It was before my time on the magazine, but I've read in back-issues and heard dealers of a certain vintage speak about the great storm of '87.

I'm aware that it's regarded as a significant milestone in the modern history of the UK dealer network. A period when there was incredible demand on dealers to source equipment to help with the national clear-up of fallen trees etc. From what I can gather, demand and indeed sales spiked like almost never before. Plus I've heard tales of suppliers going above and beyond to make sure their dealers were fully stocked, to be able to meet the requirements from their customers in need.

I was interested therefore, to hear whether the storms of last week (and beyond if you're reading this in Scotland!) had caused something similar for our dealer readers. I've caught up with a selection of retailers around the country this week, some of whom chose to remain anonymous, to hear how the storms impacted on their businesses. As ever though, it would be fantastic to hear from more of you today. So please feel free to share your experiences of Eunice, Franklin and any of the others, in the comments below.

Damage to dealerships

Firstly, I was interested to discover whether any dealers had suffered any storm damage to their own premises. Thankfully no one I spoke to reported anything catastrophic.

Anthony Deacon at MKM Agri for example said, "We had a roller shutter door blow out at our Bury St Edmunds branch which caused some security problems and a pair of broken gates at our Bedford depot, but other than that we got away quite lightly."

James Hayes at Hayes Machinery in South Molton, Devon told me, "Luckily we fared well. A couple trees came down in our yard and unfortunately the next door building to us which is an old style barn, lost some of its roof. The winds were so strong at one point that we had one of the forklifts up against the roller shutter door to ease the pressure."

Another dealer I spoke to said a large canopy which shelters some products from the worst of the weather, got literally uprooted and rolled through the fence behind it - meaning a repair job when the weather allows.

The Isle Of Wight experienced the strongest gusts ever recorded in the country, reaching 122mph at the Needles. Adam Bennett of Albany Garden Machinery at Newport on the island told me they were in direct line to these winds. As well as a rouge trampoline landing in their yard, he said that power failures forced them to close last Friday afternoon.

Because it wasn't of course just physical structures that felt the brunt, infrastructure was effected. On this theme Michael Adamson of F.G Adamson in Swanland, Yorkshire said how they lost their phone system. He said, "We still don’t know the true cause but it seems likely that it was related to storm Eunice causing havoc somewhere in the country where our phone calls are routed through. We didn’t get our telephones back until Monday morning."

Luckily, no one I heard from had anything horrific happen to their premises. Do let us know in the comments below though, what happened to you.

Customer demand

I was also curious as to whether these recent events had led to a noticeable uptick in demand for products - which considering the current issues with supply, could potentially have beeen a real problem.

Interestingly though, a fair few dealers I spoke to told me they had not seen any real increase in customer footfall or demand at all. Some felt that perhaps their areas had missed the worst of the storms, others simply said, no, nothing unusual in-store for this time of year.

I did hear some dealers report runs on certain items though. Generators were cited by one dealer as being particularly requested, but with supplies low. Also chainsaws and associated accessories such as chains and oil had seen good sales.

But I must admit, on the whole I was surprised not hear of any great surge in requests from customers for hard to obtain products. What I did hear though, was plenty of comments from various dealers along the lines that if they had asked their suppliers to quickly help out with emergency supply they doubted they would have been able to help. With all the delays to routine orders it seemed unlikely most thought, that there would be any extra stock available to help out with any unprecedented requests.

Perhaps then, the events of the past week (and longer in Scotland) were not quite as significant as those experienced by the network back in '87? And due to the current situation with supply, thankfully so.

But do let us know today how your dealership has fared. Both in terms of any direct damage to your premises and what your customers have asked of you since.