Founder Bruce Abrahams (1944 – 2014) Bruce was born in Nelson in 1944 and an ex pupil of Nelson College. He married Barbara and they have three children Dion, Todd and Megan.
He first started working as a Storeman for a Nelson company called Dalgety. Bruce progressed into Auctioneering and Fat Stock Buyer for AFFCO for 17 years and he and family lived in Dannevirke, Martinborough and Piopio towns over that period.
In 1981, Bruce brought a kiwifruit orchard in Te Puke and was also managing a variety of Pack Houses and Cool Stores in the Bay of Plenty. Bruce saw an opportunity to store apples in 2000 and opened up a site at Hull Road and created Woodland Management Limited.
Two years later in 2002, Garry Shaw from a warehousing background was hired as the General Manager. Garry continue to develop and expand the company until 2007.
Unfortunately Bruce passed away in 2014 after battling cancer.
Managing Director – Dion Abrahams Dion was born in Featherston in 1969 and attended Nelson College in the South Island. He is the father of three boys Harry, Jonty, Thomas and the husband of Mary.
After leaving college Dion attended Massey University and completed a Bachelor in Computer Science Degree in 1991. During the interim, he joined the New Zealand Army 1990 – 1993 and trained as part time soldier and after 3 years’ service left the Army as a Lieutenant.
After graduating from University, Dion accumulated over 12 years’ experience as a computer programmer from 1992 – 2004. Dion worked overseas for London based companies Perot Systems and Capscan. He’s worked in Wellington for both Telecom and Unisys and worked for Fonterra in Hamilton. In 2004, Capscan saw the management potential and promoted Dion to Manage a team of 25 employees.
In 2005, Dion joined the Woodland Management Limited team as a Business System Analysis/Operations Manager. He took over as the General Manager in 2007 and the company now has the ability to store a variety of products in either their Cool, Cold, Dry or Dangerous Goods sites.