"I NEVER CONSIDERED PRICING ANYTHING ELSE. I JUST WANTED A MACDON."

“We’ve always had MacDon swathers.”

It’s a statement of brand loyalty that any manufacturer would love to hear, but for Manitoba farmer Darryl Heide such a commitment has nothing to do with paint color, and everything to do with his long time experience with MacDon products.

“They’re just all around good. I know they’ll do the job for me,” elaborates Heide who farms about 7,000 acres of wheat, canola and flax about six miles north of Killarney, Manitoba, with his wife Nancy.

Heide says that his confidence in MacDon has been earned over many years using the company's swathers and draper headers. His confidence was recently demonstrated when it came time to upgrade his two MacDon 9350 Windrowers mounted with 30' 972 Drapers; he didn't waste a second of time shopping around and went straight to his MacDon dealer.

“I never considered pricing anything else. I just wanted a MacDon.”

He ended up selecting MacDon’s up-powered M200 Windrower with a 40' D60 Draper up front, and he reports that he's been very happy with his purchase, even though his employees “were all a little leery about going from two 30 foots to one 40.”

Turns out that they needn't have worried, as MacDon’s next generation swather proved more than able to handle the job during last year's harvest. In fact the only hiccup that the Heide farm experienced last year was with competitive draper headers on their two brand new class 9 combines.

“They just wouldn’t cut. They just wouldn’t work.”

The issues were so serious that Heide’s harvest came to a complete standstill. That's when he sent out the S.O.S. to MacDon.

“They brought a demo 40' D60 Draper out here. It worked, so the next day I went down to the dealer and said I want two, right now.”

Luckily he was able to secure two D60s and have them delivered and set up in less than 48 hours. “Normally, it takes about 40 hours alone just to set up a header, but they got us going the next day. They really went to bat for me.”

Instantly, he was back in business. Not only that, but the difference in header quality and performance was dramatic.

“The D60s just fed better. The crop flow along the canvass was more even. In fact they feed into the combine better compared to any other headers we’ve ever had.”

Another of the big differences they noticed was how much better the D60s followed ground contours, thanks to the flotation of MacDon’s CA20 Combine Adapter.

“Compared to the MacDons, the previous headers seemed much more rigid. We could also see the cutterbar better. We didn’t have to lean forward in the seat. Overall, they made things much less stressful for the operators.”

For Heide, the differences between the D60s and the previous headers was just more confirmation in his belief that MacDon makes “the best product out there.”

It’s a belief that has even spread to his neighbor, who finally decided to try MacDon on Heide’s recommendation.

“My neighbor had two other makes of swather before buying a MacDon for the first time last fall. Now he says that they could beat him silly and he still wouldn’t get rid of his MacDon.”
It’s a point of view that Heide understands all too well.