David Perry: Over-Drying Grain by 1% Means 1% Less Grain to Sell
Photo by: Latifundist.com
A grain dryer in Ukraine may be expected to handle two or three times more grain during harvest than a comparable machine in the UK. At the same time, the war has pushed energy independence, biomass and automation much higher on the investment agenda — and Perry is even considering whether some of its equipment could eventually be manufactured locally.
The British family-owned engineering company is approaching its 80th anniversary, but third-generation co-owner David Perry says longevity alone is not enough: customers increasingly want lower operating costs, fewer operators and one supplier responsible for the entire plant.
Latifundist.com spoke with David Perry about why 1% over-drying means a direct loss of grain to sell, how automation can allow one or two people to operate an entire grain plant, where AI is already changing grain analysis, how Ukrainian conditions have influenced Perry of Oakley’s equipment — and why the company says it has had no business relationship with Russia since 2022.
“You cannot invent history”: nearly 80 years of Perry
Latifundist.com: Perry will celebrate its 80th anniversary next year. Does such a long history give a family-owned company an advantage today, or can tradition sometimes become a constraint?
David Perry: I definitely think there are more advantages. You cannot invent history, and history creates reputation. We have been in this industry for nearly 80 years, so customers know that our products do what we say they will do. And if something does not work as it should, we make sure we put it right.
Customers buy from people they trust. The fact that Perry has been here for so long gives them confidence that we will also be here to support them in the future.
Latifundist.com: You represent the third generation of the Perry family. How has the company changed during your time in the business?
David Perry: I have been in the business for 35 years, and much of the transformation has happened over the past 25 years. We developed from being predominantly a UK agricultural company into a much broader business, both in terms of equipment and markets.
Today, we can supply machinery for a customer handling 2,000 tonnes of grain a year or for a business handling 200,000 tonnes. We have also expanded beyond agriculture into sectors including feed milling, brewing, recycling and biomass.
Latifundist.com: You are an engineer by background but also help set the strategic direction of Perry of Oakley. How closely are you still involved in engineering and product development?
David Perry: I still keep closely in touch with design and production because that is my background. I do not oversee production directly anymore, but I like to remain involved.
Travelling to different markets is also an important part of my role. I visit countries from Australia and New Zealand to the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe, and I spend a lot of time talking directly to customers.
Sometimes somebody will say, “Wouldn’t it be good if we could do this?” Then I start thinking: do we already have a product that can do it, or could we develop one? Is there a gap in the market? That feedback helps steer the company.
“It is not about being the cheapest”: from machinery to complete solutions
Latifundist.com: What is Perry primarily selling today — machinery, engineering expertise or a complete solution?
David Perry: Increasingly, customers want a complete solution, with the manufacturer taking responsibility for the whole project. Not every customer needs that. Somebody may simply want a replacement elevator, conveyor or dryer, and local engineers can install it. But demand for complete packages is definitely growing.
On paper, it may look cheaper to buy installation from one company, equipment from another and then bring everything together yourself. But then the customer becomes the project manager.
If the plant does not perform as expected, one supplier can blame the installation, and another can blame somebody else’s equipment. When one manufacturer is responsible for the complete system, there is much less room for that.
Latifundist.com: How much of a complete Perry project is your own equipment?
David Perry: On a complete installation, our own equipment can account for around 90% of the project. That gives us control over how the different parts work together. We make sure capacities match, the equipment is positioned correctly, and the connections between individual machines work as they should.
We have a large design and project department at our factory in the UK. The team develops projects in 3D and works with both the customer and the local team to understand exactly what is required.
Latifundist.com: Where do you rely on other manufacturers?
David Perry: For complete projects, we also work with specialist OEM suppliers. For example, we have recently used Musitelli grain-cleaning equipment from France, colour sorters from IST in Italy, pellet presses from Sizer Engineering in the UK and feed-milling equipment from IMAS.
Automation and software, however, are done in-house. We design the automation systems and do the programming ourselves.
That is important for technical support as well. Customers can easily reach the people who actually wrote the software rather than going through a long chain of dealers, importers and suppliers.
Latifundist.com: Perry competes with much larger international groups. Where do you see your main competitive advantage?
David Perry: We are large enough to benefit from economies of scale. We manufacture hundreds of conveyors and elevators every year, so despite relatively high manufacturing costs in the UK, our volumes allow us to remain competitive.
But our main advantage is the ability to integrate the whole project and to achieve quick deliveries.
We also compete on specification — material thickness, chain strength and whether the equipment is genuinely designed for the volumes and workload the customer requires.
Latifundist.com: Does that mean a more heavily engineered solution is always better?
David Perry: No. It comes down to value for money. There may be ten different ways to design the same grain-drying plant. One solution may offer more flexibility, but that flexibility costs money because it may require additional conveyors or elevators.
It is not about being the cheapest, and it is not about adding specification simply for the sake of it. The equipment has to meet the customer’s needs and be robust enough to give them a good working life without adding unnecessary cost.
“If you over-dry by 1%, that is 1% less grain to sell”
Latifundist.com: Perry has been making grain-drying equipment for decades. What has fundamentally changed in technology?
David Perry: The basic principle is still the same: you are using hot air to remove moisture from grain. What has changed enormously is efficiency. Modern burners are better, dryer design has improved, and the industry has moved from older cross-flow concepts towards much more efficient mixed-flow technology.
Capacity has also changed dramatically. Our dryers now go up to 150 tonnes per hour, and our conveying equipment up to 1,200 tonnes per hour. In the early days, capacities were around 5 tonnes.
Latifundist.com: How much difference can dryer design and drying temperature make to energy consumption?
David Perry: A lot. Mixed-flow dryers use considerably less electricity than older cross-flow designs, in most cases more than 50% less. Drying temperature is also very important because hotter air can hold more moisture.
As an example, it requires 7.5% less energy to remove 1 kg of water from grain at 125 degrees C than at 60 degrees C. Mixed flow dryers generally operate at higher hot air temperatures than cross flow dryers due to their design, which makes these newer dryers naturally more economical.
Latifundist.com: What are customers asking for today beyond capacity and fuel efficiency?
David Perry: Automation. One of the main questions now is: can I leave the dryer running on its own?
Labour is becoming increasingly important, so customers want systems that require less constant operator involvement.
Latifundist.com: How much can automation and hot-air recirculation reduce drying costs?
David Perry: Hot air recirculation reduces operating costs by reusing typically 35% of the dryer’s air from the lower drying zones and cooling section and returning it to the hot-side of the dryer.
When hot-air recirculation is combined with Grain Sentry, Perry’s dryer control system, the saving compared with our standard dryer can exceed 30% of total direct drying costs.
Most of that saving comes from fuel, and the rest from labour and electrical energy because the process is automated.
Latifundist.com: You also say farmers often underestimate the cost of over-drying. What does an extra 1% actually mean?
David Perry: It is a direct financial loss. If you over-dry grain by 1%, you reduce dryer capacity because the grain stays in the machine longer. This uses more fuel and more electrical energy.
But you also have around 1% less grain in the store to sell, as you have lost that tonnage. For a large operation, that can represent a significant amount of money.
That is why automatic control by the Grain Sentry matters: the aim is to reach the target moisture accurately rather than simply dry below it to be safe.
Latifundist.com: How far can automation reduce the number of people needed to operate a grain plant?
David Perry: Today, one operator should be able to manage quite a large plant almost single-handedly. They can use a tablet to see what the equipment and dryer are doing. Silo fans can operate automatically, and much of the manual grain sampling can be removed.
Traditionally, somebody might take wet and dry samples several times an hour, analyse them, record the results and then decide whether to speed the dryer up or slow it down. This is not only a very responsible task but also a full-time job.
Once much of that is automated by the Grain Sentry, in some cases one or two people can operate the entire plant.
Latifundist.com: Which technology do you think will have the greatest impact on grain handling over the next decade?
David Perry: AI will have a major impact, particularly on control and monitoring. For us, it has become particularly relevant over roughly the last 18 months. We already see AI technology in colour sorters and grain analysers, and we are starting to incorporate it into dryer software as well.
Latifundist.com: What can AI-based grain analysis do today that previously required manual work?
David Perry: Traditionally, when grain arrives at a large storage facility, machines can measure moisture and protein, but characteristics such as broken grains, admixture and insect damage require much more manual analysis.
We now sell a system where you pour in a grain sample and, around 30 seconds later, it can analyse around 30 different physical attributes, including admixture, insects, insect damage and broken grains.
Latifundist.com: What is the business value of that for a large grain company?
David Perry: Accuracy. If you are buying hundreds of thousands of tonnes, you need to know that the grain you are paying for is actually the quality you expect. Even relatively small differences can represent a significant amount of money at that scale.
Better analysis can also reduce disputes further down the supply chain. If a grain storage company analyses the product accurately before selling it to a flour mill, there is less risk of the load being rejected later. That can avoid the cost of rejected trucks and additional handling.
Seed processing: “The priority is to get as close to zero damage as possible”
Latifundist.com: Why is seed processing becoming a more important segment for Perry
David Perry: I think seed processing and conventional grain storage will continue to grow hand in hand. But we may see more new seed-processing plants because it becomes increasingly difficult to integrate all the latest technology into older facilities.
An existing plant may need colour sorters, better analysis and more advanced cleaning as customers demand higher-quality seed. At some point, building a new plant can make more sense than continually adapting an old one, especially as higher capacities are also required.
Latifundist.com: From an engineering point of view, what fundamentally distinguishes a seed-processing plant from a conventional grain facility?
David Perry: The main difference is the balance between speed, volume and product protection. At a conventional grain facility, the priority is usually throughput. A plant may need to intake 150 tonnes per hour or more, so the equipment is designed to move large volumes quickly through intake, drying and storage.
With seed, capacities are lower, but the priority is to get as close to zero damage as possible. That changes the whole approach to conveying and handling.
Latifundist.com: What does that mean for the equipment itself?
David Perry: Everything has to handle the seed more gently, and you also want as little residue as possible between batches. We use low-speed belt conveyors and chain conveyors, as well as bucket elevators with gravity discharge, to minimise mechanical damage.
Self-cleaning is important too. The objective is to move seed through the plant with minimum damage and leave little or no material behind between batches, reducing the risk of cross-contamination.
Latifundist.com: Perry and Westrup supplied equipment for the new seed-processing plant of Volyn-Zerno-Product (VILIA) in the Volyn region. The new line has a capacity of up to 12 tonnes per hour across the full processing cycle. What was the main engineering challenge of this project?
David Perry: The main challenge was achieving absolute minimum — ideally zero — damage across the complete line. We supplied around 13 conveyors, including belt conveyors and elevators, as well as our aspirator cleaners, working alongside specialist Westrup equipment.
The challenge was to integrate all of those components into the seed-processing line while maintaining gentle handling and minimising cross-contamination between batches.
Related story: Volyn-Zerno-Product launches new seed plant
Latifundist.com: Was there anything particularly important about delivering the project during the war?
David Perry: Our local partner Antekstroy worked closely with our UK team and Westrup to deliver the project successfully.
Ukraine: “The equipment has to be designed for that workload”
Latifundist.com: Perry has been working in Ukraine for more than a decade. What struck you most when you first entered this market?
David Perry: The first big difference was scale. An average Ukrainian farmer often has much more land and handles much larger volumes of grain than a farmer in the UK. A dryer here may be expected to process two or three times as much grain during harvest, sometimes even more.
So the equipment has to be designed for that workload.
Latifundist.com: Has your experience in Ukraine changed the way Perry builds equipment for this market?
David Perry: Yes. The dryers we sold when we first came to Ukraine and the dryers we sell here today are not exactly the same.
Our experience in this market has influenced the duty and the design of the equipment, material thicknesses and the overall specification. We know the dryers work very hard here.
Latifundist.com: How does Ukraine compare with Western Europe in terms of adopting new technologies?
David Perry: Ukraine adopts new technology quickly. I would describe it as an early adopter. In agriculture, technologies tend to develop here at a similar pace to markets such as the UK.
Latifundist.com: How have Ukrainian customers’ priorities changed over the past decade?
David Perry: Energy use and the choice of fuel have become much more important. Automation is another major issue, together with labour. Customers increasingly want plants that can operate with fewer people.
Latifundist.com: Has the full-scale war accelerated the focus on energy independence? What solutions are Ukrainian customers looking at?
David Perry: Definitely. Energy independence has become a major consideration, and Ukraine already has good experience with alternative heat sources, particularly biomass.
One of our oldest biomass installations in Ukraine has been operating since 2012. It is a 57-tonne-per-hour dryer.
More recently, our latest 27-tonne-per-hour complex near Kharkiv—invested in and built during the war—is scheduled for commissioning this autumn.
I think combining Perry drying technology with Ukrainian heat generators is a very strong solution for this market.
Biomass is not the only option. We can also design dryers to work with other heat sources, including heat pumps.
In Ukraine, we can supply the dryer ready to integrate with a local heat-generation system, with our local team working alongside the heat-source supplier.
Latifundist.com: Looking ahead to reconstruction, where do you see the biggest need for investment in Ukrainian post-harvest infrastructure?
David Perry: Grain storage will clearly be one of the major areas. Some facilities will simply have to be rebuilt. There is obviously no positive side to having infrastructure destroyed, but when old equipment has to be replaced, there is an opportunity to install modern technology at the same time.
A 20- or 30-year-old dryer can be replaced with a system using a biomass heat source, hot-air recirculation and automatic Grain Sentry control, which will be significantly more economical to operate.
Seed processing will continue to grow as well, and many new plants will be able to integrate automation from the beginning, delivering valuable operational savings.
Latifundist.com: Could Perry eventually manufacture some of its equipment in Ukraine?
David Perry: Yes, it is something we could consider. We are always interested in expanding in markets where we already have a presence.
The logistics of bringing equipment into Ukraine could make local production of at least some products sensible. It could give us a competitive advantage and reduce the number of trucks needed to bring equipment from the UK.
“We have no relationship with the Russian market at all”
Latifundist.com: Before the full-scale invasion, Russia was an important export market for Perry. Does the company have any business relationship with Russia today?
David Perry: Absolutely none. When the full-scale war started in 2022, that was it. We stopped all business with Russia.
We do not supply equipment or spare parts, we do not provide technical support, and we have no relationship with the Russian market.
Latifundist.com: Yet some Russian companies still present themselves as Perry dealers or sell equipment under the Perry name. Are they connected to Perry?
David Perry: No. I am aware of at least one company presenting itself as a Perry dealer and selling what it describes as a Perry dryer.
It is not a Perry dryer. It may be a copy of one of our machines, but it has nothing to do with us.
British engineering, local manufacturing: how Perry approaches global markets
Latifundist.com: Looking ahead to the next 10 years, how do you expect Perry to change as a company?
David Perry: I think we will become more diverse. Today, most of what we export is still grain-related equipment, even though we also work in sectors such as mineral handling, recycling and biomass.
We want to develop those areas more actively, expand into more countries and sell a broader range of products in the markets where we are already present.
At the same time, you still have to perform well in your existing markets. In Ukraine, for example, we want to continue growing the Perry business and developing our presence here.
Latifundist.com: Perry has a much smaller presence in North and South America. What makes those markets difficult?
David Perry: In South America, tariffs are a major issue. Imported equipment can face significant additional costs designed to protect local manufacturers, which can make products exported from the UK uncompetitive.
North America is different. We have made a couple of attempts there, but particularly in the US, my feeling is that if a product is not made in America, it can be difficult to sell.
To develop that market properly, we would probably need a manufacturing partner there.
Latifundist.com: Could that model — British engineering combined with local manufacturing — work in other markets as well?
David Perry: Yes. I think there is a strong case for combining British technology and engineering with local manufacturing, whether that is in the US, Ukraine or another market.
A lot of the technological value is in the operating system, the engineering and the overall design behind the product.
Latifundist.com: Africa, on the other hand, is already an important market for Perry. What makes it different?
David Perry: We already do a lot of work in Africa, particularly in South Africa. But the business environment varies greatly from country to country. In East and West Africa, you need people on the ground who understand how business works locally, how customers should be approached and how projects need to be managed. That local knowledge is very important.
In East Africa, for example, we have engineers from Uganda and Nigeria who can supervise construction, commission equipment and train customers.
So much of the project supervision can now be handled locally.
Fourth generation: “I grew up with the business”
Latifundist.com: Do you think there will be a fourth generation of the Perry family at Perry?
David Perry: I think there is a good possibility. My sister and I own the business, and between us we have children coming through. None of them are in the company yet — they are doing their own things and finding their own way first, and some are still at school.
But yes, it would be good to see a fourth generation in the business.
Latifundist.com: Was it always obvious to you that you would join the family company?
David Perry: For me, yes. I grew up with it. From the age of about 10 or 12, I was going down to the factory all the time. I never really thought about doing anything other than engineering and the business. I also worked in production myself. I was a welder, worked in paint spraying and did assembly work.
That experience still helps me today because I understand how things are actually made, how long different jobs should take and what can go wrong in the production process.
Latifundist.com: Outside work, you are also a marathon runner. Do you still manage to run while travelling so much?
David Perry: When I can. I have completed around eight marathons, and the last one was the London Marathon. My wife and daughter run as well, so it is something we share as a family.
I always take my running shoes with me when I travel, although business trips are often too busy to fit it in. But when you do get the chance, running is a great way to see a city or a country.
Sofiia Yaroshenko, Latifundist.com
