SEGMENT: FUTURE OF FARMING, FARM BUSINESS, & FAMILY FARM
Edward Van Drunen>ISM Interviews M-Z>ISM Interviews M-Z, Segment 15
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- FAMILY FARM
- I have two sons that are involved in the business and they are mostly running it now, oldest son went to Purdue for food technology, younger son went to the University of Illinois and majored in Business, worked at turning the farm over to sons for a number of years, takes a lot of planning, important to work on this portion of the business, Very proud in his sons being involved in the family business.
- HIRED HELP
- Over 300 people working on the farm, more in the summer than in the winter but it is mostly stable, Sales and management work year round, in the summer the processing portion of the herbs also runs at night and we run 24 hours a day, When starting in 1965 had about 3-5 people year round but in the summer had about 25 or 30,
- FARM BUSINESS
- Not the same every day, weather can change and make it difficult, The management of farming is more difficult than the freeze drying, If you can mange farming there is more opportunities, it is more difficult to grow herbs than corn and soy beans. Difficult part of farming is selling, it is easier to grow, have to really look into the sales part, If you can control your sales it is more profitable,
- FUTURE OF FARMING
- Looks good, changing and have to be willing to keep up with the changes, some things that we have dropped because they were not profitable, "the world is changing fast in our age", have to keep improving service quality and price, Agriculture looks good right now because of Ethanol, Corn is 8 dollars a bushel now but in the long run that is to high and it has to come down eventually, fuel is effecting food prices and it will continue, it will be more profitable it has not been profitable but it is getting there.
