John Bowler, the outspoken founder and chairman of the John Bowler Group, has hit back at complaints and criticisms which he acknowledges are regularly aimed at him and his company by some people in the egg industry. In an interview with Ranger, he said he was annoyed - even angry - at the criticism, and he said he believed many complaints were motivated by jealousy at the success of his business. He said his company did not get the recognition it deserved for its contribution to agriculture and the egg industry in particular.
From its origins as a feed merchant 30 years ago, the John Bowler Group, which is based at Hilton near Derby, has developed into the United Kingdom’s largest independent free range and organic egg producer. Its 120 producers have nearly 2 million birds producing 1.5 million eggs each day. The target for much of the criticism is the company’s franchise operation, under which producers sign a long term contract with the group. Critics say egg producers are tied into contracts. We put those criticisms to John Bowler and he rejected them outright.
"If someone wants to come without a contract that’s not a problem, but you have to remember one thing - contracts work two ways. When there was a surplus of eggs I would have no reservation about dumping someone who did not have a contract," said John, whose company guarantees to buy all the eggs of producers under contract. Under the terms of the contract, producers can, if they wish, sell up to five per cent of the eggs privately.
"If you were a new producer and you were investing hundreds of thousands of pounds in setting up the new business, wouldn’t you prefer the security of a long term contract. Well I am one of very few people who has the confidence to offer people long term contracts," said John, who said that such a contract not only provided a producer with the security of a long term market but also gave him a negotiating advantage when seeking finance from a bank. The company offers rolling contracts of 56 months - the term covers the duration of four flocks.
For anyone new to free range egg production, a contract with Bowler’s offers a turnkey entry into the industry. The company has its own in-house solicitor who will prepare and submit a producer’s planning application, a former Nat West bank manager now works for the company to help producers who are seeking financial help from a bank, Bowler’s can supply and erect housing for the hens as well as constructing roadways and ground works and installing the necessary water and electricity supplies. Bowler’s supplies the pullets and feed and full training and back-up support. Some critics say Bowler’s producers have to pay over the odds for pullets and feed. John Bowler accepts that producers could go it alone and possibly obtain buildings, pullets and feed cheaper.
He concedes that a producer on his own may be able to obtain a better price for his eggs, but he says that making consistent profits flock after flock is difficult. He says Bowler’s producers have access to a service that enables them to consistently exceed standard industry levels of profitability.
He said the average profit margin achieved by his producers was £8.50 per bird after pullets and feed. The best producers did better, some producers did worse. "For agriculture that is phenomenal. That works out at £3,500 per acre. You have to take financing and labour out of that, but those figures obviously vary from producer to producer," he said.
He said that when the company advertised potential profit margins, there were other producers who complained that the figures were not possible. "If they think that is the case they should go to Trading Standards. In fact we have been investigated two or three times by Trading Standards after people have complained and we have been cleared. We know it is possible because we have all the detailed figures from each producer," said John, who pointed to a system by which producers inputted detailed figures into the Bowler’s database daily.
The company is currently trialing a new management system on one of its own farms - Woodcock Farm close to the company’s Hilton headquarters. This new electronic system will provide producers with even greater access to up-to-the-minute statistics on how their flocks are performing. John Bowler says the use of such technologically advanced systems is one reason why the company’s producers are able to closely control the performance of a flock and achieve above average results.
John Bowler said that if the figures did not add up, banks would not be willing to lend to the company’s contracted producers. He said the banks knew producers could achieve the published profit margins and they knew that Bowler’s took great care in vetting potential producers before accepting them as contractors.
"We actually spend a lot of time putting people off," said John. "We check them out very carefully to see whether it would be viable for them and us to enter into a contract. We don’t want to take on people we don’t think are going to be able to make it work. That would be no good for us and no good for them. We hold open days about once a month. We can have up to about 30 people attending each of those and we encourage them to check everything out. We are completely open," said John, who said that potential producers could also speak to existing producers. "We don’t want people to fail. We have a near 100 per cent success rate."
As well as having contracts with individual producers, Bowler’s has its own farms - a new one is under development at the moment. The company has submitted a planning application for a 60,000-bird pullet rearing house and Bowler’s has just been granted permission for a packing station that would be capable of handling all the eggs produced by the company.
"We have no plan to build a packing station at the moment but getting planning permission gives us options in the future," said John, who said he enjoyed a good relationship with both Stonegate and Noble, who bough his company’s eggs. "They have a very difficult job in between the supermarkets and the producers but we get on with them very well."
The possibility of Bowler’s building its own packing station, however, will no doubt be a useful tool in any negotiations between Bowler’s and the packers. It is another of example of Bowler’s looking ahead to secure the future development of the business. Few can deny that John Bowler has been very successful so far.
"I think we have done a fabulous job," he said. "We are streets ahead of any other agricultural business and we are not scratching the surface yet. I have probably more experience than anyone else in this industry so I think I am more qualified than anyone to comment on free range. The long term market will grow and grow.
There is no doubt about that because younger people are more conscious about animal welfare than older ones. In the short term there may be periods where you have to balance supply and demand. We will always have periods when things have to balance up again and probably the poor producers will go. You know we have been getting some phenomenal prices. When feed prices went up no other sector of agriculture got the price rises we did. It’s only right and fair that when feed prices come down egg prices come down accordingly."
He said the future for free range eggs looked very good, but some people still complained. "If you keep on bleating no-one will believe you in the end. When people criticise us I think there is some jealousy involved. You know that because we have been successful obtaining planning permission for our producers, there have been some pe
