Farm equipment manufacturers are seeing fewer sales due to tighter margins for farmers. (Carrie Muehling/WJBC)
By Carrie Muehling
BLOOMINGTON – Farmers are fighting tighter margins and that could further affect equipment dealers in 2015.
“We think that the business will be stable. We don’t see it declining a lot more than it did in ’14 but we don’t see it going back to the times it was in ’11, ’12 and ’13,” said Mark Foster, regional manager with Birkey’s Farm Stores. “A couple of things could help us. Obviously if we could get the tax situation to be more stable and consistent. If the government would pass that to be instead of a mandate every year to year, to make that permanent. That would be a big plus for us. And then the second thing is obviously if we could find a rally in the markets that have been somewhat spotty over the last several months.”
Foster said farmers will continue to farm the ground and will need a certain amount of machinery to do that. They also will need repair parts and service, which equipment dealers will continue to provide. As technology changes, the decision about when to upgrade equipment is always there.
“I think the efficiency and the productivity and the profitability are always factors. There’s no question that today’s machinery is designed to be more efficient and designed to be more profitable for the customer and the farmers. We do see that those things do help us create demand out there,” said Foster.
He said farmers have been through many changes recently with the introduction of new engine emission standards. That transition brought price increases with it. But most of the industry is through that now and Foster doesn’t anticipate big price increases in the near future.
Carrie Muehling can be reached at [email protected].
