Pay Attention to Markets, Decide and Take Action
In the days before cell phone, Roger was told by farmers at least a hundred times, “I was side dressing corn (or spraying or cultivating a crop) as I listened to the farm reports on the radio and told myself I needed to do some pricing, but I will finish side dressing in a few days and I will do it then. Every dag-gone year, by the time I got around to pricing, the price would be 30 or so cents lower, so I did not price anything and then three weeks later, the price was much lower yet, so I never did forward price anything.”
Now that we have cell phones, farmers see what prices are doing and think maybe they should do some pricing, but make the same mistakes their dads’ made. Other farmers receive text message or a call from their merchandiser, commodity broker, grain market consultant to receive a recommendation. About 30% of farmers make a decision and do something on the spot or within 15 to 30 minutes. The other 70% think about it and lose the opportunity.