Fieldays hold out the begging bowl

Such is the case with National Fieldays who in early October headed to the Beehive, to, as they put it, “highlight the need for strategic investment in the future of Fieldays”, to evolve the campus to be truly fit for purpose.

Looking for an annual “hand up” of $5 million – that’s right, $5m – the investment would offer long term value, industry sustainability and iwi partnerships, ideally in a partnership model with government.

Citing an Economic Impact Report carried out by Waikato University, they suggested that Fieldays makes a $500 million contribution to New Zealand’s economy. Of course, economic impact surveys are used to justify all sorts of investments, usually achieving an accuracy of less than 50%. Indeed, let’s not forget an impact assessment that told us how much benefit bringing the V8 Supercars to Hamilton would create.

One also has to question such an assessment when back to 2020, Fieldays was cancelled because of Covid-19, yet the Tractor and Machinery Association reported that tractor and machinery sales were up by over 35% that year. Go figure?

Going back to that potential $5m handout, Fieldays’ business model, is about renting out plots of grass or concrete, providing toilets and car parking, then charging exhibitors and the public, a lump sum investment for a family day out.

Casting an eye over the Society’s 2024 accounts throws up some interesting numbers, with the key metrics a turnover of $10.91m and operating expenses of $10.38m. Within those expenses, we see “other overheads” of $1.34m, property expenses of $755,000 (that’s a lot of paint for the toilet blocks) and a rather large sum of $3.38 million spent on wages, for around 32 full-time Fieldays and Mystery Creek staff.

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Digging deeper, we also see that the four members of the Key Leadership Team were paid $931,000 in wages and benefits, up nearly $100,000 over the previous year.

Looking back to the Impact Report, they, rather laughably, sing their commitment to wellbeing, noting that they conducted 8094 safety inductions, which were compulsory before any staff were allowed onto sites during set up. No doubt they also clipped the ticket on sales of Hi-Viz vests along the way.

Gate entries saw 106,000 people passing through the turnstiles – just over twice the capacity of Eden Park, so is Fieldays really that important beyond being a rather large social event, confirmed by introducing lawnmower racing in 2025.

Having held such an event for 57 years, the leadership team probably needs to take a lesson from their northern hemisphere cousins, who many years ago learnt that trying to be a Jack of All Trades is really a lost cause. Such events have largely disappeared, with the exception of the Royal Welsh and Highland Shows that have huge livestock competitions – something the organisers have previously told me that the animal rights campaigners wouldn’t like.

Fieldays need to take a lesson in not believing their own marketing hype about the amount of business being done on-site. Of course, there will be lots of gumboots, waterproofs and power tools sold on the day, but large capital equipment?

If they really think that a contractor buys a $400k tractor out of the blue, they need to remember line from the iconic Aussie movie The Castle: “tell ‘em they’re dreaming!”

Deals are done weeks, if not months, ahead of mid-June, typically with the need to discuss tradeins, finance and delivery dates. The facts are that Fieldays is largely out of date with how business is conducted, with many exhibitors also realising that spending such a huge chunk of their annual marketing budget for four days doesn’t make sense, when there are another 236 working days in the year.

It’s worth remembering that the Fieldays event only happens because of the commitment and energy of the 1022 exhibitors and their staff.

Perhaps Fieldays has actually passed its use-bydate and needs to ‘pivot’, like many businesses had to do post-Covid. It would be a much better look than holding out open hands, begging for a hand-out!