In 2000, Cache River Valley Seed in Cash, AR, built a seed plant capable of producing 1.5 million units a year. Randy Woodard, the company's co-owner and CEO, proudly notes that it is probably the most state-of-the-art seed facility in the mid-South.

Over the last three years, the northeastern Arkansas company's seed sales have skyrocketed. Sales of the NK Brand seed that the company also contract produces and conditions have risen 300%. Cache River Valley Seed also saw sales of its proprietary brand of soybean seed, MorSoy, double over the same time period. Nearly all of the soybean seed the company sells is transgenic, and Roundup Ready varieties continue to be in high demand.

Woodard attributes the sales growth to the company's sales staff and to hard work and advertising. In addition to its retail sales staff of four in Cash, the company has four salespeople working throughout Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee and northeastern Louisiana. In addition to soybean seed, they sell Cache River Valley rice seed and the Dixie Wheat line of wheat varieties.

The Arkansas company has been in the seed business since it was formed by the McAlister family in 1963. In 1973, J.E. McAlister (Woodard's father-in-law) started Cache River Valley Development Corporation. At that time, the company had 40,000 to 50,000 bushels of bulk storage and about the same amount of flat storage, says Woodard, who joined the company in 1975. It now has one-half million bushels of bulk storage and three-quarters of a million bushels of flat storage. Cache River Valley Seed has gone from a local seed supplier to a well-known regional seed company, Woodard says.

In 1996, Cache River Valley Seed sold part of its business to MFA to concentrate on producing and conditioning seed for NK Brand (now Syngenta Seeds). It grows and conditions about 90% of NK's seed in the mid-South, and last year it conditioned and processed 500,000 units of seed for NK Seeds.

The company's salespeople have been instrumental in increasing sales. Woodard says his secret to recruiting is to hire people who get along with people. “That means understanding what customers want and being their friend — someone they can trust,” he says. Most of Cache River Valley Seed's salespeople also live in their sales areas, so they have a good working knowledge of soil types and what varieties perform best in those locations.

To support their recommendations, Cache River Valley Seed collects data from its research plots in all of its marketing areas, and its production and sales staffs are constantly evaluating genetics. Another benefit is that an NK research station is just 20 miles from the Cash facility. “Yields in our area have consistently improved,” Woodard says.

Woodard points out that service is also essential. “If our customers are working, we're working. If that means 24/7 to service them, then it's 24/7,” he says.

To help itself and its growers be more efficient and profitable, the company has bulk seed facilities, using the Tru Bulk seed-handling system. In just the past couple of years, it has installed eight 3,500-bu. bins. In addition, two large treaters feature 2,500-bu. overhead hopper tanks so seed orders can be treated in advance and quickly loaded onto customers' trucks or the company's bulk delivery trucks.

Advertising has helped get the word out about Cache River Valley Seed, Woodard says. But the seed company's focus on service and genetics is likely what keeps customers coming back and keeps seed sales rising.

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