| 85 nzdairy DAIRY SERVICES » Ordish & Stevens Five decades of dedicated service Virginia Wright From their base in Masterton Ordish & Stevens design, supply, install and service rural infrastructure in the Wairarapa. The company has been around for 50 years providing irrigation, water reticulation and milking systems to the region, and, while their core business hasn’t changed, it went from private ownership to being part of a bigger corporate enterprise for a few years until it went back into private ownership when it was bought in 2016 by its current owners Scott and Lisa Forbes. A fitter and welder by trade with a background in mechanical and electrical engineering Scott Forbes started with Ordish & Stevens not long after he arrived in the Wairarapa over 20 years ago. Scott was Branch Manager when the corporate owner decided to step away and he and Lisa bought Scott and Lisa Forbes. the business. Most of the highly skilled and experienced staff stayed on as they worked together to maintain business as usual. While they primarily supply on farm services they’re also involved in some asset management as well as council infrastructure, Scott explains. “Basically our clients are anyone who’s rurally located and not on a town system so it could be a dairy farmer or a lifestyler or someone who’s got a cottage out in the country. We do milking systems and anything to do with pumping, or water filtration and treatment systems including wastewater and effluent for a thousand cows or a tiny house.” In the 10 years since the Forbes took over the business they’ve added a number of apprentices to their team of specialist electricians, machine operators, pump technicians, fitters & welders, and effluent, irrigation and drinking water system designers. Their ongoing commitment to training maintains a high level of experience in the team which means they can provide the level of support for their customers which is at the heart of their business. Turnkey packages, repairs and maintenance, or emergency response to a breakdown, Ordish & Stevens does it all. “We’ll design and install whatever system someone needs. We’ve got a great supplier network and we keep stock on hand in our retail outlet so that we can provide the local support people need to keep their existing systems running without having to wait if they want to do it themselves; plus our team can generally find what they need pretty quickly to sort out whatever problem they’re fixing,” says Scott. 50 years of experience sits behind their ability to solve problems for their customers from beginning to end: putting in a treatment system to remove the iron and manganese from the bore water that breaches Fonterra’s levels starts with them taking samples and getting the lab results before they design and install a system to fix the problem that meshes seamlessly with the existing milking infrastructure. They understand that their customers usually need their response as fast as possible. If they haven’t got water for stock they’ve got problems, any issue that stops cows being milked costs money, and Ordish & Stevens aim to get someone there to sort it out as fast as possible with minimal disruption thanks to their 24/7 on-call back up and breakdown service. They’re the Waikato Milking Agent and they‘re also there to support, supply and service any other milking shed that needs it throughout the Wairarapa. Whether it’s designing and installing a farm-wide irrigation system or repairing a leaky valve Ordish & Stevens make it their business to have everything on hand to help. ORDISH & STEVENS
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