Organizing a three-day event on the scale of Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show takes a dedicated team, and show director Rob O’Connor told Farmtario in a recent interview that “we’ve got a good team. They are a fantastic group to work with.”
This year, for the first time since the show began in 1994, that team doesn’t include co-founder Doug Wagner, who announced his retirement in 2022 and was in the midst of a phased-in departure during the 2023 COFS.
For the 2024 edition Sept. 10-12, on the show’s permanent site at the northwest corner of Woodstock, O’Connor takes over the reins.
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He has been with COFS owner Glacier FarmMedia (which also owns Farmtario) since 2014, when he joined the team that put together the inaugural Ag In Motion trade show in Langham Sask., near Saskatoon. Before that, he worked on large indoor farm exhibitions in Regina and Brandon.
“I’m certainly excited about it,” he said, when asked about his first year in charge of the largest outdoor agricultural trade show in Eastern Canada.
O’Connor lives on the Prairies and spent much of his career serving farmers there, but he is no stranger to Ontario agriculture. He attended the University of Guelph and “a lot of the producers that I went to school with are the ones who come to the Woodstock show now to find out about the latest technologies in their sectors.”
Other former classmates lead some of the companies that line the Outdoor Farm Show’s exhibition streetscape.
O’Connor said outdoor shows allow farmers and agribusiness exhibitors to interact in an environment more in keeping with day-to-day business on the farm. There’s a level of comfort afforded by feeling fresh air and seeing the sky above as people discuss changes or additions to farm operations.
“It just isn’t the same looking at equipment on the showroom floor during an indoor show,” he noted. “Somehow it just doesn’t do it justice.”
However, it’s not only the outdoor setting that puts COFS (and AIM) among the top-ranked farm shows on the continent. It’s also the team’s commitment.
“The primary strength (of COFS) is that it’s a show about agricultural production. It’s not about a lifestyle; it’s not about what consumers want to see from farmers. This is a show dedicated to helping farmers do what they do, better. It speaks to them.”
No big changes or additions are planned for this year’s event but two key aspects will be enhanced.
A new south entrance, with parking next to the Discovery Farm south of the trade show, was so well received last year that organizers will make it even more effective in 2024. The parking-to-show route, over a bridge that was upgraded last year, has been further streamlined.
Popular ride-and-drive features in 2023 will expand in 2024, now involving skidsteers as well as telehandlers and high-clearance sprayers. Ride-and-drive events allow prospective buyers to climb aboard machines and try them out.
The 2023 show saw a stationary exhibit of high-clearance sprayers situated near the skidsteer ride and drive. This year, the skidsteer/telehandler feature has expanded into that space, along with bales, logs and aggregate for producers to move while they test the machines.
The sprayers have moved a short distance off-site to an approximately five-acre plot across the road. And this year, with the expanded space, attendees can climb aboard the sprayers and operate them to see which model suits them best.
With exhibitor shows, parking and the Discovery Farm, which attendees can experience during one of the regular “Off the Beaten Path” tours, Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show encompasses almost 300 acres.
“There are always some last-minute additions or changes,” O’Connor said, but “99 per cent of the show is set now. And we’re moving into the phase of delivering the final event.”
For two years during the COVID-19 outbreak, COFS hosted virtual-only programming. O’Connor said this was popular in 2020 but enthusiasm faltered significantly by 2021.
“By the end of that second year, people were itching to get back together.”
That was evident at COFS in 2022 and 2023, which had large attendance. The launch of the indoor Dairy Innovation Centre exhibit and livestock housing space was a highlight in 2022, and last year more than 36,000 visitors passed through the turnstiles over three days.
COFS hosts 650 to 700 exhibitors, and O’Connor said he is always surprised to hear about the innovations they plan to bring, in terms of products on display and in promotions planned for the audience.
“We’ll continue looking at how we can add more and more to the trade show, and a lot of that comes from the exhibitors themselves.
“It’s an amazing process when you’re organizing these shows. As the exhibitors are putting together their plans for this year, they’re also calling us and letting us know what they’re thinking about for next year.
“I tell people it’s really a 13-month or 14-month planning cycle. As we’re getting ready for this year’s show, we’re also looking ahead for what’s coming in 2025.”
For more information about Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show, visit www.outdoorfarmshow.com.
