Member Profile - Geoff Hamilton

President Geoff-Member Profile

 

Geoff was born in Cootamundra and raised on a farm at Illabo attending Illabo public school - then off to Scots College in Sydney for 6 years of boarding.  Following that he studied Agricultural Engineering at Melbourne University and went farming both at Illabo and Condobolin.  One of his memories of farming at Condo was burning a 250hp Steiger tractor on the farm when something went wrong clearing the land - an expensive bonfire!

The family ran into financial difficulties with foreign currency loans in the mid 1980s (Aussie interest @ 18%, Swiss Francs @ 6% - never mind exchange rate movements!) both farms were sold and Geoff headed off to Perth to work for the Kondinin Group - a farmer organisation that published books and magazines, including "Choice" style consumer surveys and reports on tractors and farm machinery.  Geoff has edited a number of books on the subject including one on Shearing Sheds and Sheep Yards.

 

He and Jan first met at Uni but when farming Jan spent a bit of time on "the interchange bench" but they married prior to moving to Perth. They both moved back to Wagga in the early 1990s and set up their first childcare centre which grew to 8 centres in the Riverina before selling to ABC Learning.  Following that they developed 34 sites for ABC in regional areas (and had a team in the US) but this ended in tears when ABC went broke post GFC.  From disaster springs opportunity and Geoff and Jan purchased 23 childcare centres from the Receivers going from 2 employees to 600 overnight.  Having spent 5 years turning this business around they sold the group a few years ago and invested in new businesses including a farm in Tassie (where they will move permanently later this year) and Proway livestock equipment in Wagga.  They also co-own HeliSpirit in the Kimberley which has 20 helicopters for tourist work.

 

Geoff and Jan have 3 children, Claire who is a chemical engineer with Shell in the Netherlands, Lachy who has recently finished bio-medical science and Dougall who is studying at Yale in America.