It couldn't happen to nicer people and we couldn't be happier for them. Edward and Rachel Newling first approached us about expanding into the pre-sizing world 3 years ago and excitement was high, the Norfolkians making moves and competing with the Kentish Riviera. From the inception of the project the attention to detail has been second to none, taking into account the speciality of produce they deal with and excellent way they handle every aspect. God bless them, they must've done something horrible in a past life as Bramley and Pears have chosen them and good heavens have they stood up to the task - becoming specialists in dealing with what others dread. Transferring expertise from the old situation to the new has made for a fantastic project.

Edward sold his magic beans and put up a huge, impressive new building to house the pre-sizer (with the help of the ever attentive Wealden AM) and made space for the new behemoth to enter their lives. Installation started promptly and went well with the machine ready for the 2022 season. The Newling's knowledge and mastery of, especially pears, has been a godsend at every stage, with GREEFA learning better ways to engineer solutions to problems we didn't even know would exist. Their patience and kindness cannot be overstated and I know everyone at Kent Fruit Services and GREEFA appreciate the trust they placed in us to make their dream a reality.

There can be no doubt this new machine combined with Newling's passion and care for every apple and pear that enters their farm puts them at the forefront of top fruit production now and for years to come. 

We'd like to thank them again for their business with us and as always GREEFA for their assistance with the project. We look forward to filling up the rest of their building with other assorted machinery in the near future.

F W Mansfields: I’m sure you’re getting tired of hearing their name on our bulletin board but we’re not, so hush your noise, strap up and tune into what one of the most switched on fruit growers and packers in the country are doing.

The conundrum has always been what do you do when all of your packing line infeed and actual packing are automated but the trays come out to be handled by people to be palletised. The solution? Bow down to the evil robot overlords. Mansfields devised a magnificent plan to automate the outfeed for their busiest packing lines and feed them directly into some BURG topline palletisers (link) to be stacked in whatever arrangement the heart desires and be strapped before being ejected at the end ready for loading onto the trucks. This all being done in the tightest, most space saving orientation possible to allow for maximum storage of packed product in the dispatch area. This needed some outside the box thinking but luckily we have that in abundance with both Joan van Burg and especially Lee Port bouncing fantastic ideas off each other to overcome all manner of potential speedbumps in the planning journey.

We now have 4 palletisers placed side by side and a strapper at the end. Not only this but there is an array of belting to feed the empty crates from one centralized area to each packing line, with a screen giving all the information needed about amounts and types of trays required. What an absolutely incredible set up.

If you have any hopes and dreams of automated packing, palletising and strapping please don’t hesitate to get in touch and we’ll start the plotting and scheming. 

Things in 3s are often more popular than things in 1s, even if they're a bit scary at first...orchard sprayers prove no different. Our Munckhof 3 Row Sprayers are leaders in the UK market due to their durability, simplicity and universal connectivity to all new and developing technologies. 

Over the past decade a score of extremely well respected farms such as Adrian Scripps, F W Mansfields, Goatham, Gaskains, Simon Bray, Chandler and Dunn, ACH Farming (to name just a few) have taken the leap from 1 to 3 row spraying, embracing the future. Now they wouldn't look back, with all new plantings done so with our multi-row in mind. Not only do they save on fuel for tractors, work time for operators but now also chemical usage too.

With prices sadly rocketing for every aspect of farming over the past few years there's never been more emphasis on cost savings where possible. Our 3 row sprayer assists all elements, especially with it's new precision spraying capabilities as showcased at our Precision Farming Conference last month. This is just another string to our increasingly full bow, allowing tree level spraying right now, with variable rate applications in a 3D format coming very soon. 

Our aim is to continue facilitating the coming together of all firms at the forefront of precision spraying technology, making sure our clients have the easiest route into acquiring everything they could possibly want; from orchard mapping and blossom thinning to pest control and ensuring our machines are capable of carrying them out. 

We're really excited about the future and what our sprayers will be capable of in the coming years, building on the fantastic foundation we have now. Keep your eyes peeled for further updates from the spraying world!

ISS are the latest in a long line to succumb to BURG’s charms. Who couldn’t look deep into Joan’s eyes and fall head over heels. This time it’s for a glorious BFI to help streamline the flow wrapping process.

This can often be a very labour intensive exercise, with an extended flow wrap machine’s infeed being swarmed with people in order to keep up with the hungry beast. The BURG BFI takes all the labour, cost and hassle out of the process. The noble looking steed takes as many apples as you can feed it and aligns them perfectly for whatever arrangement the heart desires, even doing odd numbers. This isn’t just a one trick pony, it can feed apples into trays too, as well as doing different produce. Check with us today if your produce is one of the lucky ones.
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It's horses for courses as they say and our money is on ISS to be the frontrunner in the imported packing game for a long time coming. John and David’s clear and concise communication of their needs and wants were paramount to such a successful project and as always we really appreciate both the business and also trust to provide a key cog in a larger machine.

G H Dean came to us with the remit of finding the best sprayer for modern, post and wire orchards which would give them the optimal spray coverage whilst allowing them to integrate with the precision spraying future/present. We pretended to look around for a good few seconds before landing on the one row airbag sprayer by Munckhof. This takes the airbag technology from the 3 row and shrinks it down to a convenient single row machine, retaining the optimal spray pattern we all know and love whilst being a smaller footprint.

Lukasz was the dream customer the whole way through, ensuring everything we spoke about was exactly what they wanted and needed from spray height to optional extras everything was carefully curated with the future in mind. Their sprayer is at the forefront of orchard technology and can feed in any prescription maps from those such as Aurea (link) to be able to reduce chemical use and human intervention by spraying exactly what’s needed, to only those trees that require it.
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G H Dean are an incredibly progressive, fast growing company which are committed to investing in the future and it give us great pride that they placed their trust in us to go forward together with them. Thanks to Lukasz and Tim as always and we look forward to co-operating again!

Mr Andrew Bridger, your Combisort is ready for collection. That’s Mr Bridger for a GREEFA Combisort.

Andy made the only logical decision and chopped his “perfect” (in name only) grader in and purchased a more perfecter GREEFA. No amount of nonsense English can describe how magnificent the machine is and it now stands proudly in West Kent ready to remain for a long time coming.

It’s a well-formed machine with only a dozen exits and onto packing tables; there’s beauty in simplicity. The Bridger family’s operation is as smooth as silk and every apple has a home for it, which is unusual in this day and age. Their connection to countless outlets has sheltered them from the supermarket storms and they continue to thrive in a tumultuous sea of sales.

The installation of the machine was a doddle and Max was a delight to tutor and quickly grasped the easy to read user interface, mastering the arts within the first week. We connected to the BURG to continue the budding relationship between the two and the line has run immaculately.
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As always, we’d like to extend our warmest thanks to Max and Andy for the trust they placed in us to deliver a world class machine for a world class business. There are few lovelier folks in the business and it was an absolute pleasure from start to finish. 

George Charltons & Sons have long been thought of as folks at the forefront of top fruit grading and packing and they’ve continued the long and storied collaboration with BURG with the purchase of new and shiny dedicated packing lines.

Charlton’s packhouse was a challenging one to fit everything required into, much like playing Tetris after a few shandies it wasn’t easy. However, thank the Lord for the sober brain of Joan van Burg who worked tirelessly to scale the differences in floor heights, peak round every corner and sneak past every pillar. The result was a wonderfully bespoke configuration giving Charlton’s every line they had wanted in the space provided.

They now have three flow wrapper lines, an existing Q-flow (Booooo) and two quicker and more efficient BFI lines. There is also a double speed bagger line for all the polybagging needs and a utility line of one side speed bagger, one side tray packing for ultimate flexibility, because as we all know those pesky but beloved supermarkets are always changing their minds.

Now as we know Charltons are not just UK fruit oriented but have a full scale import program on their hands and as such they need a better plan for potentially tipping imported boxes into all tanks. Would you believe it we have a solution for that! A single point of box tipping, elevated onto belting and dropped into the decided upon channel ready to be used on whichever line it may be. Magnificent.
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If you want us to navigate your maze and end at the holy grail, get in touch with us today. Until next time, fortune and glory, folks. 

The company is half way through its 48th year of trading and the big 5-0 is just around the corner. We couldn’t let the year pass by without some 50th birthday prep work.

We teamed up with Kylie at Rare Creative to cultivate something sleek and refreshing for the company. 
2020 as enabled us to step back a little and reassess our image. A lot of thought and time has gone into the new design and one we are particularly proud of. Our previous logo and image have been with us a long time and one we are widely known for. However, we felt it was time to bring a new light to the company that will take us forward as we grow.

F W Mansfields have purchased a wonderful new (to us and them) camera system that takes 1-3 high quality pictures of each bin of fruit, and automatically assigns them to bin on the grading system. This can be combined with a grade-out report to provide more clarity and transparency about the grading process to third party growers. There are often tensions that arise from the grading process, between grower's perceptions and grading reality, and this camera system looks to assuage those concerns with cold, hard picture evidence. This provides useful feedback for Mansfields customers that can only strengthen relationships going forward.

If you grade fruit for third party growers and are interested in this system, get in touch with us today to receive an information pack about the process and possibilities. 

Our workshop has recently taken in some spare parts that we have refurbished and are now ready to be sold. Head over to our new ‘For Sale’ Tab to see what is available.

Currently we are not taking online payments, however, if you are interested please call the office on 01227 765069.
Delivery charges apply.