Sandy Lake Imp losing AGCO

Executives in corporations are constantly scrambling to the to the top; they often don't care of what company or division because they jump from one division/company whenever they see an opportunity for advancement.  The point is, the decisions they make are often personally motivated for the good of their careers and not necessarily for the good of the company. 

The key to (career) promotion is "vision".  Executives have to have a vision which separates them from the other leaders/managers who are available to the upper management of the company.  Cancelling SLI's part distributorship may have been part of an executive's vision to reduce distribution costs/inventory space/personnel.  Whether the concept works is entirely secondary.  Once the exec can show a quarter or two of bottom line benefits, he can move up or transfer to another division or company.  The job of making the project work long term will be left to someone else.

As far as real costs on the corporate side,  personnel are expensive.  By centralizing their distributorships, AGCO reduces the amount of personnel required to maintain contact with dealers like SLI.  Instead, AGCO retains fewer highly-paid and trained salesmen/reps and can substitute lower-paid and trained employees to send out orders.  Also, the personnel who know the older parts are likely to be more experienced and therefore more highly paid than someone off the street.

What I'm looking for is AGCO spinning off its antique parts business into a separate organization.  The organization won't make any products itself but will outsource the manufacture of its parts.  I saw a posting earlier which mentioned something along those lines.  That way the company can easily separate the costs/profits on its balance sheet while reducing employee costs to a minimum.  Moving the parts business to a separate company will also make selling the parts business easier.  Selling the parts business division would give a nice bump to the quarterly bottom line.  Some executive may even get a promotion out of the deal.

Dale-OH wrote:   In the corporate world it is all about numbers,

I had seen mahindra make the claim they are already number one.  As far as US row-crop agriculture, I don't think Mahindra will ever gain much market share. They don't have implements, high horsepower tractors or Combines. Kubota will likely stay away from large harvesting equipment too. These companies do best with acreage owner/hobbiests and thats just what they're doing. 

I find the differences in different brands interesting. The Green and Red and AGCO companies are all about streamlining and getting rid of dealers, meanwhile, Kubota and other brands from other countries are setting up dealers on every corner. Now, do you suppose there is any correlation between who is gaining and who is losing business share by adding or removing customer service, convenience and presence? I see the AGCO, Deere and CNH companies as being penny wise and pound foolish. They will penny pinch themselves right out of business. I admit it will take awhile for CNH and Deere to go down, but AGCO isn't in a position to lose any more customers.

Edited by redline - 10 Mar 2012 at 1:34pm

If you have Parts only Store for Agco ,JD  etc. .You are not going to sell as many parts as you would selling the equipment they fit.Just parts store's are the reason we have the Great vendor's that are here on the fourm.Think of the money they spend to have parts made for your old tractor and all the time getting to that point of having them made (for the parts that aftermarket dose not have ).Then selling the part at a reasonable price and try to make a little money to live on.On top of the one's that would cry about the price even if you give it to them just for the shipping.Even though I have a Tractor repair business ,I do not want a store front for selling parts I am a dealer for most of aftermarket Company's ,and Major Engine etc. parts and if I can not get it ,I just get it here ,saves me from having 100's of accounts .

Edited by Fred in Pa - 10 Mar 2012 at 9:31am

They're all doing it these days. Make parts obsolete sooner. If aftermarket can't supply, then it is that much sooner you'll be forced to walk through someone's door to buy new. This is how they plan to stimulate economy. No parts to keep older units operating means more newer units sold. Going through same thing with Ford/Mercury right now.

Even in the mid 90's AGCO was getting tired of the "parts only" dealers, I have a 9000 series intro Video and Ratliff and Scheumeda (sp?) discussed keeping orange dealers going, selling new "Allis" tractors, not just parts. The difference between then and now is these men are gone and  the company doesn't care about anything orange anymore and they don't have an orange wholegood to sell. 

Edited by ACmowerguy - 09 Mar 2012 at 10:27pm

Chris/CT wrote: Very sad note. I believe they [SLI] knew it was only a matter of time. This is what the world is coming to, No grace and compassion for the regular, hard working, folks. They will have to figure out how to re-invent there business to keep going, or ??

They are selling LS tractors. They also have used parts and aftermarket stuff too. Keep in mind though the experience is still there, and Bill just got a new pup for the chief of security position, so they will be around.

Now I am gonna rant,
The thing that really burns my butt is AGCO figures everyone will flock to the nearest MF dealer, and guess what, people are not. Why would I go somewhere that has no Allis experience? I will buy used parts and aftermarket and AGCO can go pound a stump. There is a green dealer, a red dealer, a blue dealer, and ls at SLI. These are all within 15 miles from here, the MF is 30 miles away.
 AGCO really has no clue how many customers they are loosing, what a bunch of jackasses.


Edited by mtanut - 09 Mar 2012 at 6:29pm

I know that I have been very glad that Sandy lake has been there for us in the past. I am hoping that they chime in here and tell us if we can help in any way.

The idiots at corporate should be doing as I have been doing for the last few nights, reading the book: "An Industrial Heritage, Allis-Chalmers Corporation" written by Walter F Pederson, Ph.D. President, University of Dubuque.

The mistakes they continue to make.....

This really makes no sense. How does AGCO think they can make money when they keep going against what the consumer wants and they keep removing their products from dealerships??? I mean you could ask a group of middle school kids if they thought this was a good plan and they would tell you no.

D, the closest AGCO dealer to me last time gave me the impression they didn't want my old tractor parts business. R&R Equipment in Indianola Ia was always good to me, they were just not convienient.

Maybe all forum members need to chip in, we will but out AGCO, drop Massey, Fire up the forges in West Allis, and start building real equipment again

Maybe keep Rich on as a janitor 

The UP-pricing isn't anything new , when I had bought new parts for my HD4 from a dealer in Bloomington MN they seemed high. Found out the dealer added 10% or 20% plus shipping to most parts.  I went out to Herc-U-Lift and ordered parts at book price as they said that markup was in price and it was a fair profit already and any dealer that added was going against policy of company.. 

never been to found of AGCO -.-

And they wonder why there are so many foreign equipment companies and JD dealerships doing well.  HEY AGCO!!!!!!!!!!!! Pull your head out our your A$$!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!