At Deadline Products we love to support and speak at the events organised by both the BPCA and NPTA, as well as those organised by our distributors.
In an industry where the drive towards professionalism is supported by the vast majority of responsible pest controllers, events which promote best practice and share knowledge are an essential tool – and if that means early starts and clocking up a few miles on the car, we’re only too happy to do it.
It’s been great to see how these events have grown in stature over the years – from tiny little coffee morning style affairs with half a dozen people turning up to chat a bit about pest control, to the well attended events held by both associations today. You can expect to join 50-100 pest controllers, alongside the presence of half a dozen manufacturers and distributors supporting with technical talks and product displays.
This year the BPCA are looking to change their event format, to move it away from presentation based sessions where attendees are talked at – to a more interactive practical format based on demonstrations, practice and discussion groups. It’s early days at the moment so we’ll have to see if this format proves popular with the membership.
Scotland was the first trial of the new format. A discussion group led by Brady Hudson from Killgerm around the future of rodent glueboards was very topical for the local area – for those who don’t know, there is a petition to ban the use of all rodent glueboards across Scotland – so how to respond to this as an industry is very much a live issue.
The forum presented a great opportunity to get some feedback from the members who would be directly affected by any changes. Brady did a great job leading the discussion and it’s safe to say the Scottish members – whilst not always in complete agreement with each other – didn’t shy away from getting their points across.
Scotland also saw a practical trapping demonstration, a product demonstration from Sean Byrne of PestFix and an interesting talk about the dangers posed by the invasive Asian Hornet to our native Bee populations from Fiona Highet.
The London Forum saw us circle the M25 to reach Beckingham Cricket Club, the venue for the event. A good turnout on the day saw demonstrations and discussion group on topics such as Fly Killer Servicing (by the Pelsis team), alongside an interesting discussion by Natalie Bungay on treatment reports. Treatment reporting, effectively the practice of writing down what you have done and why you have done it, is becoming an increasingly important part of the pest controller’s job. Increased levels of scrutiny on use of products and potential environmentally hazardous practices mean that this is only going to become more and more essential to the professional pest controller, so it was good to see it taking centre stage as a topic. The inherently dry nature of the task though does make it something of a ‘tough gig’ in terms of presenting so well done to Nat for taking on that particular challenge with her customary gusto.
We also had the pleasure of watching Mark Wenman from Network Bird demonstrating some key issues with the AviShock system for deterring birds (or as one delegate said to me “is that the Scalextric thing you put on roofs?” – to which I replies “yeah, pretty much!”), as well as Melvyn Knapp from Killgerm who valiantly stepped into the breach to deliver a presentation case study on how the Asian Hornet is being dealt with across the channel islands after the originally booked speaker was forced to pull out at the last minute.
The next event on the calendar is the turn of the NPTA to spread the knowledge of pest control to professionals in Nottingham, and of course the surrounding areas, with an ‘NPTA On The Road’ session.
If anyone would like to get involved, or attend a pest control event in their local area, then you can find one through the events section of our website.
Or by visiting either of the associations websites, linked below:
I look forward to seeing you at an event close to you in the near future.
Cheers,
Jim Kirk, Deadline Products.
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