Business View Magazine | October 2019

51 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE OCTOBER 2019 VANDEN BUSSCHE I RR IGAT ION & EQUI PMENT LTD . access it. There is a lot of customer interaction on the company website, as well. As for long-term relationships that have been valuable to the company’s success, Marc states, “They’ve all been! We’ve been a distributor of Rainbird products for 65 years. They’re still a family-owned company - the LaFetra family - and they’re our largest vendor. We also deal a lot with Netafim, an Israeli-based manufacturer that invented drip irrigation in the 1960s. The technology they brought to agriculture with micro-irrigation has saved the world a lot of water. Another important one we started with is an Austrian company called Baeur – it’s more agricultural, high volume, super strong equipment. In fact, it’s made so well that I have too many parts sitting on my shelf and I’m not making any money on service!” Although Vanden Bussche Irrigation has become a nationally-known industry leader, the commitment to support its Norfolk County roots has never been legalization of recreational is less than a year old. “Within the last six months,” Marc reports, “that business has really taken off. On the turf/golf irrigation side, distribution is changing constantly. Where’s there’s growth in it, the companies are getting bigger. It’s the Amazon effect. That sprinkler on your lawn, you can order pretty well anywhere and have it tomorrow. That’s our challenge with distribution. So, for that part of our business we have to go on the value we have, with the knowledge we can offer, to make sure the person is getting the right system installed, whether it’s for a golf course, cemetery, city park, or lawn system. Do-it-yourselfers don’t come here; we work with a contractor base of knowledgeable installers. But it is tough to compete against the market trendsetters that can send the ecommerce pricing out, quite easily. That’s our biggest threat.” Vanden Bussche has its own ecommerce opportunities, including an ordering app that gives pricing quotations, etc.– customers must log in under their company name, not just anybody can ipexna.com | 1-866-473-9462 IPEX congratulates Vanden Bussche on 65 years in business. As a valued trading partner for many years, IPEX is proud of its association with Vanden Bussche Irrigation, and we wish them many more years of success. Working & Growing Together. Happy 65 th Anniversary IRRIGATION PIPING SYSTEMS