Pictured Above: Lehanna Louw, who is in charge of media and marketing at The Nut Machine Company shop in the centre of Oudtshoorn, with some of the delicious macadamia goodies on sale.
“I am a go-getter. My aim is to be on top of everything and one step ahead.” – Antonn Cloete Owner/Director – The Nut Machine Company
In 2013, business owner Antonn Cloete was asked by a Tzaneen-based macadamia processor to build a “maintenance-free” nut-cracking machine. His immediate thought was, “are they joking?”
It turned out the joke was on him, Cloete quips.
As a hugely successful entrepreneur, his business trajectory could be described as rocket-fuelled, but behind the scenes, the 61-year-old has achieved his success in the face of extraordinary personal challenges.
In 1997, at the age of 34, Cloete started his first company, Elecmec Transmissions, followed in 2010 by the establishment of Elecmec Engineering & Power. Both businesses are in Polokwane, Limpopo province.
But in 2014 and at the very height of his career, Cloete was diagnosed with a rare genetic condition which only recently has been named as Eye Muscle Dystrophy. The condition causes the muscles in the eyelids to decline, resulting in drooped eyelids and deterioration in the movement of the eyes.
Cloete says it is very difficult for him to visit clients or go out in public as his eyes water profusely, and the numerous operations – to connect his eyelid muscles to his eyebrows to enable movement – have lost their effect.
“I tell clients the reason I’m crying so much is because they are not giving me their business,” he laughs, making light of the diagnosis.
The Nut Machine Company’s shop front in the Karoo town of Oudtshoorn where Antonn Cloete and his wife Yolanda now live.
But the condition was instrumental in his and his wife’s recent move to Oudtshoorn. “There is a silicone mine quite close to Polokwane. The doctor believed the dust from the mine was a major irritant to my eyes. I think it’s fair to say that Oudtshoorn has some of the cleanest air in the country.”
The businesses, which employ 38 people, are now managed out of the remote Karoo town while the family’s state-of-the art manufacturing plant is based in Polokwane.
Despite his deteriorating health, Cloete says the conversation at the Tzaneen macadamia factory in 2013 was an irresistible challenge, and without an inkling of where it would lead, he set about getting it done.
“As a mechanical and transmissions retailer business, we worked regularly with macadamia farmers and processors. We would repair pumps, re-bore engines, fix gearboxes and supply spare parts. The sector wasn’t new to us. I was busy with a repair at one of the macadamia factories when the manager told me it was costing more than R300 000 a year to replace the blades on their nut-cracking machine. Also, instead of consistently cracking out whole kernel, it would often split the nuts or break them into bits. He challenged me to make something more cost effective, efficient and low maintenance.”
First, Cloete visited as many macadamia factories as possible. His aim was to gather as much information as he could before he set about designing his version of the cracker. Within eight weeks he and his team had produced what is known today as the MacMartin’s nut cracker.
Seven years on and the MacMartin’s, which is capable of cracking 1.2 to 1.5 tons of nuts per hour and described as “robust and cost effective”, is a household name in the Kenyan macadamia sector. It can be found in 12 additional countries worldwide and is in high demand
in South Africa.
“As fast as we build them, we sell them,” Cloete says.
Interestingly, the MacMartin’s is also being used in Papua New Guinea to crack the native Galip nut, which, according to Cloete, has a much harder shell than the macadamia.
He is now researching and developing a de-huller designed for South Africa’s growing pecan nut industry.
Following on the massive success of the cracking machine, Cloete formed The Nut Machine Company, which has innovated and manufactured some of the sector’s most sought-after processing machinery – from dryers to dehuskers and everything in between.
He says while R&D is expensive, it takes them just six to eight weeks from concept to the final product. And patents, he adds, are not worth it.
But it was the world macadamia price crash in 2022 which forced the couple to lift their game.
“That year, our business dried up. We realised that because the export market was flooded with product and prices were at rock bottom, farmers were seeking alternative ways to sell their crop. We responded by designing and building machines geared for value-add production, such as caramelizers, and drum roasters. We also built a smaller tabletop nut cracker – 100kg an hour – aimed at cottage industries, as well as a two-lane dehusker. Now we’re busy building an all-in-one caramelizer roaster.”
The company website has an extensive list of value-add machinery ideally suited to driving agri-processing in the domestic macadamia sector.
And to top it off, visitors to Oudtshoorn can stop at
The Nut Machine Company’s shop front at 223 High Street, where flavoured macadamia nuts, nougats, chocolates, fudge, oils and nut butters make up the list
of delicious goodies available for discerning shoppers.
For further information visit: www.nutmachine.co.za
The Nut Machine Company’s shop stocks anything from olive oil to processing machines for both factory and cottage industry use.
Article by Colleen Dardagan
