RDO director and machinery dealership veteran Bruce Vandersee (right) in conversation with Riparian Capital Partners managing partner Michael Blakeney at the Rural Press Club’s lunch at the Toowoomba Showgrounds yesterday.

TOOWOOMBA is riding high in the saddle, or the cab, following the Queensland Government’s announcement this week that it will be hosting equestrian events for the 2032 Olympics.

Centre stage for them will be the Toowoomba Showgrounds, which yesterday formed the backdrop for the Rural Press Club Queensland lunch on the opening day of the 160^th Toowoomba Royal Show.

Guest of honour and speaker at the lunch was Bruce Vandersee, who started in the family’s Vanderfield machinery dealership in 1979 in spare parts, and is now a director of leading Australian John Deere dealership RDO.

Its growth has deep ties to the cotton industry, and Mr Vandersee shared his insights into it, and the machinery landscape, with an infectious enthusiasm built up over his 46 years, and counting, in the game.

Northern pull of cotton

Cotton machinery was not around when Bruce’s father Gordon Vandersee started what became the Vanderfield network with one dealership in Toowoomba’s CBD.

“My dad started in in the business after he left Clermont and came to Toowoomba in 1963 to start up what was then called Farm Equipment in Ruthven Street,” Mr Vandersee told the gathering.

“He was a Chamberlain dealer in the early days, and in 1969, John Deere bought into Chamberlain Industries, which was a Perth-based tractor manufacturer.”

The business was part of the national dealership network that turned from Chamberlain orange to John Deere green.

Some years later, John Deere appointed two dealers in Australia to sell cotton equipment, one in New South Wales, and Vanderfield in Queensland, by then based at Carrington Road on Toowoomba’s western edge.

“Cotton was…a big step up for us.

Bruce Vandersee.

“Our business’ successes have sort of mirrored…the growth of lots of our industries, but the cotton industry was a real key one for us.

“It’s still a big part of the success of our business, and enjoyment as well.”

In the 1980s, Vanderfield expanded by opening branches in St George, Gatton, and Warwick, and in 1999, Vanderfield prepared to open a branch in Darwin.

“Someone wise once said: The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago.

“Well, 26 years ago, we went up there, and Kununurra is just starting to go now.

“We’re part of the infrastructure that’s required for these start-up farming enterprises in the north to succeed.”

While Northern Territory cotton is predominantly dryland, and production will fluctuate depending on the season, Kununurra’s cotton production is underpinned by water from Lake Argyle.

This year, Kununurra has a record 9500ha of cotton in the ground.

“There will always be a crop there.”

With Bollgard3 cotton, John Deere’s round-module pickers, and the Kununurra gin getting ready to process its first crop, following on from the Katherine gin’s recent start-up in the NT, Mr Vandersee can see a path the northern cotton industry gaining traction.

“There will still be some challenges  no doubt, but I feel like it’s really going to take off properly.”

He cited investment and involvement from established cotton growers from southern Qld and northern NSW, the likes of Ron Greentree, Russell Kiely, and Hugh Ball, as being further drivers of success in northern Australia.

“The southern farmers are very interested in in the north.”

Consolidation, change inevitable

Bruce, and his father before him, have seen plenty of consolidation in the machinery business.

“When my dad started, I think there were nine tractor dealers in Toowoomba.

“We had everything from Laverda to…Ford to New Holland to Case International.

“It’s a very different marketplace now.”

Around 13 years ago, a meeting with the Offutt family from North Dakota brought Vanderfield into contact with the RDO business.

“We started to talk…and we decided we’d have a partnership with them.”

It meant the Vandersee family, encompassing Bruce’s parents, three brothers, and sister, sold half their business to RDO.

“We really appreciated their honesty and the genuine way that they conducted their business.”

“Today, the Offutt family owns 100 percent of the business.”

Ahead of RDO’s buy-in, Vanderfield bought out Moorlands dealerships in Chinchilla and Roma, and after it, Vanderfield bought out Chesterfield Australia, which added 11 dealerships in Qld and northern NSW to the Vanderfield network.

“We surrounded each other in many places, and now my only regret is that my dad wasn’t around to…see that happen.

“I did ring Ron Offutt when we did that deal, and I said to him: ‘Ron, we’ve had North Dakota, now we’ve got Iowa as well’.”

The comment gives credit to the territory that Chesterfield covered, as “definitely some of the best farming country” in Australia, and means the RDO Equipment network now numbers around 30 dealerships.

Mr Vandersee said an awareness of the benefits that consolidation can bring for dealers who do or don’t want to continue in the business has been empowering for those in the John Deere network.

He recounted the time some years ago when John Deere put the prospect out in the open.

“At a dealer meeting, John Deere announced to myself and about 60 other dealership owners in Brisbane that…the people sitting next to you may not be here in the future.”

He said John Deere asked the dealer principals to consider whether they would “be a buyer or a seller”.

“All they had to do was declare that path, and then the…dealers, started to work themselves on growing their businesses and buying out next door neighbours and so forth.”

Five years ago, Vanderfield, Vermeer Australia, and the newly formed RDO Construction came together as RDO Equipment, and Bruce is one of “a bunch of other Australian directors” on its board.

“We’re enjoying the ownership of the American guys.

“There’s always a lot of talk about…Australian ownership and foreign ownership…but the Offutt family are…literally a family company, and they’ve invested very, very heavily in this country.”

The latest evidence of that investment is the building from scratch of the RDO Equipment site at Wellcamp, which opened in September 2024.

Innovation everywhere

Mr Vandersee was fulsome in his praise for not just John Deere innovation, but precision agriculture generally, particularly with regard to one outfit now based at Wellcamp, SwarmFarm, a business started by Central Qld farmers Andrew and Jocie Bate.

“What they’re doing here in Toowoomba with SwarmFarm, that technology is amazing.

“Australia’s always been… pretty good at innovating…and that particular product I think is a step above.

“I don’t want to be offensive to universities, but because it’s a farmer-designed thing, it’s certainly way more practical and useful than some of the prototypes, but we need those prototypes out of universities; don’t get me wrong.”

Mr Vandersee said the challenge for a manufacturer’s engineering division was that customers and therefore the dealers that supply them want machines that are bigger but more compact, simple but with more technology, and stronger but lighter.

“Some things are getting bigger, and some things are getting smaller.”

“All I can say is: it’s going to be exciting.

“I just marvel about improvements we’re seeing in every area, not just with machine technology.”

Dedication to service negates R2R issue

Mr Vandersee dismissed right to repair and its potential impact on manufacturer warranty as being at odds with the dealer’s mantra of servicing the customer.

“I feel like the conversation here is almost it’s not much of a talking point.

“I’ve actually never had a conversation about right to repair that I can recall with the customer.

“I’ve had plenty of conversations about: Bruce, you need more mechanics, and we need to be able to be quicker, and you need to be faster.

“Sometimes they say you need to be cheaper.”

Speaking on behalf of John Deere dealers everywhere, Mr Vandersee said the focus was always to get people going, and quickly.

“Our focus is not: How can you wring the last dollar out of a customer?”

Mr Vandersee paid tribute to loyal and long-serving staff, including his wife Sue and his late mother, in ensuring service to customers was at the heart of the business.

He said the dealerships’ culture based on respect for the customers’ situation came from his father.

“Dad used to refer to some other dealers and then say about them: They’d rather have a fight than a feed.

“I think we always tended towards doing whatever we could to reach a fair resolution if there was an issue or a problem.

“When I first started in Vanderfield, I was in spare parts, and I love the service element of spare parts, someone looking for something.

“They’re not looking for it for fun; they’re looking for it because they’re broken down.”

“That whole bending over backwards to get someone going really got my blood pumping.