Business
1st Major Announcement…Shed Day 5 and A Barn Fire
I guess we can let the cat out of the bag now and make the first of two major announcments that I alluded to earlier in January of some changes here on the farm.
Not only is this a shed we are building, but it will also be a warehouse for Pioneer Seed. Robertson Farms is now officially a Pioneer seed dealer. We will be servicing farmers mostly in the western part of Franklin Co. It is a natural fit for us. We have enjoyed a long and productive relationship with Pioneer as a seed customer and seed grower, mainly because I have felt that their agronomy and sales staff have always had my success at heart when offering me products and services. So when the opportunity presented itself last fall we began the process to become dealers for Pioneer. We have a lot to learn but are eager and ready for the challenge!
The end of day 5 on the new shed…………….now we are ready for metal! The nice sunny days have allowed for quick progress, but the bottom has fallen out of the ground around the site. We had to pull their forklifts and tellehandler out today. The telehandler was setting on the frame with the last truss suspended in the air………fun!
Meanwhile, while the last truss was going up, we spotted smoke accross the field and found that our neighbors old barn was on fire. By the time we got over there the major part of the black smoke was gone but the flames were still going as high as the silo tops!
The old barn has been a land mark on Rt 14 east of Benton and the silos are also the site where the original farm owner killed himself back in the 40′s or 50′s…………more on that later………
Happening now on the farm.
Busy under-describes the amount of activity going on right now.
Finished up hauling my January contracted corn this week. Glad to have that done……..it seems like it took for ever and I guess it did with all the meetings I have had and time away from the place.
Pioneer came and got their seed beans so we spent part of two days loading semis. The big plus is we got it done before the rains set in!
Progress on the new building has come to a halt with the rain and winds so no new updates or pictures of progress on that front.
Waiting on the last of the planter parts to get here so we can start the rebuild on it.
Waiting on the last of the NH3 parts so we can start the rebuild on the anhydrous tool bar.
We did get the planter monitors back from AgExpress………… that’s good news!
The next few days will be spend trying to catch up on all the paperwork that has piled up between meetings and hauling grain.
All in all, I would rather shovel grain than push papers………..
Questions to ask your input supplier.
I got a good question the other day and I thought I would share it with you.
The question was basically that an input supplier was looking for input from a grower on what they thought the future would look like to the grower, and how the input suppliers business fit into that world. In other words what can we do to keep or get your business in the future?
I like to turn the question around and ask how does the input supplier view the world and how does that view fit into my business plans? So I think I would ask them these questions to see what their view of the future and my business is:
- If you are to be my supplier of choice, what are you going to be doing to insure that you are providing me with inputs at the best cost to insure that we both make a profit?
- In these times of great volatility, what are you going to do to insure that you don’t get caught on the wrong side of the swings in input prices and have inventory that we either don’t want, or cant afford, because it puts us at a negative margin?
- If early prepay is going to be necessary to lock in the best prices, are you willing to give me letters of credit on my purchases that are still in your inventory?
- What is your vision of your company’s future and how does that vision fit with my farms vision and mission statement?
- You are my preferred supplier of choice, therefore how can I be you customer of choice to insure your success and make your day to day business life and mine easier?
- As farms consolidate what are your plans to equip yourselves to provide more timely service to larger operations and fit into their business plans?
The first three questions will most likely make them uncomfortable. Your asking them to bear their soul and they see those questions as trust questions vs. business questions. You must trust them if your doing business with them, but how are they relating to you as a business? Your suppliers have to understand that your trusting them. They also have to understand your a business that needs business assurances not just handshakes.
The last three tell you what they think of you as a customer…………and how you relate to them. Are you an income opportunity or a business partner? I hope they answer in a business partner manner…….if they don’t……red flags should appear because they view you as only an income source, instead of seeing you as a partner who will succeed when they succeed………..
I think we have to view our suppliers as our partners. That being said you only want partners who want you to succeed in your business. To me these questions tell me if they are my partner or just a guy trying to selling me bulk input commodities.
I have enough guys trying to sell me bulk input commodities………………..
New Year: Updates and Changes Coming
Well, it’s 2012, or something like, that and January is going to start off with a bang so to speak. A very busy month ahead for Robertson Farms. First up is the Farm Futures Management Summit followed by the KARTA meeting shortly there- after. Throw in a IEMA meeting, K9SIL meeting and some other training meetings and the bigger part of the month is gone.
In between those meetings I hope we see the start of the new machine shed as well as getting the new (to us) NH3 bar home so we can put the VRT controller on it. There is a planter to rebuild as well as the backhoe and dozer to work on. So we need to hit the ground running and not look back.
Plus if the weather allows we need to pull a few soil samples, grain to haul and some scraping to do.
Fun and busy!
If that wasn’t enough……..there’s more! First thing in the spare time is a revamp of the website. I have been wanting to a major revamp but have not had the time with all the other stuff going on this fall. The revamp will coincide with two new business ventures we are going to be entering into here on the farm. Can’t say much about them right now but I think some folks will be surprised at what we have planned. These will bring new opportunities for us in agriculture as well as begin to pave the way for the next generation of Robertson’s to enter the the operation.
Hopefully we will be making some announcements in the next 30 days or so……………..
Don’t be alarmed if I miss a day posting this month with all that’s happening.
It looks to be an exciting and busy winter!!!
krfarm year in review
Instead of the “Year in Review” recap that is typical this time of year, how about something different…….
My Top 5 Blogs of 2011
#1 ICCA Board works to kill off CPAg Certification
#2 Combines, Grain Bins, Grain Trucks and Bush Hogs
#3 Harvested Nitrogen Plot Today
#4 Corn Harvest Begins for Some
My Top 5 Categories Viewed in 2011
#2 Soil Testing
#4 Ham Radio
#5 Guns
2011 was a record year for krfarm.net
Almost 27,000 unique visitors who made 77,000 visits this year with 835,000 page hits while they visited. December, November, September and May were the biggest months for visitors and page content viewed.
Thanks for visiting! Thanks for commenting! Thanks for telling your friends about us!
We are going to try and ramp it up a notch for 2012…….stay tuned!
New Iron
I was at local business today when a guy asked me how much new iron I traded for this winter. I had to laugh and say “none, I am not into that game”.
He laughed and said that “I must not be that good a farmer if I wasn’t spending all my profits on trading equipment to avoid paying taxes”.
I laughed back and said that an “old tractor worked just as good as a new one for the same job as last year”.
He shook his head in agreement and we talked about all the new iron that is showing up in driveways the last few weeks. I have noticed several million dollars of combines and tractors moving up and down the roads around here as of late. Guys have had a couple of good years and with the government and their squirrelly tax laws, especially the lack of a continuation in the large deprecation write off, they are spending the money to avoid the tax and also to insure they have some depreciation to write off in the future.
He then commented that he would like to invest some money into farm land and asked what it was going for right now. After talking about some land sales around here where ground went for anywhere from four thousand to ten thousand he then laughed and said that he would leave his money in the bank. He thought that the land market was over valued and headed for a bust.
I don’t know about the land market, it could bust or plateau. I just don’t know. I don’t seem to know much anymore when it comes to the farm economy.
The one thing I do know is that new iron will eventually rust. And if there is a land bust, then that new iron will be hard to pay for in the future, rust or not.
Phishing vs. Fishing: China, North Korea or Russia?
The last few days my comment box has been full. Like overflowing with junk from the usual spammers but also from what I suspect is an internet phishing attack from China, North Korea or Russia. I keep getting the same comments in the same very bad English from different commenter’s but also multiple comments from the same “person” on multiple posts.
One might ask how I know or would suspect a phishing attack for one of these counties and I would say that I don’t have anything concrete but I offer up two things that make me say so.
First is comments are left on pictures I post. I don’t allow posting of comments to any pictures I post on the blog so when a comment shows up in the in box attached to a picture I know that is not the usual ”male enhancement pill” spam or the latest of what the Kardashians (spelling? who cares?) are up to or where I can see hot pictures of someone famous etc. So when “John Smithy” posts a comment to a picture and says “I find post good and helped me back often” I know its not the usual junk.
Second, I have a friend who does IT security for a big business. He and I have compared notes in the past: When I get lots of picture comments from “John Smithy” and “Jenny Smithy” and the lot he has said that they get a lot of “hits” on their security systems from “foreign” countries, specifically Asian counties, during those same times. While he wouldn’t tell me who, he didn’t say I was wrong when I mentioned that I think they come from China, N Korea and Russia.
I also suspect some come from the Middle East……..
The hits, like the comments, often have links to site that most likely will down load phishing apps to your computer. Phishing apps are looking for passwords, bank numbers and all kinds of your information besides infecting you computer and maybe passing it one to someone else or making your computer into a host for their activities.
It is also not a coincidence that this latest attack over the weekend seemed to peak as news of the death of the North Korean dictator came out………..again it seems that a lot of spam attacks happen very closely to news events in those countries I listed.
But then again what do I know………just a farm boy.
Acres of Acres that don’t add up.
I have been working on a whole bunch of small stuff in the office, mainly fertility recommendations but also some “what if” crop planning. A few years ago I wrote a simple spreadsheet to do some what if type comparisons. Then the thing grew to a not so simple monster of a spreadsheet. I guess the correct term would be a worksheet or work book with something like 15 or 20 different linked spreadsheets in the workbook. You change your corn acres and all the sheets update: seed needs, fertility, chemicals, insurance, fuel and so forth as well as what your insurance coverages are and what your marketing price targets should be.
In running the spreadsheet the last couple of days I have had to put in acres of corn, beans and wheat as well as landlord split acres. I never realized how many sets of “acres” I have for the same acreage.
There are FSA Acres, Rented Acres, Share Acres, Spray Acres, Harvest Acres and GPS Acres to name a few.
None of them are the same.
If you farm you know……..its 40 acres you pay rent on that only has 38 acres in it by planting and spraying but is 37.2 by GPS around the boundary but shows 41 on the yield monitor and the FSA office has it down as 40.5 acres for the farm program.
So you rent 40 acres but insure 40.5 because that’s the official government measurement, you plant and spray 38 acres of inputs but combine 41 acres of crops and figure your coffee shop yields off the 37.2 acres of the GPS unit…………
All those acres add up…………
Inventory and Receipts…..
Between things that have to get done I have been trying to get some things done here in the office and in the house that I have neglected or that got pushed to the back burner because of everything else that has gone on this year.
One of those projects that I got started over the weekend and am hoping to finish up today is installing the new kitchen counter and sink that has been laying in the family room for the better part of 10 months. So at an hour here and a hour there I am down to installing the sink and plumbing it up.
Which means a parts run this morning…………
So off to two (2) local businesses to get the stuff I need. Why not one (1)? Because no one in this economy will stock any inventory. Its not just hardware stores its farm equipment stores and tire shops and everyone with inventory. They are all happy to order, at an additional cost, but no one has any inventory. So it takes two stops to get what a fellow needs to do an odd job.
But I am wandering off topic………
I could get started on this inventory and parts thing esp. with equipment dealers who charge a premium for ordering stuff but I won’t. I have learned to save gas on the farm side and just go online and order it that way. Its here in 24 hrs delivered to the door by the Brown Truck of Joy (UPS) and I don’t have to leave the place, drive anywhere and find out they don’t have it…….plus its always flat rate shipping that is cheaper than the gas to drive to the parts store anyway……….
But again I wander off topic……..a blog for another time.
I got home from my parts run and put the receipts down on my desk so that I could record them in the checkbook. You know a receipt, that strip of while thermal paper that comes running out of the cash register or computer printer once you complete your transaction and pay for your items. A receipt. A receipt is an evidence of purchase. A receipt is an acknowledgement that a transaction has taken place.
Well, I guess we are so stupid as a nation anymore that this morning when I put the receipt down on the desk, I noticed on top of the of the white thermal paper, in bold face type the following: THIS IS YOUR RECEIPT.
What? I mean what have people been thinking the paper they get was? THIS IS YOUR RECEIPT. KEEP THIS FOR YOUR RECORDS.
Is being able to identify what a receipt is at this particular business so difficult that they have to print THIS IS YOUR RECEIPT on the tickets? Is this some legal junk to keep them from being liable for returns or has there been a problem legally where they have to state to the customer that they have got their receipt?
If any of this is the case I don’t want to shop there anymore. Why? Because that much stupid could rub off. Both in the business that has to tell its customers what a receipt is and in the customers that shop there.
Its no wonder our country and economy is in so much trouble……………
Farm Futures Management Summit 2012
Well its that time of year again, time to sign up for the Farm Futures Management Summit. This is the second year that I have been asked to speak and am looking forward to not only speaking but just attending the meeting itself. I just love this meeting and think it is the best meeting of the year and not because I am speaking. It is just one of those meetings where the line up of speakers is relevant, current and forward looking and not reflective and re hashing the same old wore out research or topics.
Its fresh. Its alive…………..that is the best way I know how to describe it. I always leave St Louis with a positive outlook even in those years when their wasn’t a positive outlook to see on the horizon.
I think the reason why is that all the other meetings I attend during the year are based on reacting to what is happening in the agriculture world after it happens. The speakers at the Summit focus on being proactive and managing what is happening in the agriculture world before it happens. The information gained at this meeting has help me be a more profitable farmer each year. No its not one big thing that David Kohl or Mike Boehlje say or that Moe Russell or Daryl Dunteman point to but its the trends they talk about and all the little things that add up to something big that make the difference.
So I have taken to labeling meeting invites I get anymore into two categories: Reactionary and Proactive. Then I try hard to make all the Proactive meetings I can attend and fill in with the Reactionary if I need to.
The problem is, in my opinion, that most of agriculture is focused on being reactionary………… A result is that a lot of meetings beat the same old dead horse to death. Reactionary meeting invites fill my inbox and mail box. Proactive meetings seem to be few and far between these days. They exist and you must seek them out and you will have to travel to get there but that is a small sacrifice to pay for the empowerment they give you.
So I hope to see you in St Louis for what I anticipate will be the great PROACTIVE meeting of the year…………. I wouldn’t expect anything else at the Summit.
My New Bag Phone
Remember bag phones? I do. When I got one it was the best thing in the world. Or it was but it wasn’t. You could make calls from your vehicle and if you really wanted to you could hook a battery up and sling it over your shoulder and carry it with you. The battery didn’t last long, it was heavy and wasn’t worth the trouble. There was no caller ID, no missed call alert, no nothing, just a phone. It worked great as a phone allowing you to make those calls you needed to make. It was a tool of convenience.
Today, as predicted then, your cell phone is now your do all computer, phone, text, email, internet, phone book, Twitter, Facebook, weather radar, grain market ticker and a list of apps and downloads for whatever else your into. It is your way to stay connected to the world. You can literally do everything you need to do in your office on your phone while sitting in your vehicle or café or where ever. You’re connected.
Connected. Well pardon me while I disconnect myself. If all of this “being connected” is the eight lane information super highway, when I am taking the next exit for the information super cow path. You all know what a cow path is don’t you? That little worn down dirt tail in the cow pasture, a trail with grass on both sides, an occasional cow patty in the middle of the path and beautiful scenery on both sides. Have you forgot what a cow path is?
The last few weeks, ok really off and on for the last few months I have experimented with my new bag phone. No I don’t have a real bag phone, but I have turned my Droid into a bag phone. It says in my truck. I don’t carry it when I am out of the truck or working around the farm. It says in the truck. It stays in the tractor or combine when I am working in them because it is a safety device. I have been stunned at the amount of work I can get done without my phone on me. I can work without the constant calls, emails, Twitter updates, market updates and so forth.
In short my “new” bag phone has allowed me to get blue collar work done that my white collar phone wouldn’t let me.
Now let me be clear: I have made a lot of money with my Twitter account the last two years give or take a month. Not in selling a service or product on Twitter but just in having the largest research community in the world reporting information to me that allows me to make farm decisions quicker. I don’t care about Brittney Spears or some junk like that on Twitter, I care about the dollar, grains, crude, potash and the like. Yep there is money to be made with Twitter. You have lots of people willing to share freely what they know and you have to get dialed in but there is money to be made off that info for any farming operation.
Same thing with those market and product updates sent via text message. But I don’t need play by play information taking up my day and phone call after phone call in between those Tweets or texts to keep my hands busy on the phone vs. on the work at hand. So by conscious effort, I have taken the first exit I could find off the paved eight lane super information highway and found the fist cow path I could take. I have even begun to change how I do email and have found more peace of mind in it all.
Oh I like to go to the over pass and watch the fast cars go by, but there is something, maybe more to be gained by taking the cow path.
So if you need me, send me a text, email or Tweet. Call me and leave me a message. Just as soon as I get back in the truck I will check my bag phone and get right back to you. Don’t worry I haven’t left the world of technology, still on Twitter, Facebook and blogging, just taking a break and listening to the cows moo, the birds chirp, the wind blow and the bugs talk while I work.
Significant Yield Results vs. Economically Significant Results
I understand regression and inferential statistics. I am not a statistical genius by any stretch, but I sure do like playing with statistics. The two semesters I had of them in grad school just a few years ago were two of the hardest and most fun semesters of graduate school. I really enjoyed the classes. I enjoyed statistics.
Enjoyed maybe too much. It ruined me on buying lottery tickets and raffle tickets at fundraisers. Yea, I still buy a raffle ticket, but not a hand full, just one. It also gets me in trouble at plot tours, field days and sales meetings with seed and chemical salesmen. I question their sample size, plot design and resulting conclusions.
I also question their yield vs. economic responses. Farmers are hung up on yield. Well that’s alright because everything we do is based on a yield. You get paid on what you grow. But you had better get paid more for that yield than what it cost you to grow it.
And that is where I get in trouble. Below are a couple of examples of selling yield or lack there of over the return in dollars to get that yield.
Example 1 is a yield significant/economic non significant scenario that is pretty common in Ag right now. The treatment to a growing crop results in a 5 bu/ac yield increase. That yield increase is significant, as in the likely hood that the result is caused by the treatment is greater than random chance. So by doing X you get a 5 bu yield increase. Lest say that yield is corn: Corn is $5 a bushel. So you grossed a 5 bu increase at $5/bu for $25/ac. But it cost you $26 to get the 5 bushel increase. So I lost a dollar (-$1) in the end……….I lost money by increasing yield. Then why do it?
Example 2 is a yield non significant/economic significant scenario that is also pretty common today. The treatment to a growing crop results in a 5 bu/ac yield increase. That yield increase is NOT significant, as in the likely hood that the result is caused by the treatment is not greater than random chance. So by doing X you get a 5 bu yield increase that could or could not be caused by the treatment. But more often than not you get a 5 bu yield increase. Lest say that yield is corn: Corn is $5 a bushel. So you grossed a 5 bu increase at $5/bu for $25/ac. But it cost you $10 to get the 5 bushel increase. So I gained or netted $15 in the end……….I gained money by increasing yield an insignificant amount. Then why not do it?
Both cases point to a flaw in our research models in Ag. We assume that the underlying result of any practice we use has to be a significant yield increase. Yes, I would hope anything I do results in a significant yield increase. BUT ONLY IF IT MAKES ME MONEY. I also would like to know if the economic return is significant (or at least greater than 50/50) for any treatment even when the yield may not be significant by a statistical model.
In other words, farming is a business. What is my return on investment for any practice despite the results of a significant yield response? In the end it’s about net dollars earned, not winning the yield trophy.
