With four of its 16 plants spaced only 15 miles from each other, Wabash Valley FS, located in Browns, IL, knew it needed to consolidate business by building one new plant and closing the four old ones. The biggest question was how it was going to automate the new plant.

The 10-county co-op, which provides a full line of crop protection products, plant food, grain bins, buildings, and petroleum products, has always been technologically advanced. Wabash Valley FS operates four Soilection machines and works closely with its customers to see that they get the best technology, including precision agriculture technology, to make their businesses profitable.

At the co-op's new plant in Browns, a two-bay Junge system handles 12 bulk herbicides as well as packaged materials. With a loadout time of three minutes, one man can easily keep both bays going. Blend tickets are made by the salesperson, mix person or the secretary. The person mixing goes into the billing software and pulls up the blend ticket, and the Junge makes the load exactly as it is billed.

“Previously, we had concerns with our check valves and backwash of water into the tanks,” says Mike Wilson, manager of the new plant. There is no guessing about amounts being loaded out now. “We estimated our shrinkage at about 3% previously,” Wilson says. “Now there is almost no shrinkage at all.”

Two and a half years ago, Wabash Valley had 215 employees. Now it has 190. As a result of the plant consolidation and automation, it lost six people throughout the four locations. Some people retired, others moved to other positions, and others were let go.

Wilson estimates that the $100,000 investment will be paid off within three years. “Before, applicators were working only for their specific locations,” he says. “Now all equipment operates out of one site, and if a tender or applicator happens to break free, it will be fully utilized.”

Just as Wabash Valley FS knew it had to streamline to remain competitive, Farmers Cooperative in Dorchester, NE, felt the same pressure to update its facilities to continue servicing its farmer customers.

In the fall of 2002, a merger of 32 Farmland and Agriliance dealerships, forming 13 full-service Farmers Cooperative locations, provided an ideal opportunity for the update.

Previously, crop protection manufacturers had provided one or two monitors on random tanks, but none of the plants used them consistently. Based on its positive experience using FarmChem equipment, Farmers Cooperative decided to use the supplier to automate its 13 plants.

Two points were critical as Farmers Cooperative narrowed its decision to install an automation system, however. The installation needed to be completed in a short period and all 13 plants needed to be coordinated. The FarmChem system gave a proprietary Internet-based information system that allows inventory management from a single location.

“It's a fantastic tool,” says Brad Stedman, business development manager at Farmers Cooperative. “We are now able to monitor multiple tanks at different locations and fill orders as quickly as they come in without fear of running out of product.”

Since switching to FarmChem's automated system, Farmers Cooperative has reduced end-of-year inventory by 6 to 7% in one season. While each plant manager can access the information for his specific plant, Stedman can access inventory throughout the entire 13 sites several times each day. Previously, with stainless steel tanks and unreliable monitoring, it had been next to impossible to determine how much inventory was in each tank on a daily basis. “Not only can we make better decisions regarding moving product from one site to another, but we are now better prepared to take advantage of early fill deals and other manufacturer incentives,” Stedman explains.

Staying competitive with early fill deals and taking advantage of other incentives help retailers pass along savings to customers. That helps build a strong customer base, and in the ag retail business, that is what it's all about.

At Helena Chemical Company's Guthrie Center, IA, plant, manager Keith Buttler says the plant “maintains approximately 90% market share within a 15-mile radius.”

To keep that share, Helena has to stay on top of technology to provide its customers with the best possible services. Servicing corn, soybeans, alfalfa, and pasture acreages, the plant used to offer only suspension products. It switched to dry phosphorus and potassium and liquid nitrogen and now is back to liquid.

After installing Kahler Automation equipment a year ago, Helena has decreased loadout time from 35 to 10 minutes. “Because we were a suspension plant before, we were set up to mix in our tenders,” Buttler notes. Currently, the first 10% of product is unmixed, the middle 80% is feathered in, and the last 10% is either water or solution fertilizer to clean out the lines.

“The Kahler Automation system has had a huge effect on both our tending and spraying,” Buttler says. “I can't think of a time when I've had a machine sit idle since we've installed the automated system.”

Although he doesn't think the Kahler Automation system has a direct impact on his customers, Buttler says the system lets him get his spraying done within the limited window of opportunity all applicators face during the few hectic days of planting season. “I'm paying for the investment with my loss of shrinkage,” he says. “Last year, we had virtually no shrinkage at all.”

Not only is there less loss due to shrinkage, but Helena is picking up an additional 80 to 100 acres per day. That, too, adds up. Ironically, as acreage has picked up, Helena's payroll has been reduced as a result of the automation. “We expect to cut down on seasonal help by about one-third as a result of the Kahler system,” Buttler says.

Whether the goal is cutting back on payroll expenses, reducing shrinkage, or taking advantage of the synergies that result from mergers, plant automation seems to be at the forefront of every retailer's plans.

Bay Lakes Co-op and Mid County Co-op joined forces January 1, 2003, to form Ag Ventures LLC, a 75/25% partnership agronomy center located in Shawano, WI. Because at the time of the merger neither of the plants was automated, Ag Ventures decided to install in both plants the Murray Automation System, which is capable of automating both liquid and dry facilities. By installing the same system in both plants, Ag Ventures has been able to train manpower to work both plants more efficiently.

Jeff Simon, an agronomist at Ag Ventures, says that operation of the Murray Automation system was easy to learn and has been reliable. “The first load after the Murray Automation system was installed worked just like it was supposed to,” Simon says. “It's much faster and more accurate than loading manually.”

More importantly, sales have increased because of the Murray Automation installation. Although Ag Ventures initially reduced the number of its personnel, it recently hired more people to keep up with its expanding business.

Simon likes the fact that sales inventory can be conveniently kept on the automated system. When a grower places an order, the information is entered into the system. His load is automatically mixed when the delivery vehicle is ready to load it out. That information is then stored so it can be used for subsequent mixes if no changes are necessary. In the future, Ag Ventures plans to be able to prepare invoices from sales tickets.

The next option Ag Ventures is considering, which can minimize labor even more, is to install a card system. An operator will be able to drive into a secured bay after regular hours, hook up his truck, put the card in and load the desired mix.

“It's a long way from the way business used to be,” Simon says. The Murray system adds accuracy, reliability and flexibility with user-friendly touch screens and industry-standard electronics. All processes are easily seen on the touch screens, which provide instant information for the operator. The system also adjusts for product overruns to help reduce inventory shrinkage. Mass flow meters, in the liquid plant, now measure the product. “This saves the time it used to take to have a truck roll across the scale. That really saves us a lot of time,” Simon concludes.

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