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No-Tilling Has Arrived — Expect More From Your Dealer

Now that no-tilling accounts for nearly a quarter of the land being farmed, you can look for dealers who are getting up to speed and going the extra mile to deliver equipment and advice to help you succeed.

By Ron Perszewski, Conservation Tillage Product Guide

We’ve come a long way since no-till equipment was something designed and built in a pole barn because there were virtually no other options. Now, no-tillers can choose from a wide range of equipment from both large and small manufacturers.

However, a disconnect between no-tillers and manufacturers is still common at equipment dealerships, where no-till knowledge varies from exceptional to almost non-existent.
Steve Groff, a well-known, 23-year veteran no-tiller in Holtwood, Pa., witnessed the differences between dealers first hand and understands why many don’t make much effort to learn about or sell no-till equipment.

“When I was looking for a planter about 5 years ago, the dealers didn’t seem to know about the latest attachments available. They thought they would be cutting their own throats, because if they sell a no-till planter, they’re not selling that guy a disc and a chisel plow and everything else, along with all the replacement parts that go with it,” he says.

“But I did find a dealership where they were educating themselves about no-till. They’ve really made an effort to know what no-tillers need,” he adds. The effort by the dealership, Binkley & Hurst Bros. of Lititz, Pa., demonstrates a commitment to customer support, Groff says.

“They were willing to do everything they could. One of the reasons I went with them for my no-till corn planter was because they were willing to customize it from brand new,” he says. “I have nine different brands of parts or attachments on that planter. They were willing and able to do that for me.”

Popular Demand

Groff believes no-tillers can influence the way reluctant dealers do business. “The only way some dealers will pay attention to no-tillers is if there’s enough demand, if enough no-tillers are asking for something. Then those dealers will learn about no-tilling,” he says.

Binkley & Hurst Bros. was poised to recognize the looming demand for no-till equipment. As sales manager Don Hoover says, “My business philosophy is to stay on the cutting edge and keep one eye on the horizon. That’s been very successful in the planter business.”

It also helps explain why the dealership moved into no-till about 15 years ago. That’s when a government effort to clean up the waters of Chesapeake Bay spurred farmers in the region to begin no-tilling as a way to avoid soil and chemical run-off. The farmers’ conversion to no-till was also driven by their interest in cutting fuel and equipment costs.

As the farmers began no-tilling, the dealership learned the ins and outs of the new practice along with them, Hoover says. “And we connected with top-notch no-tillers like Steve Groff and Ken Ferrie of Illiniois. We’ve gotten a lot of input from them over the years.” As the dealership began “sinking our teeth into this,” the dealership was invited to local Soil Conservation District meetings on no-till.

“We didn’t go there with a hard sell to farmers in mind,” Hoover says. “We went with some technical knowledge and some practical experience to share with them. We built a base of experience and evolved from there. Our reputation has improved and grown because of that.”
The dealership, which has 70 employees, now has the equivalent of 7 full-time people working on no-till, and more than that during the growing season. Binkley & Hurst Bros. regularly serves no-tillers from as far away as 4 hours drive time in all directions, rather than the 40- or 50-mile radius common to dealerships, Hoover says.

Find A Dealer

Groff suggests that no-tillers, especially those transitioning from another type of tillage practice, identify qualified dealers.

“Question the dealer,” he says. “What does he know about no-till? Is he a believer in it? Has he seen farmers who have done it successfully? The bottom line is, you have to know someone who has been successful at it before you even think about trying it yourself. And encourage the dealer to come to no-till meetings and field days and get educated.”

Dealers knowledgeable about no-till practices will be able to point to their experience. Groff notes that the Binkley & Hurst Bros. dealership not only attends clinics and field days, it helps to sponsor such events. “And they’re active in the no-till community through the no-till organizations around here,” he adds.

Dave Dum, a product support specialist for Binkley & Hurst, says a lot of the education comes from actually working closely with the no-tillers at planting time.

“We hang with the crowd that’s planting. We’re in the field from April to June. We watch what works for the guys, and we talk with them about it,” he says. “We’re always learning ourselves, determining what works in certain conditions across the state. Our job is to match up accessories to the area and conditions the farmer faces.”

Binkley & Hurst Bros. could also be spotted when exhibiting model row units to field days and farm shows. “That way, instead of showing glossy photos in a book, we can stand there and spin the coulter and show the tolerance between the fertilizer knife and the opener and that kind of hands-on thing. That’s led to a lot of our business,” Hoover says.

Full-Range Service

What a no-tiller can expect after identifying a dealer with whom to do business depends on the no-tiller’s own level of expertise.

“The range of customers is intriguing,” says Hoover. “One customer comes in and asks what no-tillers are doing for equipment these days. We can talk to him and show him literature and specs, then walk him through the planter shop to see the attachments and accessories that we recommend.

“The next farmer says he’s been no-tilling for 15 years, it’s time to change planters, and he’ll give us a list of what he wants on it. Maybe he wants to go to a Nu-Till system and wants the Case IH depth gauge wheels, Keeton seed firmers and so on.”

Inexperienced no-tillers should not hesitate to ask basic questions that will help them work their fields most profitably.

“We are more and more often a resource for that kind of information. The farmers aren’t so much asking about the price of closing wheels as they are about no-till concepts and practices,” says Hoover, who notes that the dealership is also involved in other conservation tillage practices, such as strip-till and ridge till.

“Anytime something new comes out and people have read about it or seen it at a show, we’ll be asked about it,” he adds. “We will tell them to go ahead and put two of them on that 12-row planter and see if they can tell a difference.

“Given the cost of a 12- or 16-row planter, plus all the accessories at $200 to $400 a row, it adds up. We give them the wherewithal to plant a day with it and see if they’re satisfied. If not, we might be able to build from the single-disc opener to one with depth-gauge wheels or whatever they actually need.”

But, Hoover says, “There are farmers out there, especially among today’s clientele, who are more aware of what’s available in the no-till market and what they want to do than ever before. So it’s a matter of tailoring our no-till planter presentation to the individual customer, which is what endears us to them.”

It Takes Time

To take full advantage of a knowledgeable dealer, allow enough time to choose and install the proper equipment.

“Back when I started, I could sell a 6-row corn planter in about 20 minutes. I just needed to ask if they wanted liquid or dry fertilizer, insecticide boxes and row markers,” Hoover says. “Today it takes months, maybe even a year, to sell a planter because there are so many options and so many questions.”

Dum spent several months talking with Groff about how the planter should be accessorized. “We traded ideas. It was a joint effort. That’s something we pride ourselves on. We don’t say ‘Here’s the no-till planter and the only options.’ We work with the customer, going back and forth to find what will work,” he says.

Expect a wide selection of equipment options from an established no-till dealer. As Hoover says, “We have vendors lining up at our door to sell us components for no-till.”

Dum and Groff started with a Kinze planter and double-framed it so it could carry all the accessories. They added Rawson no-till coulters, Kinze sweeps on Monosen row units, Ascherman row cleaners, Martin spiked closing wheels, Keeton seed firmers, a foam marker system for use in high-residue conditions, and a couple of fertilizer tanks and pumps.

The design of the planter, which was put to work in October 2000, worked well. Although Groff has since changed the brand of row cleaners and adjusted the coulter system, he has not needed to make major modifications.

In The Fields

Kevin Smoker, foreman of the planter set-up shop at Binkley & Hurst Bros., notes that customers don’t leave the dealership with just a customized planter and high hopes.

“When we sell a planter, it includes a free start-up,” he says. “We’ll go out the first day of planting and make sure all the adjustments are right. Some of the growers know which attachments they want, but when they get it to the field, they don’t really know how it should be adjusted.

“So we’ll be there for the first few acres they do to make sure everything is working satisfactorily,” he adds. “Anything that’s not adjusted makes the product look bad. We’re there to back them up right from the start.”

A top-flight dealer also offers support after the planter is up and running, Hoover says.
“It goes beyond taking a man’s money and then checking with him a year and a half later to see what he thought of the equipment. We provide a lot of up-time service, where we drive an 18-foot van to overhaul a no-till planter from A to Z with all the components available on the truck. It can go out of here for days at a time, and we’ll keep the truck supplied while it’s out there,” he says. “We just keep trying to raise the level of service to ensure their success and ours.”

Hidden Support

Some of the dealership’s support for no-tilling is not apparent to customers.

“We’ve had manufacturers’ engineers out here getting under planters and working to develop a no-till coulter that will work in the rocky conditions in this part of the world,” Hoover says. “That’s happened more than once — they’ll ask how something is working and whether they should be working on this or that. It’s all part of equipment development.”

He adds, “I see us more and more as facilitators of the flow of information between the manufacturers, vendors, no-tillers and even researchers. They’ll come to us and ask what’s needed out there.”

And, he says, the dealership is considering taking another step toward making no-till work for everyone concerned.

“We’ve actually been talking about opening our own little research center here at the dealership, which sits on a small farm. The land around it has been rented, but we might try to use it for trying various equipment options and accessories.

“For example, how much good does it do to rip and then plant right over the slots? What about Keeton seed firmers; are they really worth the money? What about row cleaners?” Hoover asks. “If we could bring that all into a controlled environment and do our own in-field trials, in conjunction with the local agronomic service, we think that would benefit the dealership and the no-till farmers.”

Can a no-tiller dispute the argument that dealers can’t afford to support no-till because they lose too much in conventional tillage sales?

Hoover says, “We’re not out there selling a ton of 30-foot disc harrows. We’re not selling the number of coulter chisels and the big rippers that we used to. Yes, we are selling less tillage equipment. And there were some decent numbers to be done in those product categories.
“Our conventional tillage numbers are diminishing while our conservation tillage numbers are increasing. Our sales of strict no-till is probably increasing more rapidly than conservation tillage as a whole.

He adds, “My parts department guys are not overjoyed when they hear us talking about decreasing the use of tillage equipment, chisel points and ripper tips and disc blades. These things have a decent profit margin for us. But in the interest of serving the farmer, we think no-till has merit.”

The dealership’s commitment to conservation tillage has an up side, Hoover says. “It has certainly elevated the perception that farmers have of us and it is helping us sell bigger planters to the bigger hitters. The people in this are looking at us as an outfit that seems to know what they’re doing. They’re coming to us and buying second and third 12- or 16-row planters. And we service planters we didn’t sell.”

Dum says the no-till planters have led to other sales. “They’ve been an opening point with new customers who’ve heard about us from their neighbors. That brings them in the door to us.”
The no-till service is labor intensive. To minimize that cost, Hoover says, Binkley & Hurst Bros. does not set up no-till planters just for the showroom, waiting instead until after they are sold, then customizing them to meet the buyer’s particular needs.

Understandably, Hoover does not offer his dealership’s financial figures to show that dealing in no-till is profitable.

But Groff notes, “For most dealers, it’s a catch-22. “They want to keep the no-tillers happy, but they don’t want to end up selling smaller tractors and fewer plow shares and chisel points and chisels and discs and all the rest of the conventional tillage equipment.

“Those dealers are going to have to figure it out,” Groff says, “because no-till is going to continue its progressive, steady growth. It’s going to increase, and the dealers are going to have to meet that demand if they want to stay competitive. Money talks.”