Partners Mike Roberts and Thomas Reiff co-own Chester Farm Supply in Chester, SD. With only six full-time employees, annual sales of $6.5 million, and cool, wet soil conditions that don't offer much of an application window most years, time is critical in meeting the needs of growers who might plant as many as 4,000 to 5,000 acres of corn and soybeans.

Since purchasing the business in 1983, Roberts and Reiff have seen trends come and go. One change they have seen is the bundling of products, including seeds, with one supplier. In Chester Farm Supply's case, Monsanto, which supplies the business with both crop protection products and Asgrow and DeKalb seeds, has become a good fit, and the partners have stuck with them. Although this business approach has been profitable for Roberts and Reiff, they spent the better part of a year deciding if they wanted to make the added investment and jump into the dry fertilizer business in a big way. Up until a year ago, their dry products were purchased from competitors.

“It got to the point where we felt we needed to take advantage of the price advantages from building our own plant,” Roberts says. “A good friend in Elk Horn had recently replaced a 27-year-old Ranco system with Ranco's new DW system and was extremely pleased with the results.” Besides the Ranco system's longevity, a feature that impressed Roberts and Reiff was the fact that the equipment doesn't require large motors. “Our largest is 15 hp and that cuts back on the electrical service we have to provide,” Roberts says.

Chester Farm Supply contracted with Peterson Bros. Builders from Sioux City to construct a 68- × 104-ft. structure on land where a tornado had leveled a grain elevator. The holding capacity of the new building is 2,200 tons. Although the town has rail service, all product is currently trucked in. Inside, they off-load into a T drag at a capacity of 100 tons/hr. A bucket elevator then moves product to a 120-ton/hr. tripper conveyor, which takes it across the top. There are four bins: two 600-ton urea bins, one 550-ton DAP bin, and one 450-ton potash bin.

One concern that Roberts and Reiff express is keeping track of product densities. With only six employees, they don't have time to keep checking from one load to the next. However, Roberts is pleased that the new system is mostly within 20 lbs. He adds, “Our platform scales are on 20-lb. breaks, so we are probably more accurate than we can measure.” Since running the first batch through the new system on September 15, they have liked the results. “It can really move fertilizer through. We are very pleased,” Roberts concludes.

Just as Chester Farm Supply met the needs of growers planting upwards of 5,000 acres, Country Pride Services in Bigham Lake, MN, increased its capacity five-fold to meet the demands of its growers in southwest Minnesota. “We had facilities getting up in age,” explains Kevin Jackson, general manager of Country Pride. “We decided to close two other sites and concentrate on improvements at the most central and environmentally friendly location.” The company also tore down an elevator to build its new fertilizer plant. The new plant opened on November 6, so not a lot of tonnage has passed through. However, Jackson likes what he sees.

The plant, fitted with Waconia equipment, is built for unit trains and takes advantage of bulk prices. Jackson explains that raw ingredients are received into a large hopper under the track. A receiving belt then elevates it to another belt that runs the distance of the building. A tripper drops product into desired bins and onto one of the two vertical Waconia mixers. It took approximately an hour and a half in the past to unload a train car. Now it takes 7.5 minutes to unload potash, 8.5 minutes to unload DAP, and 9 minutes to unload urea, according to Jackson.

When asked why he chose Waconia, Jackson said, “We built a relationship over the years that I'm comfortable with. Because of that, we know that Waconia will stand behind us in anything we do.” Once they decided on the direction they wanted to take, Jackson and others sat down with an engineer to design the plant. Waconia then fit the equipment to the plant they designed.

The new plant has allowed Country Pride Services to become more competitive. “Not only do we operate more efficiently now,” Jackson says, “we have cut costs by downsizing staff.” It is also more environmentally friendly. Because the fertilizer doesn't see the light of day from the time it is unloaded until it is loaded onto spreaders or tenders, both dust and spillage are virtually eliminated. “We're as cautious as we can possibly be,” Jackson explains. “Our attitude is that we don't own the environment. We are just caretakers for our kids.”

If you want to know how rugged fertilizer handling equipment really is, ask the man who repairs it when it's down. Sam Mullins, in charge of equipment maintenance at Morral Company's Caladonia, OH, facility, has a long history of using fertilizer handling equipment manufactured by A.J. Sackett Company. “Every time I call, I get a positive response. I get the answer I need,” Mullins says.

Unlike most dealerships where there are two small windows of opportunity to meet the demands of customers with fall and spring fertilizer applications, Morral has a third window to deal with. Besides regular fertilizer blending and application, the company also private-labels ice melt products for national retailers across the country. If rainy weather doesn't keep the applicators out of the fields at planting time, unpredictably snowy and icy winters can cause the demands for ice control products to fluctuate wildly.

Morral Company has two manufacturing plants — one in Caladonia and one in Morral, OH. Both bag and provide bulk fertilizer. The Caledonia facility blends and packages lawn fertilizer and ice melt products and provides dry fertilizer application services. The Morral site provides much of the same, but its basic operation is liquid manufacturing and packaging. Some of that product is bottled for private labels.

Once they unload by rail or truck, a Sackett Bulk-Toter moves product into the building and then onto a slider bed conveyor. It is then mechanically moved back and forth horizontally into one of eight bins.

The 25-year-old Bulk-Toter that provided exceptional service is the biggest reason the Morral Company selected Sackett's blender when it decided to double its blending capacity. Mullins says, “What I like about Sackett is that when you explain the vision of what you want, they will see to it that their equipment fits your needs. They don't hesitate to make custom alterations.” He concludes, “I know that there are other good companies out there. However, Sackett has been at it a long time and I like how they do business.”

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