Page 52 - Simply Vegetables Spring 2024

Scottish Branch Seminar
11th Nov 2023
The highly anticipated Scottish Branch Annual Seminar was held in our new venue of the Aytoun Hall, Auchterarder and the committee’s planning throughout the year certainly paid off. Always apprehensive when we switch venues, but it all worked out very well and with staging the commercial stands and our sales table in the same large hall as the presentations, it felt much more inclusive, plus the whole Commercial team and sales team was able to enjoy the presentations too.
On the Friday in preparation, Gavin Thomson of Premier Hydroponics, Broxburn did yet another sterling job with his team in setting up the commercial stands. Eric from the Aytoun Hall could not have been more helpful for all our Branch committee members setting up chairs, tables, information stands, signs and the presentation equipment, all ready for the big day.
Saturday morning came round fast and whilst teas and coffees were on the go, our wonderful trade stands were opening up and our committee members were beavering away setting up the sales table, manning the door, providing refreshments, displaying the raffle prizes and selling raffle tickets. Prior to the main event, we had our continual PowerPoint slides on the go with details of our commercial stands and information on their products. Whilst people took their seats for the day, each found a wonderful goody bag on their chair. In addition to the 100 goody
bags, there were also lots of fantastic give aways, from T-shirts to hats, Mills Nutrient and Substrate Starter packs and Bio-Bizz Fertilisers starter packs for our members to peruse and pick up.
Frank Taylor F.N.V.S., Scottish Branch Chair, welcomed everyone to the Seminar and took delight in asking our National Chair, Sandra Hall, to present a Fellowship award to Jim Veitch and a Silver medal to Neil Muirhead for their services to the NVS.
Our key speaker of the day was Mark Hall B.E.M. F.N.V.S. who travelled up
to Scotland from the
Midlands with Sandra.
This provided the audience with photos and details of the winning exhibits plus entries by our Scottish Branch members for each class plus shared information
on varieties and trends of veg types. As reported previously in the Winter edition
of your magazine, the Scottish Branch had done extremely well, which gave me plenty to talk about.
Moving swiftly on to lunchtime, this provided everyone with the chance to enjoy a good chat over some tasty morsels, explore the trade stands to pick the brains
Ask the experts Busy Commercial Area - Autopot
Mark gave a very detailed
and interesting talk on
how he grows beetroot
(both long and globe)
which was most helpful
for the general grower
and exhibitor alike. With
our seminar falling on the
Remembrance Sunday,
we respectively paused
mid-talk for a minute’s
silence and then Mark continued to share his knowledge of vegetable growing which is extensive. This came across very well throughout both his talk and in answering questions from the audience.
Following on from Mark, I gave some Power Point presentations, firstly on the Scottish Branch Championships that had been held at Haddington, secondly, the National Championships that had been held at Ripon and lastly “The Scots abroad”.
Lighting display
Whilst people took their seats for the day, each found a wonderful goody bag on their chair
of our knowledgeable commercial Reps and
see what’s new. A major thank you must go to AutoPot, Ecothrive, BioBizz, Blue Lab, Growth Technology, Canna, Mills and Maxibright Lighting, and of course Gareth from Premier Hydroponics who did so well in pulling this together.
Our sales table went like a fair and kept the team busy. Whilst
Fred Stewart and Jean Thomson busily processed membership payments and gave out membership cards, Gareth Cameron supported the 200 club sales and Georg Bartling headed up the raffle ticket sales team. (I don’t think anyone escaped you George... thankyou).
After lunch, our next speaker was Gareth Hopcroft, Ecothrive. Gareth gave an in- depth talk on how the World Record Onion was grown organically by Gareth Griffin with the help of Ecothrive’s “Living Soil” along with an insight into the production of Living Soil. It’s quite fascinating, the amount of work that goes into producing such a product! NOTE, there is an article that Gareth Hopcroft kindly wrote for us on page 14 regarding some of Gareth Griffins’ World Record onion growing methods.
Next up was our Scottish Branch President, Jim Williams F.N.V.S., who gave
Fred Stewart and Jean Thomson looking after membership
52 Simply Vegetables