can think about things should your region/all NZ are placed in LEVEL 4 response to COVID19 (link to govt site) Every farm/business is different and these are not solutions.  They are prompts to get you to think about what makes sense for your business.  It is easier to have thought about these ideas BEFORE you need to use them.&nbs...

Hey townie - we got ya back

Don’t worry townies – we got ya back The only reason people get to fight over toilet rolls and panic buy coffee (cheers Wellington for putting that in perspective) is because you out-source your hunting and gathering to farmers.  As our country takes on the WWII of our generation it is time to remind some of how fortunate they are to have that opportunity to sit in cafes, have lunch breaks and take holidays.   Maybe this will be our generation’s forced awakening -  to ...

You are not alone

For many in the Dairy Industry this is the "dry" time.  Before calving starts there is a bit more flexibility in the day, new season targets are set and people have finished the move after annual gypsy day. There is still many things that need to be done and the list of "when we are dry" jobs never seems to get sorted before the first calf is on the ground.  This is for those that had the "get a HnS system" in place on the list.   You don't need one. If you have been far...

Never have a HnS meeting!

We are farmers, our clients are (mostly) farmers.  People who love farming and people who love meetings are often not the same person.  You got into farming because you didn't like working indoors, you thought animals (cows in particular) were more predictable than humans and you like riding a motorbike.  Maybe you love meetings - you like nothing better than writing up a checklist and ticking it off.   Even so I personally can recommend - never have a HnS meeting. Even ...

Don't Reinvent the Wheel

We really believe that farmers and small biz owners in NZ are generally doing a good job at keeping people safe and healthy.  We have massive areas to improve - but as a rule most people are doing OK.  We just need to document those decisions that we call 'common sense'. Similarly it makes no sense for the developers and managers of Orange Cross to design and maintain a complex chemical handling register when one is available already.    So we have designed Orange Cross to li...

Password Monster

I volunteer for the school PA – there are about 5% of the families doing 95% of the work to raise money for planting trees, improving playgrounds and our latest coup – FLYING FOXES!! (self congratulatory whoop whoop!) So everyone is excited and they drive past completely adequate schools to come to ours but they don’t appreciate the effort to get it looking/feeling so good.  This rant is about passwords – coz we have just transferred another chunk to the BoT account and what a ...

Inducting Staff to site

So you have new staff and the season is already happening and you want to know where to start.  We recommend the resources at DairyNZ for anyone (even the non Dairy people and non farming people).  They are really comprehensive and you can save them to your PC for tweeking and making your own. Staff are most likely to read and be engaged in your porcesses when they first arrive.  Take time to go through the things that you may think are "normal" and make sure that you allow them t...