Stacking up a Milestone

O G E Chapman &Sons of Long Sutton, Lincolnshire were the fiftieth UK grower to install an Oldenhuis & Prinsen palletiser since David Harrison Handling Solutions were appointed UK distributor. The event was marked with a presentation of certificates from OP Managing Director Lammert Prinsen and Harrison’s Sales Manager Gary Palmer.

The simplicity and reliability of the OP palletiser has guaranteed its success among small and medium growers and packhouses, providing a lifeline to many through the ups and downs of the market. Michael and Jamie Chapman grow 2400 tons of Marris Piper potatoes on 120 acres of rich Fen soil and find that their machine’s 9.5 tons per hour capacity enables them to respond quickly to market demands without recourse to additional labour.

The Chapmans are proud of their history from council tenants, through acquisition of neighbouring smallholdings to successful growers and they bought the OP only after thorough investigation of alternative systems. Having talked to existing operators, including four OP customers, their informed purchase was for the latter. The controls are simple and their 25kg bags can be neatly stacked up to 13 layers high, much higher than manual stacking. Whilst every OP palletiser is programmed to customer needs on delivery, additional programming to suit large or medium crops is simple with no need to call out an engineer with a laptop!

Service call outs on the OP on the other hand are rare. In fact Gary Palmer reports that 90% are resolved over the telephone.

The 50 UK units equates to 25% of Oldenhuis & Prinsen’s total production of palletisers over the past ten years, all of which remain in daily use, except one which was destroyed in a building fire in Holland.