Stumped

This week was my 6th work trip this year.  Granted two of those were just day-trips by car, but still that is by far the most I have had in a long, long time.  I do enjoy traveling; getting to meet customers, and seeing how every uses their tractors in slightly different ways.  This week’s trip was not one I looked forward to.  It was a customer complaint that dealt squarely with my area of responsibility.  The local rep had expressed the extreme urgency needed on this issue, so on relatively short notice we booked the trip. 

The trip was to a job in South Carolina where they prepare land for reforestation.  The location of the customer was both good and bad.  It was near Myrtle Beach, which provided convenience for travel and accommodations, as well as entertainment, should we have any extra time to enjoy it.  The location also put the trip in jeopardy due to it’s proximity to the path of hurricane Irene.  Fortunately the impact of Irene was limited to only a couple inches of rain, and was long gone by the time we got there. 

I won’t go into too much detail on the customer visit, other than the application was certainly interesting to see.  I’ve seen plenty of plowing, but not any where you had to push the branches out of the way and cut off stumps at the same time.  At the end of the visit, we had improved the situation with the customer, but didn’t quite get all the way to where he wanted to be.  We’ve got some work ahead of us to get the rest of the way there. 

We finished in time to make a brief visit to the beach before we headed to the airport.  You couldn’t even tell a hurricane had passed near there only a few days before.