“You have to know what it does, to fix it and make it go” (Dave Wary). Dave Wary, service technician and sales representative of Hoobers Inc., informed the University of Delaware students about Hoobers Inc. through giving a small lecture about the operation as well as giving a tour of Hoobers Inc. and the different equipment they sell and are currently fixing. Hoobers Inc, unlike many equipment companies, began in the mid-19th century when the 1st generation, Charles Hoober, signed an agreement to sell International Harvester farm equipment in Intercourse, Pennsylvania and started a business in that same year; which later caused him to open the Hoobers & Son Farm Equipment in 1956. With the start of the operation from the first generation, over time the family has continued to grow and expand the business and operate in various locations such as, Middletown, Maryland and Seaford, Delaware and sell and fix equipment such as, lawn mowers, sprayers, combines, and other tractors, and consult farmers, on equipment that the students were able to see today. Essentially, with the Hoobers operation, selling, consulting farmers and servicing equipment, farmers and producers are able to contact the operation on a piece of equipment when it breaks down or has issues before or during planting season, and is able to speak to a specialist who will guide them on how to operate the equipment or will go out to the field to fix the equipment the producer is having issues with. Essentially allowing farmers to get the service they need to operate and continue there work again.
With seeing and learning about the equipment and different services Hoobers Inc provides, Dave Wary allowed the students operate the sprayer, planter, and spiker which allowed the students and myself to experience the equipment farmers use and Hoober consults and fixes which essentially allowed myself and the other students to learn part of a new skill set, broaden our understanding of the agriculture industry in terms of precision ag and the equipment that is used within it; and learn a something that grabbed my interest which is that there is a lot of specifics in building a piece of an equipment, thus to build it, takes a lot of skill set, knowledge and labor to create something to allow farmers to have a more efficient way of producing a product.