In a column I wrote in 1994, I said the new Outdoor Farm Show, which had just started up that September prior to the IPM event, would spell disaster for the International Plowing Match. Reasons I gave was that the IPM had become a huge flea market that attracted rural folks and hobby farmers and was flooded with busloads of school kids.
Agricultural exhibitors complained that there were too many non-farmers attending the event. They were the ones showing interest in the big tractors and wanting to sit in one, but a sale isn’t made to people with no land. Companies looked at the big expenses to showcase their wares to mostly non-buyers. Many pulled out of the IPM and left it to the local dealers to support the match.
Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show in Woodstock attracts 750 exhibitors and 40,000 people. It’s a known fact that the true farmers attend the Outdoor Farm Show and the rural folks and the hobby farmers go to the Plowing Match. The Outdoor Farm Show is well known for exhibitors showcasing their technology and for the large number of live demonstrations.
Commencing from humble beginnings in rural southwestern Ontario in 1994, Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show is 24 years old this year. The three-day farming extravaganza is without doubt the nation’s premier outdoor agricultural showcase.
It was Doug Wagner, now the President of Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show, and a man named Ginty Jocius who forged a business alliance and are largely credited with getting COFS off the ground with that inaugural show in 1994 and 200 exhibitors and advancing it to the stage it is at today with 750 exhibitors
For people involved in the agriculture industry, the name Ginty Jocius is extremely well known. He died in 2008 at the age of 61. A memorial waterfall at COFS has been named in his honour.
Jocius and Wagner set up the first three Canadian Outdoor Farms Shows in Burford, Ontario, but an opportunity presented itself to lease space at the nearby University of Guelph Woodstock Research Station. The move took place in 1997.
Before launching Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show, Wagner was in communication with two of Ontario’s larger farm organizations. The Ontario Federation of Agriculture, which came on as a supporter had about 58,000 farm families as members at the time. The Ontario Soil and Crop Improvement Association, with about 55 organizations across the province, has a mandate of crop production and soil management.
In the early formative years there wasn’t a whole lot of support from mainline farm machinery companies, with most instead opting to watch the proceedings from the sidelines. However, it didn’t take long for those big players to join in once they saw how well-received it was by the farming community. Kubota was one of the few mainline farm machinery companies that has supported Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show from the outset. It’s a great show! I will be attending the event this week.
