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The Topflight Grain Board of
Directors and the family of Richard Thomas invite you
TO
AN OPEN HOUSE
HONORING
TOPFLIGHT GRAIN COMPANY
FRIDAY, MAY 28, 2004
3:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.
BEST WESTERN GATEWAY INN
I-72 Route 105 Interchange
MONTICELLO, ILLINOIS
By Richard Thomas
This will be my last time to write an article for our newsletter as manager of your company. It has been a very rewarding and educational journey. My family and I moved to Bement in March of 1969 to become the manager of your company. I was 28 years old with a wife and two children. We moved in to a large two story house (old Hardiman place) just three houses east of the elevator where we still live today. Then in April of 1970 our third child was born. Some say it was because of the good Bement water. Our kids were educated in the Bement School system and are now all married. They have provided Bonnie and me with 6 wonderful grandchildren, three boys and three girls.
As I watched my family grow, I also watched the company grow. We have had five mergers and one acquisition since I became your manager. With those mergers and acquisitions we have increased our licensed storage capacity from 500 thousand bushels in 1969 to 21 million bushels today and increased full time employees from 6 to 46 currently. While managing your company we have built 6.2 million bushels of concrete and corrugated steel storage. We got into and out of the bulk petroleum and cement business.
One of the most important decisions I feel this company ever made was in 1970 when we extended our siding here in Bement by 1,310 ft. at a cost of $29,594 (rebated at a rate of $25 per car over a five year period by the railroad) to accommodate loading 100 car trains. This gave us an advantage that prompted our growth.
To get to where we are today has not come without taking many chances on the profitability of the company and sacrifice to my family. I have laid awake many nights worried about corn on the ground, having the grain and ownership to the grain to make timely shipments, disgruntled employees, upset customers, profitability, and missed family functions.
With a lot of prayer, support from my wife and family, great boards to work with, and a loyal customer base I’ve been able to have 34 profitable years as your manager. We have been able to put 14.8 million dollars back into the hands of our owners.
I’m stepping aside to let the younger generation take over. Early in my career I worked for a manager that retired on the job and I made a promise to myself at that time to never let that happen to me. The board has graciously decided to let me stay on and work enough hours so I can qualify for group health insurance until I reach age 65.
So as of June 1st, Scott Docherty will be taking over as your new general manager and I couldn’t be handing it over to a more capable person. Scott has worked for the company 11 years as the farmer marketing director and grain merchandiser. Scott will carry on the same tradition that the five managers before him have carried on in the 101 year history of the company.
Thanks for your support and business the last 35 years.
Bonnie isn’t so sure about my retirement:
By Scott Docherty
It truly amazing how much you can accumulate over 11 years time without totally cleaning house. We moved last August and I am still moving boxes and looking for some important stuff that we think we still have and use. Denise is busy redecorating the kitchen and the bathrooms and teaching dance classes. Annie (9 yrs old) is doing well in school and busy in dance and gymnastics competitions. Dillon (12 yrs) is in 7th grade and fitting right in at the new Monticello middle school. Dillon took up speed skating this past winter and did great for his first year. Dillon hit the wall 2 out of 3 races in his first competition but he really improved in his last competition. Dillon is running track this spring and really loves the hurdles and long jump. He will start baseball in May so Dillon is eating well and is still not putting on any weight( 5’4” & 99lbs wet) . Serge (21 yrs old) has had a tough year; Serge started on dialysis last May and had to have his transplant kidney removed in February of this year. Serge has lost 75 lbs in the last year and is on a renal failure diet. He doesn’t have either of his kidneys so he has dialysis 3 times a week for about 4 hours at a time. He is dealing with a lot and is trying to cope with the thought of going through another kidney transplant sometime in the future. Denise and I sure appreciate the prayers and thoughts we have received from everyone.
Eleven years ago I started working
for Dick Thomas and the Bement Grain Co. I have to admit that at that time I
did not know what a great opportunity and experience it was going to be working
with Dick and the rest of the Topflight employees. In this day and age it is
not uncommon for people to change jobs every 5-6 years, so to see the years of
experience within your company should make you feel good of what you have in
this company. We have seen a lot of changes in agriculture and in the elevator
industry in the last 11 years and as I become the General Manager for Topflight
Grain I am sure we will continue to see even more changes. If we continue to
ask ourselves the question, “What is the good business reason for doing this?”
and we can find a good fundamental answer to those questions, then change can
be good and change can be the price of progress. I look forward to new
responsibilities and challenges as General Manager and want to continue with
the programs and leadership that you have had for the past 35 years. Your Board
of Directors and Management put together the Topflight Mission statement one
year ago and I would like to print it again for your review. We are committed to the future of
agriculture by improving the profitability of our customers through quality
service and exceptional people.
I would like to end by saying thank you for your support in the past and in the future.
By
Vanessa Stinson
What a great winter! Now these are the kind you don’t mind staying around for. At least I don’t mind them. We have been busy this winter with shipping grain out and getting grain in off of the farm, which at this time is just about caught up. We are not planning any major projects at LaPlace this year, only to finish the dust system on the bean complex, and to rock and chip the driveways.
The women’s program was a big success again this year. We never think we can beat the year before but always seem to. If you have ideas for this program please forward them to us.
Scot Daily spent a week in Florida for bike week in February. He says he had the time of his life. Keith and I recently celebrated our 25th anniversary with a surprise party given by our daughters. Thanks to all of you who helped us celebrate.
We are planning our last graduation party for our daughter Nicolle. This is weird; our last child graduating! It does not seem possible that our baby is a senior. She will be attending Eastern Illinois in the fall. Ashley is finishing her first year at Richland and Gretchen is at Kroger full time. We are looking forward to a great summer.
We hope that the planting and
growing season is great for you and that we have a bountiful harvest with the
great prices that we are experiencing at the time.
By Eric Clements
It looks like spring is here to stay. The winter could have been worse. At least we did not have any ice to contend with this year. We have loaded out a lot of grain this winter. The elevator operators always like to have a lot of grain shipped before the spring gets here. It seems to prevent a lot of grain conditioning problems. We have already moved 450,000 bushels out of the big flat at Shacks to Milmine this winter. We put about 950,000 bushels in the big flat at harvest.
The bin project at Cisco is moving along very well. The concrete crew is digging the footing for the bin. The footing for the bin is nine feet wide and twenty inches thick. The bin will need a total of 700 yards of concrete for the footing and bin pad. The bin footing and pad will have a total of 78,267 pounds of rebar. We were fortunate to get this bin ordered before the steel prices went up. Before starting to build a bin we have to get soil borings and analysis to determine if we can build the bin and what type of footing the bin will require. We have good soil around here so that saves us money by not having to dig deep footings to set the bin on.
The operations crews have been busy this winter picking up grain off the farm and performing maintenance on the grain handling equipment. Most of our farm pickup jobs are finished. If you have any questions or need farm pickup please give me a call. We have four semis and eight straight trucks ready to pick up the grain for you. The maintenance crews have several projects they are working on. Willard is installing a new dust system for the west dump pit at Laplace. Roger has new pit augers to install at Emery and Shacks. Rob has a new loadout spout at Seymour to install before next harvest.
I hope that everyone has a safe and productive spring.
ANOTHER YEAR!
By Rodd Runyen
I can’t believe a year has come and gone! I started my employment with Topflight Grain Cooperative on March 31, 2003. When I started, I was inexperienced in the grain business, except for those 8 years of detassling corn in the summer!! But I am grateful that with my employment with Topflight, I landed in the Bement office. Pam Jarboe and Chuck Bentley have been excellent mentors for me! They have taught me quite a bit in the last year and allowed me to learn all the ins and outs of our agricultural computer program. I want to thank them for all of their help. I am still learning something new every day and I find this to be a very rewarding job. I also want to thank all the Topflight customers who have had to “put up with me” learning the grain business. I enjoy working with you and enjoy meeting and talking with you.
It is also a benefit when you have an office that is relaxed and laid back. I know that some folks out there will be glad to know that I enjoy giving Eric a hard time!! Pam and Chuck both think it is going to be a long summer. Why? Well, with Eric being a Cardinals fan and I being a Cubs fan, it seems we get a dig in on each other every day! But of course, it’s all in fun. So when some of my fellow Cubs fans come in (Babe Foran, Frank Lux, and Dave Thompson to name a few!), you will have to brag about the Cubs to get Eric going!! Eric just needs to express what he feels inside, that this is going to be the Cubs year!!
I also wanted to update you on my wife, Tera. She has finished radiation and will continue to undergo chemotherapy into next year. The initial diagnosis is that the brain tumor is shrinking. We continue to hope for the best. Thank you for all of your prayers and concerns.
I hope everyone has a safe planting season and that the rains will come when needed. I look forward to seeing the green fields and the warm days of summer. Enjoy it! For we all know that this year also will go by too fast. As I get older (39), it seems as if the years go by faster. I look at my children and I can’t believe how old they are (6, 9, and 14). We do everything together but yet I feel as if I missed that one day when they grew older. Maybe you get more melancholy the older you get, but I long for the days when I was young and it seemed as if a year took forever to come and go! But as the song says, time marches on. And you know what? In a very short time I will be saying again, I can’t believe a year has come and gone!
Have a great summer!
WHAT IS HAPPENING IN THE MONTICELLO AREA?
By Stason Kopps
It has been a busy winter and spring here in the Monticello area. The crew spent a good part of the winter picking up the ground pile at Seymour. I am glad to report that job is done and the corn came up in great shape. We also have been loading many trains in Monticello and Seymour.
The Monticello facility has been the site of a major construction project. We are replacing the main corn receiving leg. The old leg could move 7,500 bushels an hour, but the new leg will be able to move 15,000 bushels an hour. The new leg will be nice to have during harvest.
As I mentioned earlier the guys have been very busy. Bob spent a good part of the winter blending corn for trains and cleaning. He is really looking forward to having this new leg. Chris spent most of the winter at Seymour working on the ground pile, but when it was slow at Seymour we kept him busy here in Monticello. Rob also spent a good part of the winter picking up the ground pile. Plus he was able to find time to fix anything that broke down. Ole Jim has been spending a lot of time at Lodge, and we hope to have the facility empty soon. I spent a good part of the winter helping out on the Seymour pile or helping out where needed.
I hope everyone has a safe and productive planting season.
By Doug Adloff
Hard to believe that spring is here and the planters are beginning to roll again. It has been a good winter in Seymour, as we have gotten our ground pile all picked up and quite a bit of grain shipped. It took us a couple months to get all the corn picked up and hauled back into the elevator. We could probably have done it all in a month or so, but there were some days that just weren’t fit to haul and days that the extra manpower was not available. But it all came up in great condition, as good as the day it went out there. We were fortunate that during the two weeks it took to fill the pile we didn’t have any rain on the corn. Most of our soybeans have been trucked out, with only the bin bottoms left to ship out. We have been averaging about two or three corn trains a month since the first of the year, so we have shipped over half of what we took in since harvest.
This is the time of year that the maintenance side of things begins to heat up. It is a lot easier to make repairs when there isn’t a lot of grain coming in or going out. We hired a painting crew to sandblast and paint the east Columbian tank, and are currently looking at upgrading the outside receiving leg and drag conveyor.
As we progress through spring and into summer, I wish everyone a safe and prosperous farming season. Have a great summer!
NEWS FROM MAROA
By Denny Hill
It has been a busy winter around here with all the grain deliveries off the farm and trying to get truck deliveries to the processors in Decatur, plus the fact that grain prices have skyrocketed since the January USDA monthly report, there has never been a dull moment.
This being my first winter at the Maroa facility, I wasn’t familiar with the amount of off farm storage that is used around this area by the farmers, but by the middle of December I realized there was even more than what I expected. Our two semi-trucks kept busy with farm pick-up when we were able to get enough room in the elevator, which was a big problem in December and January. ADM was getting plenty of railcars in and the truck dump would only be open 2 or 3 days a week, so we had a hard time making space in the elevator for the D.P corn wanting to be delivered during the mild weather. Fortunately, the farmers understood the problem we faced and were very cooperative.
Since the first of November we have shipped over 1.3 million bushels of corn to Decatur and have taken into Maroa around 900,000 bushels of corn. Bean shipments to Decatur since harvest have totaled 300,000 bushels and bean receipts into Maroa are around 150,000 bushels. We have contracts on the book for April and May to Decatur so we will be busy picking up the 700,000 bushels we have stored on the ground at the North bin site during this period. The corn in the bunker and the rings has kept in good shape this winter and we look for it to come up with a minimal amount of discounts.
As most of you know, Jerry Lambert our semi-driver, retired on March 19th after 27 years of service to this elevator. His wife, Juanita, and he have moved to the upper part of the state of New York, where she is from. Jerry will be greatly missed in this organization by his fellow employees and the many farmers he dealt with in his farm pick-ups. One thing you could always count on with Jerry was if he said he would be at your bin at 6:30 in the morning, he would be there at 6:15. If anyone would like to drop them a line sometime, their new address is 186 Exchange St., Geneva, New York, 14456. They can be reached by phone at 315-789-5874.
The past 3 months have seen the markets spiral upwards after the USDA’s report on January 9th. Since that report corn has risen 75 cents and beans over 2 dollars and they will remain very volatile thru the summer months, as we need to raise a normal to above normal crop to meet demand. We are seeing some great opportunities to get some prices locked in on our 2004 crop and I would hope our patrons will stay in touch with the market daily as there will be some wild swings as we go thru the growing season.
HAVE A SAVE PLANTING SEASON!
By Derrick Bruhn
Monticello has been a busy place this winter. With the markets active it has kept things busy. We keep telling Sherryl it will slow down some day. Sherryl has been a savior since coming to Monticello to help. She is taking care of offers, which this winter have been used a lot; she takes care of balancing our daily position and handles our specialty contracts. Scott and I have really enjoyed having her working in this office.
Bob Boughton has been loading out trains since harvest stopped and almost has the elevator empty. He has run the elevator most of the winter by himself because the rest of the crew has been at Seymour picking up the pile and at Lodge loading out grain. Rob Dick, Chris Frye, and Stason Kopps have been spending the majority of their time working on the ground pile. They did a fantastic job getting it cleaned up with very little damage. I think they kept Rob over there to keep the machinery working. It doesn’t seem like Jim Shaffer has ever left Lodge since harvest. He has been loading out beans to go east or loading out corn to transfer to Monticello. Jim just about has that elevator cleaned out and ready for fall. He is waiting on some help to sweep the corn bins. Each time we have a train to load at Seymour or at Monticello all of the guys gather and get it loaded. When I first started at this elevator it would take 12 hours to load a train. The guys have got a routine down and they can now load a train in 8 hours and be ready to go home at 4:30. It is really great to see all the guys work as a team and do a great job. Occasionally Stason gets to moving a little too fast and his feet can’t keep up, but luckily he lands on a soft spot.
Scott has had meeting after meeting this winter and is kind of covering two roles. He is easing into Dick’s position and easing out of the merchandising position. On the weekends he is busy with Annie in gymnastics and ice-skating and Dillon in basketball and speed skating. I guess someday I will find out what that is all about for myself. Scott and Denise have also spent a lot of time with their son Serge. Four and a half years ago Scott gave Serge one of his kidneys because both of his had failed. This was a tough thing for the whole family. This winter the kidney Scott had given him also failed and it had to be removed. Serge currently has no kidney and has to be on dialysis three times a week. It is absolutely amazing what technology can do these days. Serge is on a donor list to try and find a new matching kidney. Scott’s kidney was a partial match and ideally they are looking for an exact match. Our prayers have been with this family and will continue to be.
As for myself I have been busy learning and busy trying to keep up with the markets and with daily duties. With Scott being gone it has given me the best hands on experience. Crop insurance sign-up just ended and that took the majority of my time for the two weeks that everyone has to make their decision. Lynne is still teaching at Monticello Christian Academy and has 10 students this year. After harvest began, Lynne and I started a project that neither one of us thought would take as much work as what it did. We decided to build a house. This sounded so simple in the beginning. In the end it was very rewarding, but the in between time meant a lot of very late nights and very busy weekends. I think that the guys at Menards knew Lynne by name by the time we got done because I was sending her over there to get me materials every other day. Besides adding 10 years to me, the ending result is something both of us had spent a lot of time on and now enjoy a great deal. That is a quick update on the Monticello elevator and we will write again soon. I hope everyone has a safe good spring and I hope to see many of you in the fields with a pop and a candy bar.
By Brock Casteel
Spring has sprung. As I am sitting here in my office writing this article it is very apparent that spring is here. It is sunny outside and about seventy degrees, there are puddles along side the road, and I just saw a United Prairie floater drive across the scales. Yep, I would say spring is definitely here. Here at Topflight, spring brings to mind a lot of things. About this time of year we need to kick projects into high gear and this one is no different. The Non GMO flat at Atwood has been cleaned out, and with a little cooperation from the weather, we hope to have one of the outdoor storage rings at Pierson picked up by the end of the week. Clean out of bins is always a spring and summer time task that is dreaded around here, but is always one of those things that makes you feel like you have accomplished something that day when you are done.
Spring also brings other things to mind, such as mowing. Topflight now has eighteen locations. With grounds keeping at every location, that is a lot of yard work and mowing during a summer. I don’t know about you but I sure do love to see a freshly mowed and cleaned up yard when I come into work of a morning, or go to visit one of our many locations through the course of the week.
Our monthly safety meetings have been going well, and now with the start of warmer weather we will be able to move to the outside for more demonstrative and hands on training, which makes for much more informative meetings. On a personal note, tractor-pulling season is just around the corner, and I always enjoy seeing some of our Topflight customers at the local events.
THE COBANK DIFFERENCE
By Chuck Bentley
Richard Larimore, Board President, and I attended the CoBank customer meeting March 29-30 in St. Louis, Missouri. CoBank, a cooperative, has been our primary financial institution for supplying both term and seasonal lines of credit. A short review of their 2003 financial report shows net income of $261,000.000, patronage distributions of $135.000,000, total loans outstanding of $24,773,000,000 and return on average common equity of 10.85%. At the meeting, CoBank officers and board members allowed us to ask questions and voice any concerns we had with the company. This is truly the difference of being a customer-owner in the company.
An example of our relationship with Cobank came this year when our capital requirements for January payments indicated we would need approximately twice as much money than we required last year. Thanks to some early planning, we worked with CoBank to double our seasonal loan limit to $40,000,000. This is no small amount of change.
CoBank continues to be the preferred lender of agricultural coops. Although times are changing, CoBank continues to change with the times.
GROWING………
By Mikki Burns
Spring is trying to get here!! We’ve had a little taste of warmer weather – boy…isn’t it nice?!?! The trees are budding, flowers are growing, and soon, the farmers will be planting.
Talk about growing – our grandchildren sure are!! Blaine is now 1 year and 9 months, JD is 9 months, and Audrey is 5 months. We are sure enjoying them!! When Blaine is at our house, he LOVES the trains. Grandpa showed him that if he got up on the sofa and pulled open the curtains, he could see each and every one of them. So, that’s what we do! Blaine just learned to jump last week. He is so proud and claps after each jump. JD is crawling and pulling up, so he is really busy. He seems to want all the things he can’t have. He has eight teeth and will probably walk before he is a year old. He can patty cake and says ‘hi’. Audrey has “big” beautiful brown eyes. She is almost sitting up—she doesn’t want to miss anything that her big brother is doing. The kids are absolutely amazing – and all Jim and I talk about is what it will be like in about six months. We know the boys will be very busy, and Audrey will try to and probably will keep up.
To accommodate the children, I traded vehicles. (Good excuse, right?) I’ve also had my experiences with the car seat!! WOW—I don’t know how our kids ever survived. They stood up in the car, and we would put our arm over them when we came to a stop. Things have sure changed for kids—and although, we know change is good—there are sure a lot of rules now that weren’t before. We are learning, though.
There will be a change here at Cisco, as we are adding a new bin at the West elevator. It sure will help at harvest!! We have been short of space here and always have to load out at least 1,000,000 bushels of grain. It should speed up the farmers’ delivery process and also cut down on transferring grain out to the bin site. It will be a great improvement!! The project has been started so it will be done by fall.
We hope all of you have a wonderful spring and summer. I know I am looking forward to all the warm weather and the activities that come with it. Please make safety the most important factor as you are in the fields planting this spring. Our customers are our greatest asset.
By Sandy Davenport
It is hard to believe that winter is over and spring is here. My winter at Emery was a “mini harvest”. Farmers were trying to deliver their grain to Emery, but we had to ship grain out in order to make room. For awhile, I thought I was going to have to use a number system like at the Penney’s catalog department! Now we have room and continue to get grain in, but at a slower pace
It doesn’t seem possible that planting season is upon us, although the recent rains (we had approximately 3.7 inches Mar. 29-31) have set the beginning back some. Pretty soon the office will be quiet because the “regulars” will be busy in the fields. I hope that everyone has a smooth and safe planting season.
Nothing too earth-shattering happened at Emery since the last newsletter, with the exception of the day the furnace died. Of course, it was one of the coldest, windiest days of the winter. Charlie said that the temperature brought back memories of the old office. Guess it was pretty cold and windy in it most of the winter! Anyway, by the end of the day, Emery had a brand new furnace installed and warming the office. Really hated to spend money on a new furnace, but just like buying new underwear----nobody ever sees it, but you gotta have it!!
Charlie has begun cleaning up outside as weather permits and Boomer is right there beside him making sure that he is doing it right. I hope to have Emery cleaned up and looking nice. Maybe Charlie will even teach me how to use the mower.
The annual Women’s Program was held on March 23rd. Since this was my first one, I don’t have anything to compare this years from previous years, but I think it was very nice. The food was excellent and the speakers and entertainment were good. I even saw my high school Home Ec teacher and enjoyed talking with her.
As for the Davenport family, all is pretty quiet. Jerry and I have put away the cushioned seats for the bleachers at the basketball games and have put the lawn chairs in the trunk for the baseball and softball games. Probably in the next 2 weeks or so, we will be opening the camper up and getting ready to head to Weldon Springs. We don’t know yet what we will do on vacation this year, but we are leaning towards going west.
I hope that everyone has a great spring and summer.
By
Louie Tieman
Well, as we get into our newsletter deadline I have not any notes to speak of. Well I haven’t anyway, but D.S. has. Guess you will have to ask R.B. about that. I have been to “THE OFFICE”, a couple of times and had to check out the “Palm Pilot”. The office is the meeting place between 2 and 5. It serves a nice cold beverage of your choice. So my newsletter article will not be seven pages long, as I have been told it is too long to read unless it is the evening hours. Also I was warned by R.D. that if I put too much in the newsletter he would tell Pam a few things on me and we are talking about 37 years ago and I forgot most of it, but he hasn’t. So I will be careful as what I say, he has it all on his P.P. and not his nephew’s nickname.
I have learned a lot at the office, and even get weather and road reports from our very own H.L. He is Judy Fraser’s understudy except he gives the road reports, and he will even call you.
Now all I hear is who’s going to be the first to pull out the planter. My guys (3) talk every morning to see who has done what. Milmine is usually the last one done at harvest time, but we are the first ones to talk about who’s doing what and where. I now have section farmers here.
As far as the home front, Collin is learning to talk a lot better and he really loves his PAPA.I can hear him when I call; he goes a mile a minute hollering PAPA.
I had a running streak of 85 straight days till my arthritis set in my left foot and I could just barely walk. Arthur seems to be getting worse and maybe part of it is old age.
So I hope everyone has a safe planting season from all of us at Topflight Grain.
So my newsletter is a little shorter to make room for S.D.’s comments. And don’t forget to make it to Dick’s retirement party at the end of May.
by
Russel Wright
Another winter has passed us by, but as winters go it wasn’t too bad. It seems that winter only lasts for a few weeks. Now don’t get me wrong, I like winter as long as it doesn’t snow, get too cold, or get ice. I’m sure the kids will disagree with me on this. The “good ole days winters” seemed to last forever, with lots of snow piling up as high as “ knee deep to a tall basketball player.”
January seemed like another harvest around here, we were getting grain off the farm. Rail cars started showing up in the nick of time; these cars were cleaned and loaded for the Southeast markets. We also shipped grain by truck to Decatur, either to ADM or Staley. Another project that was done this winter at Pierson, Paul’s Machine shop from Villa Grove, took down one of the old grain legs that we don’t use any more. They also took down some spouts that had worn holes in them, patched them and put them back up. I’m sure Willard was grateful, he didn’t have to slide down and put a patch on them.
Now that spring is here, the weather is warming, the earthworms are crawling, the Robins are here, and flowers are blooming, and that means our farmers will be getting back in the fields. United Prairie is getting busy, with fertilizer. Bill Sparks is delivering seed to customers. He told me the other day, when he got home from a rather busy day, that his door bell rang about twenty minutes later, it was a certain part of his anatomy that was catching up with him. So the next time you see him ask what that might be.
Debby and I are looking forward to our trip to Florida. We are going with Matt, Jodi, Zac, and Kady, to Disney World. I’m sure they will really enjoy this vacation. Fred and his wife Pat will be going to Las Vegas in May. Their son Daniel will be getting married. Gloria is helping her daughter Stacey with her wedding plans this June. Brock is getting his tractors ready for the summer tractor pulls. Willard is always busy with his projects that keep him busy.
Everyone at Pierson wants to wish everyone a safe planting season. And to stop and enjoy “the roses” as they say.
By
Pam Jarboe
The spring and summer months at Topflight will be a little different this year. They may be a lot different. On May 31, Richard Thomas will step down as manager of your company, and Scott Docherty will become the manager. Dick was hired as the manager of Bement Grain in 1969, 35 years ago. He has worked with the varied personalities of each board of directors and encouraged all of his employees to do their best work for the company.
We have seen the company grow, facilities improve, and marketing opportunities increase, while working diligently to keep the stockholders informed and included. As an employee, I have seen Dick encourage each of us to improve and reach beyond our comfort zone. He continually reads and studies for new ideas to keep the company profitable and the employees enthused and motivated. Most of us have learned a lot from him, about business and customer relations. He has trained and promoted many others to professions in agriculture, and is proud of them.
As we work with our new manager, we are fairly certain that the “culture” of Topflight will remain. The board of directors carefully chose Scott as the next manager of Topflight. They interviewed him several times, and they interviewed other applicants, to be sure the new manager would continue to lead the company in the best direction. Scott was hired in 1993, as the market advisor for Bement Grain Company. He has been a leader among the employees and a leader in the community. He knows our strengths, and we know his strengths. We knew him as a friend, now he will be our boss. Sometimes that can be a difficult transition, but I think, the relationship that he has built with his co-employees will contribute to the successful transition, as we all work together.
The business world is changing; agriculture is changing; Topflight is changing.
Hi, my name is Andy Plummer and I am a senior at Bement High School. I have been an intern here at Topflight since February. Unlike the other interns in the past, I am interested in the business portion not the agricultural portion of Topflight. Since I have been here, Dick has taught me about how important it is to have good management for a business to be successful. Chuck showed me how a business operates financially. For the past few weeks I have done all types of work like filing contracts, sorting checks, and answering the telephone. Topflight has shown me a great example of how a business operates. It has also given me a better idea of how an elevator and a co-op operate. I’ve enjoyed my experience here and I will encourage future interns to choose Topflight for their internship. I hope Dick has a great retirement and everyone has a good harvest this year.
In Monticello --
Monticello has done a great job these last couple of years in the fall dumping trucks. This has not been an easy job for anyone that has ran the outside, but we have always made it through with very few lines. Now we are starting to reap the rewards. The board has approved the installation of a new leg at our outside corn pit. It has always been a bottleneck and now we are trying to eliminate it. The leg will be upgraded from a 7,500 bph to a 15,000 bph and will be taller then the previous leg so that we can hit more bins. This will help to keep trucks out of the old house except when segregating moistures and on very busy days. Bob will have a lot more time on his hands to work on other jobs that need done around the facility.
Eric’s report for the Focus meetings included planned projects for facility improvement:
Topflight Grain has two major projects for this summer. Koehl Bros. Inc. from Fairbury, Illinois has been hired to complete both projects. The first project is a new bin and leg at Cisco. The new bin will be west of the west elevator. The new bin will be 105’ diameter and 84’ at the top of the sidewall. The bin will hold 682,000 bushels. This bin will be similar to the big bin at Bement. The new leg will be inside the west elevator. The new leg will have a capacity of 15,000 bushels per hour. This will replace a leg that was rated at 5,000 bph. The project will also include new fill conveyors and reclaim conveyors rated at 20,000 bph and 15,000 bph. This should greatly help the storage shortage that we experience at Cisco in the fall. We have been short at least 1,000,000 bushels of storage in the harvest for the last several years. We are also upgrading the wiring in the west elevator to 480 volt. The overhead power lines that you see when you exit the west elevator dump pit will be buried underground. The total cost of this project is $1,483,000.
The next project is a new leg at Monticello’s dump pit two. The new leg will have a capacity of 15,000 bph. This will replace a leg that was rated at 7,500 bph. The old leg was getting in bad condition and was rusting through in several spots. This project will also include a new pit drag conveyor and a new drag conveyor from the big white Columbian tank. We will also be able to reach three more bins from the new leg. The total cost of this project is $305,750.
We are also installing a new dust system at Laplace. The dust system will be for the west dump we had installed two years ago. Topflight’s maintenance crew is installing this system. We have also had several spouts at Emery and Pierson replaced or repaired this winter.
PASSING THE BATON
By Richard Thomas
Dick’s part of the sports program of the focus meetings was to complete his lap of the relay race, as retiring manager, and pass the baton on to Scott, the new manager
What I am passing on
A company doing $100 million dollars worth of business and handling 30 million bushels of grain.
A company with 19 locations; 10 open the year round, another 7 open during harvest
Total storage capacity of over 21 million bushels
Seven of the elevators are located on rail lines; two on the CN – can load 30 car trains or larger, three on the NS – can load 50 car trains, two on the CSX – can load 15 car units
All the elevators are in good condition; total receiving capacities 250,000 bushel/hour
Just signed contracts to add 700,000 storage and increase receiving capacity by 20,000 bushel/hour
In rolling equipment we have twenty nine trucks, thirteen trailers, forty one other pieces of machinery from tractors, mowers, trackmobiles to skid steers
We have 10 very nice offices (several just recently built), seventeen truck scales, sixteen grain dyers, forty-five dedicated and talented employees. The average employee age is 43.5; the oldest is Jerry Lambert at 65, the youngest is Chris Frye at 22. The average years of employment is 12.3; nine started 1 year ago, the newest employee is Russ Durham; four have worked over 30 years for company; Dick Thomas longest 35 years.
Working capital 3.4 million dollars
Long term debt 1.7 million dollars
We have an investment of $908,000 in
United Prairie LLC, a fertilizer and chemical business in Tolono that is very
profitable
Capital stock worth $4.9 million, that is current. Meaning all estates and retired farmers with no land interests have been bought back.
A computer system that is being improved and can be expanded upon.
Our information system from webpage to our newsletters is envied by everyone in the industry
Community involvement by our employees is encouraged and supported.
Stockholder meetings with a meal and speaker have long been a tradition at Topflight Grain
Keeping the stockholders informed has always been a goal of Topflight Grain that’s why we’re having this focus meeting today.
So as I hand this baton over to the new manager, I feel like he is running with an excellent team and has the right equipment to get to the finish line ahead of anyone else in the race.
By Sandy Davenport
One day I was telling Dick about a tradition that has been going on at Waller for several years. He asked me if I would put this in the newsletter.
Let me start by giving you some background information. Several years ago someone at Waller came up with the idea of putting everyone’s name on a slip of paper, put those names in a can and everyone put $1.00 in another can. Then on Friday, we will draw a slip out and the name on the slip will win the money. Thus, the beginning of the “Friday Pool”. I think we started with 5 or 6 people. On Fridays we would wait for a certain farmer (I won’t mention names) to stop by and we would anxiously gather around the can with the names and someone would draw a slip of paper out. This went on for quite awhile, but we decided to make it more interesting. Along with everyone’s name, we made several slips with the word “Rollover” on them and put them in the can. If one of the rollovers was drawn, there was no winner for the week but everyone would put in another $1.00. Now this made the Friday Pool interesting. There were times where the pool was worth anywhere between $18.00 all the way up to 50 some dollars.
We made an unwritten rule that if a person won at least twenty dollars, they would bring “goodies” for the group. Usually it is doughnuts, but we have had homemade desserts and even pizza!
Well, it was time for me to go on vacation and the Friday Pool was pretty big, around 50 dollars or so. Since I was keeper of the money and names, I decided I was going to protect my interest while I was gone. I took every slip from the can and replaced them with slips with my name on every one of them. I would be a sure winner!
When I got back from vacation, I was greeted with the news that I had won the big Friday Pool. Of course, I acted really surprised and thanked everyone for their contributions over the weeks! A couple of hours later, I couldn’t stand it any longer. I confessed! I told them what I had done. I also told them that I had tested their honesty. They could have thrown my name back in and told me they had drawn a ROLLOVER, but now I knew that I was working with an honest group. After it had “soaked in” as to what I had done, we all had a good laugh. Needless to say, I lost my job of keeping the money and can of names!
One of the employees went from full time to part time and wouldn’t be working on Fridays, so we decided to have the Friday Pool drawing on Wednesdays, when she would be working. Even though the drawing is on Wednesday, we still call it the Friday Pool.
Employees come and go (even I had to leave) but the Friday Pool is still alive. The drawing is still held at Waller, but I know after my little experiment, that I can trust them to tell me if I was the winner. Sure enough, the one and only farmer that is in the pool, stopped by and told me it was time for me to bring doughnuts. I had won the Friday Pool ($32.00) on Wednesday!!!
ISO is the International Organization for Standardization. It is made up of countries large and small, industrialized and developing, in all regions of the world. ISO develops voluntary technical standards which add value to all types of businesses.
They contribute to making the development, manufacture and supply of products and services more efficient, safer and cleaner. ISO standards also serve to safeguard consumers as well as make their lives simpler. Topflight’s vision statement reflects that quality, “Working to make your life easier”. ISO also develops only those standards that are required by the market.
So how does this work for Topflight Grain? There are seven quality management principles that we adhere to:
1. Customer Focus, to better communicate with our customers.
2. Continual Improvement, to provide a workplace in which people are motivated to continually improve the quality of our products.
3. Mutual Benefit Supplier Relationship, to develop associations with our suppliers, you the customer, and work with them to jointly provide a quality product for Topflight customers, the processors.
4. System and Process Approach, Topflight will provide procedures of work and manage our processes as one system that meets all of the company objectives.
5. Factual Approach, we will gather information through the system approach and evaluate the data to determine the appropriate course of action.
6. Involvement of People. Topflight will provide a working environment so our personnel will use their knowledge and experience to contribute to the organizations growth. We also encourage each individual to reach their full potential through training, education, and community involvement.
7. Leadership Approach, to establish our vision for the organization and through leadership qualities to demonstrate good principles and direction to maintain our goals.
So what this means for Topflight is, we have good customers that bring us exceptionally good grain. We will market that grain to get the best possible price for our customers. By being ISO certified, we will most likely be able to get better market avenues to be able to sell to more processors, by guaranteeing a good reliable product.
With the help of two Millikin professors, Larry Stapleton and Charles Smith, as well as University of Illinois Extension member, Paul Mariman, the quality manual is complete. Now comes the fine-tuning. We have five very good and capable internal auditors, Doug Adloff, Mikki Burns, Jill Kuykendall, LouieTieman, and Russ Durham. They have put many hours on auditing this manual. Their next step is to go to each location and see if those places are actually doing what the book says.
This has been a long and time consuming ordeal, but in the long run, when Topflight is ISO certified, our customers will be able to enjoy the benefits of being ISO certified. The next time you drive by a place of business that is ISO certified, you will know that, that company will be able to guarantee a good product to the consumer.
MY MENTOR
By Richard Thomas
In this newsletter, I’ve talked about where the company is and where I think we are headed, but I’ve never said much about where we have come from. I want to give some long over due recognition to a person that had a lot to do with getting me and the company headed in the right direction. That person would be Wilmer (Babe) Foran. He was the president of the board when I was hired at Bement in 1969 and he remained on the board until 1985.
He was a mentor to me all these years and I wanted to give him credit for all his help and support. First of all you got to know something about Babe.
He likes caps with the mesh covering. I guess it’s because he doesn’t want his brain to get too hot from all the thinking he does. Then secondly no one could ever wear a cap just the way he does. I can’t explain it; it’s just a special way.
He is stubborn and opinionated but will change his mind if you have good evidence to support your side of the argument.
He takes his half out of the middle on any country road, but would stop to give anyone help that needed it.
He has four grown sons, two of them farm in this area, one farms around Williamsville, and the other works for Kellogg’s in Battle Creek, Michigan. His wife Pauline says the weaker sex in a marriage gets all the help. He is also very proud of his grandchildren.
He always had the newest and best in farm equipment. Preferred the red color but if they wouldn’t give him a good deal he would consider green.
He worked hard and played hard. Pauline has been known to rein him in on the playing hard part.
He was fair but expected a lot from those around him.
He was a good athlete and so were his sons and grandson. He even played semi pro football. But he didn’t like to lose.
He raised $75,000 from our stockholders so we could keep our grain dealers license right after I got here. I went with him on the visits and we didn’t get money from everyone we visited but you sure could tell they all respected him.
He even helped with account receivables. I’ll never forget his advice to me on this, and it has stuck with me forever. As we’re headed to the country to collect some money, he informs me it was the previous manager’s fault for ever letting these customers get in so deep. In later years as I would have to call on accounts to collect money I would always think about what Babe had told me, knowing the customers would get mad, but I was really doing them a favor for not letting them get in debt over their heads.
He stood firmly behind the decisions made by the board. As we were building and growing, Babe supported patronage paid back in stock at a 80/20 ratio, 80% stock and 20% cash. He understood the cooperative system and wanted to have a good elevator to deliver his grain to.
He has a lot of good common sense. There were periods when I questioned it however.
I’ll be real honest with you and say there were times when I would have liked to hit him up the side of his head. Here is an example of what I mean. One time I had Farmland come and go over a proposal to evaluate all our employees and write job descriptions for every job we had within the company. I was really fired up about this because as you all know dealing with employees is a manager’s toughest job. Well the meeting was going along real well and I think a board member was about to make a motion we do this, when Babe speaks up from the other end of the board meeting table and says “What did we hire that guy down there for, and points to me.” Well that was one of those times I talked about when I could have hit him up beside the head. No motion was made and the Farmland man headed on down the road. Boy was I mad!
The moral of this story is Babe was right. You can’t hire someone to do the tough parts of your job that you need to deal with yourself. I went on to write the job descriptions and have done all the evaluations in the company ever since.
Babe has retired and lives here in Bement now, so I stop by regularly for a visit and get some of his common sense knowledge. You know I just thought of something, I’ve never asked him how he got the nickname Babe. I’ll have to ask him on my next visit.
A man traveling down a country road was forced to stop before a giant puddle covering the entire road. Looking to the side of the road, he noticed a little boy sitting on a fence, swinging his legs.
The man rolls down his window and calls out to the youngster, “Think it’s safe to cross here?”
“Sure!” the boy answers.
The car was immediately swallowed by the puddle as the man drove in. It was so deep, in fact, that water poured through the open window of the car and the man barely had time to escape as he swam to the surface.
He sputtered as he came up for air, yelling at the boy, “I thought you said it was safe to cross here!”
“Well, mister,” said the boy, “It was only chest-high on the ducks!”
Jerry Lambert retired from Topflight Grain, on March 19. After more than 25 years with Maroa Grain, and Topflight Grain, Jerry and Juanita have retired, moved to New York, and are planning vacation trips and a slower paced life. Jerry drove the semi truck for Topflight, hauling grain from the elevator to Decatur, and from the farm to the elevator. Jerry quickly became a favorite friend to all the Topflight employees, after the merger with Maroa, because of his friendly smile and easy conversation.
We wish them a very Happy Retirement, and many happy travels!
Recently, a routine police patrol parked outside a local neighborhood bar. Late in the evening, the officer noticed a man leaving the bar so intoxicated that he could barely walk. The man stumbled around the parking lot for a few minutes with the officer quietly observing. After what seemed an eternity and trying his keys on five different vehicles, the man managed to find his own car, which he fell into.
He was there a few minutes as a number of other patrons left the bar and drove off. Finally, he started the car, switched the wipers on and off (it was a dry night), flicked the hazard flasher on and off, tooted the horn and then switched on the lights. He moved the vehicle forward a few inches, reversed a little and then remained stationary for a few more minutes as more patrons left in their vehicles. At last, he pulled out of the parking lot and started to drive slowly down the street.
The police officer, having patiently waited all this time, now started up his patrol car, put on the flashing light, promptly pulled the man over and carried out a Breathalyzer test. To his amazement, the Breathalyzer indicated no evidence of the man having consumed alcohol at all! Dumbfounded, the officer said, “I’ll have to ask you to accompany me to the police station. This breathalyzer equipment must be broken.”
“I doubt
it,” said the man, “tonight, I’m the designated decoy.”
By Scott Docherty
That was the title of my market outlook presentation for our Focus meetings in February. A picture can be worth a thousand words and that is how I tried to explain the PowerPoint presentation for the demand picture in soybeans, soymeal and vegoil consumption since the early 90’s. We have had Avian flu scares and mad cow scares and the market has had minor setbacks but still in that demand driven market where no one can pick the highs. Topflight Grain has purchased over 90% of the beans received to date. The average price paid for those beans was $6.84 per bushel to date. We do see some rationing in soybeans in both exports and domestic crush, and soybeans have made a double top at $10.64 futures. Brazil and Argentina have had their own problems with dry weather in the southern regions and extremely wet in north central Brazil. Harvest is progressing slowly and the crop size is coming down from 60 MMT to 51 MMT from some of the private analysts. World protein demand is still strong and China is the country that has been driving the bean market the past 6 months. The US provides 36% of the world soybean exports and South America provides 57 %, so with a reduced SA harvest coming on, this puts more pressure on the US to grow a 2.9 billion bushel crop for 2004. The USDA projected bean plantings at 75.4 million acres, which is about 1 million acres more than the average trade guess. The CZ/SX futures ratio is at 2.34 to 1 and CZ corn is trying to buy some more acres from soybeans as we get started with plantings. As I mentioned earlier, we scored a double top in nearby bean futures at $10.64, but we should see a blow off top in the soybean market, which has not been confirmed.
The 2003 crop production of 10.114 billion bushels was only the second time in the past ten years that the US has produced a crop of that size and yet we see US and world stocks getting smaller. The corn ending stocks are projected at 882 million bushels and with the expansion in ethanol plants coming online next year and China stepping out of the world export market, corn has a lot of work to do heading into this spring planting season. The first warning shot has been fired across the bow with the USDA projecting corn plantings
at 79 million acres for this spring. If the US has any weather problems at all CZ Dec corn will need to work its way towards $4.00 to slow demand and ration usage. Corn stocks would be trimmed from 880 to 600 and that is pipeline stocks. The US is still a major exporter capturing 67 % of the world corn exports so again the pressure is on for a good growing season. This spring and summer is going to be very volatile with such demand and pressure on our growing season.
Remember, corn has a 20 cent trading limit and beans has a 50 cent daily trading limit and this summer we could test both of them. I would strongly recommend the use of risk management tools in your marketing plan and to look for an opportunity for 2005 sales to be made also.
By Brock Casteel
Recently Topflight Grain has run through the hoops of seeking facility insurance once again. Prices for company insurance have increased dramatically in recent years, which has been a driving force in development and implementation of safety programs and awareness of facility improvements. In the past five years Topflight has seen a small increase in the number of federal recordable injuries, but due to mergers with other grain companies this only seems natural. The ability to keep our insurance mods under 1 is a key to lowering our insurance premiums, and I am happy to say that our mod is below 1 for this most recent quote.
The insurance industry as a whole has changed
dramatically in recent years, as many of you know. Providers are now more than
ever looking for documentation for all aspects of our facilities and employees.
Programs such as maintenance reports, housekeeping checklists, hot work
permits, bin entry permits, and training documentation are things that a
company should be doing any way, but are now looked upon as the bare minimum
for a provider to supply a company with insurance. A provider is looking for that
company that goes the extra mile, and not only shows it on paper but has the
hard core loss prevention numbers to back it up. In short, making Topflight
Grain a safer work place is not only great for employees, but also good for a
financial bottom line.
Due to our recent insurance inspection for a new insurance quote, we received a list of issues that needed to be addressed through out the company. We have taken this “to do list” very seriously and have completed almost all of the requests. We will then document what corrective action was taken and send that to the provider. The quoting insurance company would also like us to form a safety committee, comprised of myself, maintenance employees, supervisors, facility support staff, and one of their agents. While I am a little skeptical in having an outsider of the grain industry take part in our meetings, I suppose a fresh view of any obstacles we may come across can’t be a bad thing. These are just a few of the things that we at Topflight are doing to be that company willing to go the extra mile to be a safe and profitable company.
Topflight Plant Insurance
Premiums
WATER AND SOIL CONSERVATION ???
By Derrick Bruhn
Governor Rod Blagojevich made a surprising proposal to transfer the SWCD from the Department of Agriculture to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. Since the 1930’s the Water and Soil Conservation Districts were started after the Dust Bowl to provide technical, educational, and financial support to landowners. The program has been very successful in helping landowners to protect the land, water and other resources of the state. The governor proposed this transfer to help streamline the state government. This transfer brought on deep discussion about funding for the programs, benefits for the employees and administration.
On March 29th the Governor reconsidered his early-announced proposal and left the SWCD under the Department of Agriculture. There was a lot of calls made and letters sent to governmental officials on this issue.
Soybean farmers will have the opportunity to request a referendum on the soybean checkoff this year. From May 3 to May 28, any soybean producer can file a request for the referendum, by completing the “Request for Referendum” form, obtained at the county FSA office, or the USDA website.
A referendum will be conducted if 66,388 eligible soybean producers (and no more than 1/5 of whom can be from any single state) request the vote. This number represents 10% of the total eligible soybean producers in the country.
The soybean checkoff was authorized under the 1990 farm law. It requires the first purchaser of soybeans (ie, Topflight Grain) to deduct .5% of the net market price of the soybeans. (On $5.00 beans, .5% is 2.5 cents per bushel; on $10 beans, .5% is 5 cents per bushel). This money is distributed to the state and national organizations for research, promotion, and education. Every five years, the USDA provides soybean growers the opportunity to request a referendum on whether to continue the checkoff.
Topflight Grain farmers contributed $95,250 to the soybean checkoff fund in the month of January.
EMPLOYEE
MEETNGS
By Richard Thomas
On February 12, 2004 we had Employability Skills Unlimited Inc. come in and talk to our staff about Effective Communication and talk to the outside employees about Making Your Team Work.
The Effective Communication workshop with the staff was a basic presentation on the common methods of communication; verbal, listening, non-verbal, and written. Participants learned to speak in an assertive manner, develop good listening skills, identify body language indicators, and write effective e-mail, memos and letters. It lasted about 4 hours.
The Making Your Team Work was a program that began with a fun activity for the participants; i.e. “Interview Competition” for a large group of unknowns, followed by a “Cup Stack”. The activity was followed by a review of the successes and failures, which occurred during the teamwork activity. A presentation was given to participants regarding practices of successful team building and the pitfalls to avoid.
Richard Lyons that put on the seminars had a frightening way of identifying everyone’s personalities.
GRAIN OFFERS
By
Scott Docherty
Topflight
Grain offers the service of filling firm grain offers at a predetermined price
set by the producer. As a producer, you can offer grain based on price,
delivery period, delivery location and expiration date. Topflight Grain will
look at the futures market and the cash market to determine what futures and
cash basis to use for posting bids and filling cash grain offers. The futures
market and basis market have been very volatile and changing very quickly with
45 cent daily ranges in soybeans and 10 cent moves in corn. Basis is the
difference between the board price and the cash price. Basis is determined by
interest, insurance, storage, transportation and demand or lack of demand.
We
fill grain offers through the day session and also in the overnight session.
The cash market is trading 24 hrs a day so we do have the ability to fill
offers before or after CBOT trading hours. Grain offers are a valid marketing
tool and can help you market your grain but they have to be managed. Please keep us informed if you want to
cancel or amend your offers so they are accurate and correct.
WELCOME!!
Rick Chestnut has joined the
operations staff in Bement. Rick worked
through the harvest season with us, and will fill a full time position, left
vacant, as Brandon Durbin begins a new job. Rick and his family live in
Milmine. We’re sure you will enjoy
meeting Rick, and we look forward to working with him.
180 Topflight women enjoyed the speakers and entertainment presented at the Topflight Grain annual women’s program, March 23, at the Cisco Center. The day began with summer picnic drinks of tea and lemonade during the social hour. The tables were covered with red checked and blue checked tablecloths and decorated with picnic baskets, baskets of wine and cheese, and popcorn bunnies.
Nancy Clarkson was the first speaker, telling about her life in the Peace Corps, specifically the role of women, in Africa, where she served. She told of their simple homes, their responsibilities of child rearing and earning income, and their family life.
A picnic lunch of fried chicken, potato salad, fruit salad and assorted desserts was served by Basket Case Catering of Maroa.
Steve Wentworth, then, described the 10-acre pepper plant that has been built near Maroa. In this huge greenhouse, pepper plants grow towards the ceiling, fed through hydroponic tubes. Temperature is computer controlled and backed-up with a big generator. Bees pollinate the peppers and aphids are a constant threat. About 30 workers will harvest the peppers, for delivery to local and state markets.
Louann Jacobs and Shelly Jacobs popped into the next topic, as owners of Del’s Popcorn Shop. Their family operates popcorn shops in Decatur, Springfield and Mt.Zion. They showed their various flavors of popcorn, and some of their popcorn creations that celebrate the seasons of the year. The ladies generously donated 25 popcorn Easter bunnies, given as door prizes to the ladies who could most accurately guess the number of popcorn bunnies sold through the three shops, during the Easter season.
“Life is Too Short to Drink Bad Wine”, according to Albert Heim, who was the next speaker. Albert described his adventures in making home made wine, and offered tips to the novice, wishing to learn the process. During the “tasting” break, Albert offered samples of his wine. For those who preferred, sparkling grape juice was also served, during the break.
The King Family of Monticello concluded the program, with music and humor. The talented family performed instrumental and vocal numbers, much to the enjoyment of all in attendance.
Manager Richard Thomas expressed his well wishes to the ladies for an enjoyable day, and introduced Scott Docherty, the next manager of Topflight Grain. Scott expressed his desires to continue the success and “family spirit” of Topflight Grain. Bonnie Thomas received special recognition, as the manager’s wife, who has helped with so many women’s programs and supported the company (and its present manager) in so many ways.
The women’s program is always a special day for the women. It is held to express appreciation for the contributions and support to Topflight Grain of the women as stockholders, landowners, and producers’ wives. It is a day of adventure, learning, and fellowship.
EVERYONE HAS A STORY TO TELL
By Richard Thomas
This story is about Dean Creviston, who I got to know when he came on the elevator board in 1984 to represent the LaPlace trade territory. What I first noticed about Dean was how straight and erect he walked. Little did I know that he lived his live the same way, straight and upright. I grew to respect and admire Dean over the years because of the example he set for others and me. This story is unusual because Dean is 12 years younger than me and most of the time you look up to and respect someone who is older. The first time Dean made an impression on me was at a Grain & Feed convention in Peoria. We were all out eating at a nice restaurant and the waitress came around and asked to take our drink order. When it came time for Dean to order he said he’d have ice tea. Others at the table told him the elevator was paying and if he wanted a DRINK he should order one. He said ice tea would be just fine. The next day I saw Dean in the hallway and apologized for any pressure to drink that might have been put upon him. He assured me that it was no problem and we went on about our business.
A couple of years later we were at a Farmland meeting in Indianapolis and for entertainment one evening they had casino night. That’s where they give you so much play money and you gamble with the play money to accumulate more to buy stuff at the end of the evening. As we sat down to eat, by each place setting they had $500 worth of play money. When the meal was over and everyone got up to go play Dean handed his money over to me and said, “I think I’ll just go back to my room and read a book”. You see, he never ever gave me a lecture about gambling even with play money, or how I ought to live my life; he just went about setting a good example.
Then a few years ago when Topflight Grain decided to get out of the petroleum business it caused some dissention among the stockholders. So the board called a meeting in LaPlace to discuss the situation. The meeting was getting pretty heated and Dean stood up and made a statement from his experience of being on the board and knowledge of the situation. It didn’t take long for everyone to come to their senses and agree that the action the board had taken was appropriate.
When Dean did get upset about something and needed to let off some steam his favorite expression was, “Well, Shoot a Bug”. I had never heard that expression and really don’t know what it means except I knew when Dean said it you better pay attention.
I have never shared with Dean what he has meant to me over the years so that’s why I wanted to tell this story. When I grow up I want to be just like Dean Creviston.
By Derrick Bruhn
It seems like farming is continuously changing with new technology and new programs. The subject of crop insurance has really caused a lot of customers some problems the last couple of years because there are so many options to choose from. Many times the program that they used last year isn’t the best thing this year, so they have to learn about all of them to make the best decision. I have been working with customers helping them understand what is out there and how it will work in their operation. Not every operation is the same and requires the same insurance. I spend time with customers that buy insurance from us and with customers that just want a better understanding of the programs. I really enjoy speaking to farmers about these programs and helping them select an insurance that works well for them. If anyone has any questions about crop insurance or hail insurance feel free to call me at the Monticello office anytime and I will do everything I can to help. Our hail rates this year are very reasonable. Call 1 (217) 762-2163 and ask for Derrick Bruhn.
By Derrick Bruhn
The average price program began pricing on the 8th of January at 2.37 for fall corn. At that time I told Scott this is a great price to get started with. Little did I know that the pricing on April 1st would be 3.09 for fall corn. We are currently running an average of $2.70 for fall delivery corn. The pricing period is over halfway complete and we will be pricing until May 29th. At the end of the pricing we will offer to those involved an opportunity to purchase a call option to protect them on any upside risk of the market going up this summer. If anyone has any questions about this, please feel free to call the Monticello office and I will be more than happy to help you out.
Grain statistics
for the 2003 –04 crop year:
Total beans received 5,414,826 bushels
Average bean price $6.84
Total corn received 24,930,514 bushels
Average corn price $2.33
for the 2004-05 crop year
Beans purchased 566,600 bushels
Average bean price $7.12
Corn purchased 4,309,500 bushels
Average corn price $2.78
* 50-cent premium for fall delivery or 55 cents for post harvest delivery (buyers call)
* Accepted delivery locations are Atwood, Cisco, Emery, Laplace, Seymour, and Shacks
* Purity: 99% NON-GMO soybeans
* 10% maximum splits
* Must sign contract and certificate upon delivery
* 25-cent premium based on 8.0% oil content for harvest or post harvest
* Accepted delivery locations are Cisco and Bement
* Non-BT variety specific program
* Fall delivery must be less than 20% moisture
* 30-cent premium for post harvest delivery only
* Accepted delivery locations are Bement and Monticello
* Pioneer and Beck seed only
* #2 corn specifications with purity of 95%
* Must sign bushel contract prior to harvest
Recently, we received a report, from an associate who had spent 11 days touring farms in Brazil. Some of these findings were interesting, and we think, worth passing on to you:
1. Brazilian farmers age between 20 and 60, usually younger, on the average than American farmers.
2. Most Brazilian farmers live in town; the farmhands live in bunkhouses on the farm.
3. Mato Grosso is about the size of Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Wisconsin and Michigan combined.
4. In Mato Grosso, soybean acres have increased by 20% during the past year.
5. Farmland prices were quoted at $670 per acre for land that was ready for production.
6. The red porous soil allows farmers to harvest a day after a heavy rain.
7. Soybean rust is the worst problem they’ve ever dealt with.
8. Most farm equipment is 5 – 6 years old; they use a combine for about 3500 acres.
9. Road conditions are “unbelievably poor” and the farmers face many transportation challenges.
10. Farmers often haul a 1500 bushel load more than 3 days to reach port. A complete trip takes a week.
11. Grain companies have built large storage facilities.
12. Many people lived with a tarp for a roof, pulled over tree limbs, with no plumbing or electricity.
13. Food is considered cheap, compared to US standards.
Our thanks to Stu Ellis, Macon County Cooperative Extension Service for this information.
Darrel Good, U of I extension crop specialist, shared this information:
In April 1977, July soybean futures peaked at $10.64; they traded below $6.00 by mid-July.
In mid-June 1988, July soybean futures reached $10.99; they expired in mid-July at $8.29.
In mid-June 1988, November soybean futures reached $10.46, and expired in mid-November at $7.28.
In early June 1973, July soybean futures reached $12.90, traded to $6.30 in early July and expired in mid-July at $11.87.
Our thanks to Stu Ellis, Macon
County Cooperative Extension Service for this information.
HONORING CONTRACTS
By Richard Thomas
This year at the Grain & Feed Assoc. of Illinois 2004 convention, one of the seminars was on “Producer Grain Contracts”. The speaker explained how cash contracts should be written. They should be clear and complete and have remedies such as arbitration, damages, attorney’s fees and costs. But most important the speaker said you should know your customer, because a desperate producer may do desperate things and take a self-serving position.
Our contracts have all been looked over by an attorney who specializes in this type of work. We try to keep abreast of any changes taking place in the industry that would cause us to make changes in our contracts and then act accordingly.
You know, as long as I’ve been your manager I’ve never had anyone not honor a contract. Even back in 1973/1974 when corn made its first move to $3.50 and then to $4.00 and soybeans went to $12.90, I didn’t even have signed contracts. I never will forget going to a Grain & Feed meeting at the Redwood Inn at Rantoul and Tom Hieronymus, the guru of markets at the U.I. at the time, talked about how elevators better have signed contracts because there probably would be farmers who wouldn’t honor their cheaper commitments. I remember coming back to the office after the meeting late that night and looking over all the new crop grain I had purchased. You know what? I didn’t have one signed contract. Back then it was all done with a pledge and handshake. However it wasn’t long after that concern that we started having all our contracts signed.
We are members of the National Grain & Feed Association because they have an arbitrating committee that will arbitrate any problems we have with customers connected to grain contracts. Thank goodness we haven’t had to use them and I hope you never have to use them in the future either.
Congratulations to . . .
Darci & Wayne Chupp, parents of Dawlton Wayne, born March 16. The proud grandparents are Larry & Linda Dyson, and the proud great-grandparents are Helen Dyson and Dwight & Mary Blythe;
Charles & Shirley Sievers, recently celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary;
Don & Virginia Kaufman, recently celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary;
Jim & Mikki Burns, recently celebrating their 35th wedding anniversary;
Todd & Cheri Thomas, parents of a new daughter, Sidney. The very proud grandparents are Richard and Bonnie Thomas;
Adam & Heather Logue, parents of a new son, Jacob Leo;
Jan Riggins, winner of two gold medals in table tennis, in the Golden Age Olypmics;
Linda Peterson, proud grandmother of a new granddaughter, Lexie, born in November;
Goldie Shinneman, who celebrated her 80th birthday in March;
Todd Thomas, who won a guest appearance on the TV show “Street Smarts”;
Jessie Rowe, featured in the Decatur Herald, for her active volunteer duties;
Bob & Madge Fultz, who celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in January;
Pete Paulin, described in the Decatur Herald’s “Profiles in Success”, and his business of cryogenics, “300 Below”;
Cora Marshall, who celebrated her 90th birthday in January;
Jim & Jacki Morris, celebrating their 40th anniversary in January;
Mae Davis, who celebrated her 80th birthday in March;
Mike and Cheryl Day, parents of a new son, Chayton. The proud grandparents are Dean & Pam Day;
Rob Ford, featured in the “Gift of Hope” calendar;
Keith & Vanessa Stinson, who celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary with a surprise party hosted by their families;
Jesse Wright, 2nd lieutenant in the
Army. His bars were pinned on by his
grandfather Bob Morgan, and his father, Stan Wright. Jesse graduated from ROTC at Southern Illinois University, and is
presently stationed at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland. He is the son of Stan & Pat Wright. His great-grandfather, Sid Morgan served in
World War I in Germany; Bob Morgan is a World War II veteran, and Stan Wright is
a Vietnam veteran.
Our
sympathies to the families of . . . .
Bob Scheffer, Harriet Bunselmeyer, Carmileta Bryson, Francis Brett, Chris Canull, Bill Agee, Ann Ard, Robert Lienhart, Velma Betzer, Forest Norman, Geneva Walsh, V C Westerman, Don Tibbs, Ruth Reed, Blanche Hammerschmidt, , Mary Born, Dakota Warnhoff, Ellen Querrey, Mary Jane Wyatt, Ray Richardson, Mary Uhe, Bob Peterson, Eleanor Seitz, Jean Whitted, Grason Crowe, Leo Hannon,
Joe Hodge; and all others who have lost loved ones.
LOCK ‘EM UP!!
Each year, the Topflight Grain board of directors and management, “retreat” for a daylong meeting, to focus on Topflight Grain. They briefly review the company’s current status, then look ahead to the future of the company and the stockholders.
This year’s retreat was held at the Best Western in Monticello. All the board members attended, plus Brad Lee, from CoBank, your manager Richard Thomas, merchandiser Scott Docherty, controller Chuck Bentley and assistant manager Pam Jarboe. Joe Smith, of Creative Ag Solutions, moderated the meeting. Joe opened the meeting describing one of the duties of a board of directors is the strategic planning of the company. He said that a successful company has a clear, well understood vision, committed stockholders, a culture that supports trust, truth, and accountability, good benchmarking skills, establishes networks, has a good vision of what success means, and communicates well to the customers.
Topics for meeting included mergers and consolidations, main office location, facility analysis, board size, financial information, markets, company meetings and programs.
In mergers and consolidations, thoughts were expressed toward other market access, the current benefits of flexibility of markets, services, transportation and labor, and that profitability is more important than size.
The main office should be located where management personnel can work best together. It is very important to maintain qualified, skilled personnel in all facilities to provide market information, grain accounting, and grain services to producers.
Chuck Bentley is preparing financial data to analyze the profitability of each Topflight facility. Currently, this information has red-flagged a few areas to be investigated. The information will be further used to make upgrading and personnel decisions.
The size of the Topflight Board of Directors should be large enough to represent all areas. Dedication of the directors is most important; they should make a sincere effort to attend all board meetings, and also represent the company in community and business activities. Annual reviews of the directors would evaluate their duties, performance and ethical standards.
In order for Topflight to meet its goals of stock redemption, facility maintenance and improvement, and debt repayment, a year end profit goal should be targeted. This number would be a goal that would allow the company to meet its objectives, but would also be flexible to allow for ever- changing financial situations.
Company programs, and communication tools are considered very important to the “culture” of the company. It is difficult to determine a financial return on these programs; if changes are proposed, they should be carefully considered.
Spending the day, “locked in” a room together, provided time and ideas for all in attendance to look ahead to the future and anticipate some of the needs the company will have to meet, to serve the stockholders.
COOPERATVIE
SPIRIT
By Richard Thomas
I have witnessed many things done in the cooperative spirit, but one event will be etched in my mind forever. On January 24, 1972 the Norfolk Western delivered a 100 car train to the Bement Grain Co. at 7:00 a.m. that had to be loaded in a 24 hour time period. It was a cold January day with snow on the ground and a wind blowing briskly. Our storage capacity at Bement totaled 650,000 bushels at the time. The 100 cars would hold 350,000 bushels. We had been anticipating the big event for some time so we had plans in place on how we were going to handle the occasion. I had called 24 farmers to help with the loading. Our plans were to work two crews changing every eight hours. We also had a couple of farmers who brought their tractors in to help move the cars. In addition, we had farmers volunteer to use their farm trucks to transfer grain from Piatt to Bement just to make sure we had enough grain to meet our commitment. You see, our total legging power was just 15,000 bushels per hour so there wasn’t any margin for error.
As the day progressed it kept getting colder and colder, so I began to wonder if the first crew would show back up to work at midnight. Without an exception everyone arrived and a lot of the second shift people stayed until we finished at 6:00 a.m. the next morning. The local restaurant stayed open to feed the crews and keep hot coffee available thru the loading.
It was a day for the record books and every one involved felt like they had helped their local cooperative achieve a milestone. We could have never accomplished the feat if it had not been for the farmer’s cooperation. We continued to load, needing all the farmers help, until in March of 1973 when be built a 450,000 concrete annex.
As the general manager I couldn’t wait until we could do the loading ourselves and not have to ask the farmers for assistance. But we lost the cooperation and camaraderie that went with all of us working together. We still talk about the big event and how much we all enjoyed working together in the spirit of a true cooperative.
GRAIN AND FEED ANNUAL CONVENTION
Your board members and employees attended the annual Grain and Feed Convention in Peoria this February. The convention brings together the people and companies involved in the grain business, to meet, to exchange ideas, and to find solutions to problems. Some of the topics presented included how does a local elevator prepare for succession?, how politically active should elevators become?,how does the local elevator add value to the producer’s grain?, unemployment insurance/workers compensation, employee safety, facility security, risks of providing market information, ISO 9000, agricultural research, and energy costs.
Usually, staff and employees chose different meetings to attend, so that the information presented at each meeting was learned, and shared with all.
Your manager, Richard Thomas, and the Topflight staff assisted with the ISO 9000 workshop. It was presented by Larry Stapleton and Charles Smith, and assisted by Paul Mariman, all who are preparing Topflight for ISO certification. Topflight employees were present to answer questions from the meeting participants.
As well as attending the workshops and meetings, attendees visited the trade show, viewing and visiting with the vendors who displayed elevator maintenance systems, computer systems, advertising specialties, insurance and accounting services. Renewing friendships and exchanging information with others in the industry is also an important benefit gained from attendance at the annual Grain & Feed Convention.
LOCAL SPORTS TRIVIA
Presented
at the 2004 Focus meetings
From
the Maroa meeting:
1. Who was the basketball coach of the famous ’56-’57 team that was 29-3 and advanced to the state tournament?
2. The gentleman was a member of the ’58-’59 team that posted the best record in Maroa history of 24-1 and now works part time for Topflight Grain.
3. Name 3 players (with agricultural interest) on the ’93-’94 men’s basketball team that was 23-6, won the Macon County Tournament, Meridian Conference Tournament, Meridian Conference and the Regional Tourney.
4. Name a local athlete who received a scholarship to play College Division I sports.
5. Can you name the lineman on the ’76 football team that was all conference and also all area and helped lead his team to a 10-2 record and the state semi-finals.
6. Name the professional football teams that the Marao-Forsyth graduate Jeff Query played for during his professional career.
From the Monticello meeting:
1. Who has the MHS career rebounding record of 1978?
2. Who set the 200-meter dash record at 21.9 seconds in 1954?
3. Who holds the record for the triple jump, at 45” 8 ½”?
4. In what two years did Monticello basketball participate in the super-sectionals?
5. Who holds the record for career rebounds in basketball at Bement High School?
6. Who holds the record for assists for 1 game and career assists in basketball at Bement High School?
7. Who holds the record for career steals in 1 game and career 3 point field goals in basketball at the Bement High School?
8. Who holds the record for highest pole vault in track for the Bement High School?
9. Who, working for Topflight Grain, was a great running back for Bement High School?
10. Who, working for Topflight Grain, has the career longest punt for Lovington High School?
11. Who, working for Topflight Grain, played football at ISU in 1959?
12. Who, working for Topflight Grain, has the record for throwing the most elbows while playing basketball at Bement High School?
13. Who won the Illinois State Fair hog calling contest in 2003?
From the Hammond meeting:
1. What father-son team rushed for over 1000 yards in one season?
2. Who was the first ever Illini MVP in football that graduated from Bement High School?
3. Who has the most rushing attempts and carried the ball more times in one game?
4. Who passed for the most yards?
5. Who had the longest pass completion?
6. Name the top three BHS football players with the most receptions in his career.
7. Who holds the state record for fumbles recovered in his career on defense?
8. Who has the most tackle assists in a game?
9. Which major city in the US has professional sports that have the same colors?
10. What area farmer received 2nd in the state triple jump in 1977?
11. Who won this years Daytona 500?
12. In 1986, this son of an area farmer was the leading scorer for the Lovington Panthers.
13. Name an area farmer who was on the 73-74 state basketball team at Cerro Gordo
14. What LaPlace area farmer was named “Player of the Week” by WLRW, WAND, and the Decatur Herald in 1980?
15. In what year was Atwood-Hammond, the Class 1A State Football champions?
16. Atwood-Hammond merged their football team with what local school? What is the team name?
17. In 1991, the most points in a basketball game was set by this Atwood farmer.
18. Name the Atwood-Hammond girls basketball coach with the most wins.
19. What two brothers graduated from Atwood and went on to play sports for the U of I in the late ‘20’s and early ‘30’s.
WHAT’S HAPPENIN’ AT TOPFLIGHT??
Russ Durham, and his family, and Pam helped with the Topflight float in the Cerro Gordo Christmas parade.
Scott & Dillon Docherty and Derrick Bruhn represented Topflight in the Monticello Christmas parade. The theme was a tropical theme, thus the bright shirts, grass skirt and palm tree!
Eric and Hayden Clements and Pam Jarboe threw out the candy canes for Topflight Grain, in the Bement Christmas parade.
Scott Docherty provided market information at the CF&H crop insurance meetings in January, in Monticello and Hammond.
Chuck Bentley attended the Agris convention in January. Agris provides the grain accounting software used by Topflight Grain. At the convention, Chuck met some of the Agris employees and learned about some of the planned enhancements to our current program.
It took a lot of paper, and many employees to send out the year end statements to our customers! That mailing summarized the 2003 calendar year of grain business, and listed remaining grain and open contracts. We hope that is a valuable service provided to you, by your company.
Pam helped the Bement students celebrate Dr. Seuss’s 100th birthday by reading “Daisy-Head Maisey” to several of the classes.
Doug and Pam attended joined fellow ag constituents at Parkland, to hear Representative Tim Johnson address current legislation.
Pam enjoyed Ag Day Breakfast in Macon County, sponsored by the Macon County Farm Bureau, and the presentation given by Alan Jarand of RFD Illinois.
We’ve asked our local art students to help us with a new theme and architecture for a summer float. We hope to have a new float for you to see this summer, and the school that helps us, will receive a donation for art supplies.
Kyle Frazier, senior from Southern Illinois University, interned at Topflight Grain for a week this spring. Manager Thomas presented him with a “world famous” Topflight t-shirt. Kyle’s interest was agricultural engineering, so he spent most of his time with Eric and Brock, and some time with Dick.
Louie made a birthday wish, as he blew out his candle. Jill made the brownies, to celebrate Louie’s birthday, during an ISO audit committee meeting.
By
the staff of Friendship Hill
Our area is fortunate to have two locally owned and funded retirement homes. This issue, we highlight Friendship Hill.
Friendship Hill is located on Route 36, 1 mile east of the LaPlace junction of Routes 36 & 32, or 6 miles west of Hammond.
It is a retirement residence for men and women, age 62 and over, who are ambulatory, and who want to enjoy carefree living and congenial surroundings. When you come to Friendship, you may bring with you the freedom and privacy that you have enjoyed in your own home, plus the advantages of companionship of others and relief from responsibilities and cares.
Friendship Hill offers single and double rooms, each with a private half bath. Each of the rooms may be fully furnished, or you have the option of bringing in your favorite pieces.
They serve three home-style cooked meals a day, provide weekly housekeeping services and laundry services.
Twenty-four hour security and an alert staff provide peace of mind, in the peaceful, natural setting of Friendship Hill.
Chuck
Bentley presented the financial state of the company at the Focus
meetings. Here is a summary of his
report:
Your company, for the first eight months of fiscal year 2004, has sold 20,680,000 bushels of grain. Projected sales are 30,000,000 bushels. Merchandise sales are $206,000 Projected sales are $300,000. Gross income thru the end of January is showing $589,000. Projected gross income for the year is $690,000. It does appear that your company will meet the projected sales volume, but could fall short of the projected gross income number. This is mainly due to reduced storage income and reduced basis appreciation. Although we have purchased over 80% of the crop, most of these purchases have been at a narrower basis level because of strong demand and no carry in the market.
Other interesting January financial facts to note:
corn check off collected for the month-$30,929;
soybean check off collected for the month-$95,250;
grain insurance fund collected for the month-$19,108;
Total checks written for the month-$47,525,990;
and seasonal loan high total-$32,472,198.
UNIVERISTY OF TOPFLIGHT
In order to keep Topflight Grain employees up to date with current information, skills and training, several of them have attended different meetings.
In December, Champaign-Danville Grain Inspection met with the Topflight employees, to review and instruct them in grading grain quality. Specifically, some of the areas covered were damage, heat damage, and the various odors that can occur in stored grain. This information will provide more accurate grading if damaged grain is received off the farm, and will also help assure quality shipments of grain.
Stason Kopps studied for the pesticide test, passed it, and is now licensed.
The ISO audit team attended “audit class” at Millkin. This included Russel Wright, Mikki Burns, Louie Tieman and Brock Casteel.
Denny Hill, Vanessa Stinson, Doug Adloff, Pam Jarboe and Derrick Bruhn attended the MIDCO winter outlook meeting. The MIDCO staff shared information about grain prices, basis, grain supplies and market opportunities.
Chuck Bentley and your board president, Richard Larimore, attended CoBank’s annual meeting, to participate in the annual business meeting. Topics of workshops held during the event also included an economic outlook, and employee motivation.
Brock Casteel, Stason Kopps, and Russ Durham attended the Grain & Feed’s Operatons Conference, where they learned about elevator equipment maintenance, fire prevention and fire extinguishing.
Gloria Litwiller provided a very informative report to us about soybean rust, from a meeting that she attended, on that topic.
SOMETIMES, WE’RE THE TEACHER (or
speaker)
Occasionally, Topflight employees are asked to share information, by speaking at different meetings:
Dick Thomas spoke to the Indiana GEAPS organization in December. Dick was contacted by former employee Steve Mechling, who is now working for Central States in Montpelier, Indiana, to talk about the changes in the grain business, and preparing for future changes.
Scott Docherty presented a market outlook at the Corn Belt FS meeting in December.
Derrick Bruhn discussed the markets at a Piatt County FS meeting in December.
Dick Thomas told the Piatt County Farm Bureau women about Topflight Grain during their January meeting.
Pam Jarboe presented a market outlook to the Champaign County Lady Landowners in Febuary.
Pam Jarboe told the Ivesdale Women’s Club about Topflight Grain, and the importance of agriculture, in March.
Scott Docherty, Jim Murphy and Pam Jarboe hosted a group of Chinese U of I students for a tour of Topflight Grain. The tour also included a visit to the Ayers farm, to FS ag supply, and a visit by Marilyn Ayers about the Abe Lincoln heritage of central Illinois.
The 2004 Focus meetings were held in Maroa, Monticello and Hammond, to keep our customers informed about their company, and to answer questions and take suggestions for the improvement of Topflight Grain. For a little fun, this year (we hope you thought it was fun) a sports theme was carried through the meetings.
Manager Thomas was dressed in the referee shirt, and employees wore various sports shirts, supporting favorite teams. The meetings began with the coach (location managers) introducing the team (employees). A few warm up exercises (local sports trivia) proceeded the first quarter.
The first quarter included Stadium Improvements (facility improvements) by Eric Clements, and Defensive Strategies (safety and training) by Brock Casteel.
Denny Hill and Pam Jarboe joined the team in the 2nd quarter, with Run the Table (marketing pool update) and Over the Net (iView and the Topflight website).
During the half time show, more trivia questions were asked, and halftime refreshments (popcorn) were served.
Back in the game, for the third quarter were Scott Docherty with the Hail Mary (specialty grains), Derrick Bruhn with Hedge Your Bets (crop insurance) and Par for the Course (average price contract), and Chuck Bentley with the Scoreboard (financial information).
The fourth quarter plays included the Pre-Season Analysis (market outlook) by Scott Docherty and Passing the Baton (transition to a new manager) by Richard Thomas.
When the two minute bell sounded, customers were asked to complete their score card, which rated the quality of service provided by Topflight Grain.
In the locker room, after the game, questions were asked and opinions were shared.
Throughout the newsletter, you will find the information presented during the Focus meetings, as well as the Trivia questions. We hope you enjoyed the meetings, and learned a lot from them, if you were able to attend. If you were unable to attend, we hope that you find the information presented in the newsletter informative, and fun.
Answers to the sports trivia
questions
From
the 2004 Focus meetings
From
the Maroa meeting:
1. Herman Edwards
2. Roger Lewis
3. Adam Hanes, Nathan Marsh, Ryan Aupperle
4. Nikki Stemler – Volleyball at North Carolina State
T J Jackson – Baseball at the U of I
5. David Zelhart
6. Green Bay, Houston, Cincinnati, and Washington
From the Monticello meeting:
1. Jim Williams
2. Larry Lecrone
3. Dan Lecrone
4. 1977 & 2003
5. Tom Foran
a. 1001 career rebounds, from 1969 – 1972
b. 378 rebounds in 1 year – 1970
c. 28 rebounds in 1 game – 1971
6. Steve Mills
a. 18 in one game – 1972
b. 535 career, from 1970 – 1973
7. a. Andy Hendrix – 12 steals in 2002
b. Andy Hendrix – 197 3 point field goals, from 1999 - 2003
7. Randy Hinton – 13’4” in 1975.
8. Charles Bentley
9. Jim Murphy – over 70 yards in 1971
10. Richard Thomas
11. Eric Clements
12. Chris Karr
From the Hammond meeting:
1. Chuck Bentley – 1968, & Cory Bentley – 1989
2. Stan Bodman
3. John Clark – 46 times in one game & 260 times in 1983
4. Joe Thompson – 1630 yards
5. John Marker – 91 yards to Chuck Bentley
6. a. Zach Gallagher – 51 receptions
b. Todd Thomas – 47
c. Chuck Bentley - 44
7. Tim Walsh – 18 recovered fumbles
8. Bill Gorrell – 20 tackle assists in 1972
9. Pittsburg
10. Jeff Davis
11. Dale Earnhardt Jr
12. Jon Day
13. Larry Pflum, Terry Curran, Greg Morganthaler
14. John McRae
15. 1980
16. Bement, South Piatt Wildcats
17. Ted Romine
18. Amanda Romine
19. Kamm Brothers
We’ve had a lot of fun with our adopted 2nd grade class. In December, during the Christmas party, Santa had some time to visit with the students (and the teachers and the Topflight employees) to inquire of their behavior and what they were asking from Santa.
In February, Louie, Vanessa, Gloria, Scot, and Dick joined in the fun at Tom’s Bowl in Bement. The gracious hosts took time to demonstrate the workings of the equipment that re-sets the pins and returns the bowling balls. Then, the teams spent the afternoon trying various techniques and styles to perfect their bowling styles.
Our hosts served cookies and soft drinks before the conclusion of the outing.
A field trip for April and a Play Day in May are planned yet, before the school year ends.
Yes, it’s true, you can win a world famous, sought-after, coveted Topflight Grain t-shirt. All you have to do is logon to www.topflightgrain.com. Click on the green tab that says “Trivia Contest” (it’s even printed in gold, so you can find it easier), and correctly answer the weekly Trivia question. One winner a month will be chosen from all the correct entries. That very lucky person will receive a Topflight Grain t-shirt.
So, keep checking, and keep sending your answers. You may be the lucky winner!!
Letters to the editor:
To Mr. Thomas and the Topflight Board of Directors,
Thank you so much for your lovely holiday gift to our community of the lighted cross atop the elevator building.
Carol Otis
By Pam Jarboe
My part of the focus meeting was to demonstrate our Internet product called iView, and to show a few highlights of the Topflight Grain website.
IView is a program that allows producers to access grain records through our website. During the focus meeting, we showed the information that was available to you, and how to sign up for the program.
There is no cost to use the program. When you enroll, a message is sent to me, and I will set up your grain accounts, then you are ready to go! The program is good, but too complicated and really, provides more information than most people want to see. We are working with the programmers, trying to make it a simpler program. (We are also pursuing similar programs that might be better suited to us.)
After a few screens about iView, we cruised through the Topflight website, highlighting the bid page which shows CBOT quotes, cash bids and weather. The quotes are based on a 10 minute delay; the cash bids are current, based on the CBOT quotes. Detailed weather information is available, custom charts can be drawn, and option quotes are also available.
If you would like more information about the iView package, or some help with our website, please call me.
Topflight Grain missions statement: We are committed to the future of agriculture by improving the profitability of our customers through quality service and exceptional people.