With 2,500 acres of land in their care, Sue and Jules Green have amassed plenty of experience of agricultural buildings – and they know a good grain store when they see one.

The couple, who own the Montreal Estate near Sevenoaks, went out to tender when they decided to boost the efficiency of the estate’s woodchip business by commissioning a new six-bay store adjacent to an existing open-fronted building.

“For various reasons we weren’t able to go back to past suppliers but were looking for someone new,” Sue explained. “We wanted a local builder of the right size with whom we could develop an ongoing business relationship and on whom we could rely to deliver what we wanted on time and on budget.”

After drawing up a shortlist of suppliers, they went to visit Graham Elgar, of Ashford-based G J Elgar Construction Ltd. “We were impressed with the quality of work and the design of the stores he had put up, but more importantly with the little touches that had been finessed into the job to make life easier for the customer,” she said.

“While it was basically a standard barn, there were lots of tweaks to make things work more smoothly, fit better and generally add value. The product was first class and Graham and his team proved to be a delight to work with.”

The barn, 36m by 19m, was finished in time for harvest “and the invoice didn’t deviate from the quotation by a single penny”, said Sue, whose father Alan Miskin was a dairy and arable farmer locally.

The historic Montreal Estate, owned by the family of General Jeffrey Amherst, who accepted the French surrender at Montreal in 1760, until early in the last century, was bought by Sue and Jules in 2012.

The couple, who previously both worked in the city, added the 2,100-acre estate to an existing 400-acre holding nearby and now run a successful arable, forestry and livestock operation on the land. They have a pedigree herd of Sussex cattle and host conferences and events in the ultra-modern estate office building at Penn Farm.

The original farm buildings at Salters Heath have been repurposed into 13 business units in five fully accessible buildings, while the estate also has 20 rental properties and a flock of 50 ewes.

The couple, who “sadly had no choice but to shut the dairy on day one”, grow the usual cereal crops including wheat, oats, beans, barley and oilseed rape on 1,000 acres of arable land and also have a number of other contract farming arrangements.

The new barn built by G J Elgar Construction was aimed at streamlining the other major part of the business, a sustainable forestry operation that covers another 1,000 acres supported by some eight kilometres of new trackways.

“We had to clear out and clean the existing woodchip store each June so that we could use it to store grain through until September,” Sue recalled. “Not only was the store open to the elements, but the dual use meant we were losing out on four months of woodchip sales each year.”

Building the new, purpose-built grain store next door gave the estate the storage it needed and allows the biomass business to continue all year round, as well as removing the hassle of cleaning it out annually. “It has given us so much flexibility,” Sue added.

Alongside timber production, The Montreal Estate supplies both chestnut and softwood chip for biomass boilers, all harvested locally as part of a comprehensive, fully accredited woodland management plan.

The estate’s 55 pedigree Sussex cattle are descendants of the Mayfield herd.  A huge amount of effort is put into showing the bulls and heifers, which can be seen competing at most of the major shows across the region, sometimes being awarded Breed Champion. The estate’s top pedigree Sussex bulls are for sale and the beef is sold locally.

“Showing the cattle relies on a big investment from the estate, but it’s vital for public engagement, which is an important part of our vision,” said Sue. “We undertake one public event a year, sometimes Open Farm Sunday, and last year we hosted one day of the Royal Forestry Society’s annual meeting.

Meanwhile the new relationship with G J Elgar Construction looks set to be another long-term feature of the estate. “The team has already been back to do some more work for us,” Sue said.