How Oxbury supported Paul Williams and Sarah Bevan through a crisis

It’s the disease every dairy farmer fears.

TB.

Paul Williams and Sarah Bevan were only in their second year of farming, having bought Wallhope Farm though an Oxbury Term Loan. They had already struggled through a difficult first year when an exceptionally dry summer forced them into buying extra feed.

But TB was a whole new level.

“We lost a third of the herd and we thought we were going to lose the lot in the first 12 months,” remembers Paul. “We really did.

“We thought, we’ve bought a dairy farm, and we’re going to end up with no cows.”

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Paul had grown up on the farm – which had been purchased by his grandfather in 1964 – and he and Sarah saw potential for diversification, driven by its idyllic setting with views of the Wye valley and estuary.

Ultimately, it was those diversification plans that saved them.

“As soon as we knew that there'd been changes to the plan and we'd had the TB outbreak, the first thing we did was to come out on farm and sit down with Sarah and Paul to go through the numbers,” says Relationship Manager Victoria Crisp.

“They've always been very close to their business and the numbers, and they've done a wonderful job at fast-tracking the diversifications.”

The couple’s first diversification was to alter an area of the farmhouse and turn it into a two-bedroom, two-bathroom holiday let.

“We then moved swiftly on to pasteurising our own milk on farm,” said Sarah. “We put in place a vending machine and we started to supply some local farm shops and other outlets.

“Then we began selling gelato from the farm and we had a shop off the farm as well for a short term.”

Planting a sunflower field provided an attraction to pull customers to the farm where they could buy the gelato and milk. The success of that idea inspired Paul and Sarah to try other seasonal events, including a maize maze, pumpkin patch and selling local Christmas trees. And they’ve been able to take their produce out to the public as well, using a trailer to sell their gelato at events around the area at weekends.

“Our latest project is a glamping pod we run with our initial holiday let,” says Sarah. “We had our hospitality experience from the farmhouse, and then, after quite a lot of research, we found some farmers who had diversified into an engineering business, and they built it for us.”

The result is a farm that has become a destination in its own right, both for holiday makers and the local community.

But the herd is at the heart – 150 healthy cows producing milk and gelato for local families and holidaymakers.

“We have lots of families visiting the farm and the public are really keen and interested – they want us to succeed,” says Sarah.

“We have created a community locally, actually,” adds Paul. “There are people around here I would never have spoken to if we hadn’t done this.”

Sarah says that their decision to use Oxbury to purchase the farm has been a smart choice.

“I think that we needed guidance,” she says. “We wanted to work with a bank that were reactive and resilient because, as farmers, that's what we have to be.

“They understand the pressures. They understand the unpredictability of farming and the challenges that are completely outside our control.

“We came into it knowing that farming isn't straightforward – it's a way of life.

“And we're very fortunate to be able to do it.”