FBN

FBN

David Sparks Ph.D.
David Sparks Ph.D.
Farmer’s Business Network, Inc. has a Crop Marketing Service for the technology-enabled market access, and brings global markets to the farm gate. They claim their business model is the future for crop marketing that uses the power of networks and data to level the playing field for farmers and increase profits.  

 

Here's Charles Baron, co-founder and Vice president of products: "FBN Crop Marketing helps farmers find buyers and sell their crops more profitably. It consists of FBN Profit CenterTM, a web product, and an exclusive crop marketing service called FBN Select MarketsTM. FBN Select Markets has already helped farmers contract thousands of acres at premium prices. "

 

Farmers are already on board. "In the past, producers were financing the whole industry," said Montana farmer Todd McCabe. "The FBNSM network, in my mind, is changing the whole structure for the good of producers. Instead of paying cash early for inputs and getting paid at harvest, we're getting advances on the crop up front, and able to finance our inputs." McCabe continued, "It's amazing how much money we can save and keep our working capital available when the cash flow isn't there in the middle of the season. It's a really good risk management tool." 

 

Farmers confront persistent informational, financial, and market-access-related disadvantages. "Farmers have lived in a world of high risk and low reward," said Erik Malmstrom, General Manager of FBN Crop Marketing. "But the revolution in data science and rapidly changing buyer demand provides farmers a huge opportunity to create and capture greater profits." FBN Profit Center provides farmers with an easier way to track and manage crop marketing activities, and analyze the estimated profit of daily bids from over 4,000 buyers. FBN Select Markets gets farmers access to premium crop contracts and packages that can drive higher profitability.

 

- FBN Profit Center automatically analyzes the estimated profitability of thousands of bids based on each farmer's individualized costs of production, transportation, and storage – and identifies the best options. Farmers also get automatic alerts for "in-the-money" bids, delivered right to their phones.  "I typically have to call every buyer to get their price which is pain," said Minnesota farmer Cory Nohl. "I really like having all local bids right up in front of me, and automatically knowing my trucking and storage costs. Without me doing any math in my head I already know I am 10 cents above my breakeven."

 

- FBN Select Markets provides farmers exclusive opportunities that value crop attributes like quality, traceability, and seed variety - rather than just quantity. Opportunities include premium and forward crop contracts on specialty and novel crops with higher values and premium deal terms like advanced payments and discounts on farm inputs. After experiencing FBN Select Markets in action, South Dakota farmer Mark Gath said, "Select Markets allowed us to capture $1.70 above board and above basis for our non-GMO soybeans. That's an extra $135 per acre for me."

 

"Marketing effectively is an extremely difficult part of farming and the industry structure forces farmers to leave lots of money on the table," said Malmstrom. "By giving farmers better information and the power of our network, we're bringing dollars back to farmers. We're creating an independent, digital, data enabled future for crop marketing which gets farmers premium prices and buyers the specific crops they are looking for."

 

The launch of FBN Crop Marketing comes in a period of rapid growth for the FBN network. Combined with the FBN analytics platform – the industry's most advanced farm analytics system – and FBN DirectTM, which helps growers save up to 40% on inputs through manufacturer-direct savings.  The launch of FBN Crop Marketing enables the FBN network to provide farmers a full-profit system and is creating a completely independent, unbiased, and data-driven farm economy that truly puts Farmers First.

www.farmersbusinessnetwork.com/crop-marketing.

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