Gripple Connect: Stories of Success - Mt. Ridge Farms

Gripple Connect: Stories of Success, featuring Mt. Ridge Farms

At Mt. Ridge Farms in Biglerville, PA, the Slaybaugh family has been growing apples for five generations. Under President David Slaybaugh’s leadership, the farm has expanded to 600 acres of apples, including 350 acres of high-density orchards.

Where do all those apples go? Mt. Ridge sells their apples to packing houses across various states, who then supply them to major retailers like Walmart and Costco, as well as to slicers that supply the likes of Subway and McDonald’s.

Their Challenges

The biggest challenge they have is where they’re located on the east coast. The terrain is very hilly, so they don’t have the advantage of flat terrain like some other states do. So anywhere they get a chance to put in high density orchards that are level enough, they definitely do! Over the generations, from when David’s great- grandfather ran the farm, he’s been able to see the progression of tree planting increase at Mt. Ridge. Where there used to be 40 or so trees planted per acre, they now plant a minimum of 1,500 to 4,000+ trees per acre.

The Gripple Effect

Mt. Ridge is utilizing a V-trellis system for supporting the trees in their orchards, and they had been looking for a product to connect the wire between their V posts. David was introduced to Gripple after visiting various trade shows, where he met companies that supplied the Gripple wire joiner products.

At Mt. Ridge, they thread the inline trellising wire through the Gripple joiner, feed it through a staple and around the end post, and then thread the wire back through the other end of the Gripple joiner. They repeat that at each end post, pulling the wire through the Gripple joiner to tighten the line wires and keep them straight.

David says their oldest trellis system at Mt. Ridge Farms is about 20 years old, and they haven’t had to replace any Gripple joiners during that time.

“One thing about Gripple is that it’s a customer service friendly company. I had the Gripple reps come out to see our farm, understand our concerns, problems, and issues, and they  addressed them. If had any questions they couldn’t answer right then, they go  back to me quickly with answers.”

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