Dad's wisdom with Scott Church: generations of wisdom

Scott

Church: You know, Chris, as we talk about the farm and life and things like that, it reminds me of the conversation that Doc Holliday had on his deathbed as he was talking to his best friend Wyatt Earp. And Wyatt Earp had been through the shootout at the OK Corral and gunfights in the street and the lawmen and this and that. Of course, they were the best of friends. Wyatt says to Doc Holliday, he says, Doc, he said, man, he said, I've been through so much. He said, all I wanted was a simple life. And Doc looks at Wyatt right before he dies and he said, Wyatt, there's no such thing as a simple life. It's just life.

Chris: Welcome everybody to another episode of the Ag View Pitch. You've got Chris Barron here with Scott Church and we are doing another Dad's Wisdom. We haven't done a Dad's Wisdom for a long time here. It's been kind of a busy winter getting out, seeing all the farms and working with everybody, but we're lucky enough today to catch a dad at the end of the meeting for the day here. And so, uh, Scott— we have Scott Church here from Catlin, Illinois, uh, just east of Champaign-Urbana. Scott, how's it going?

Scott

Church: Good. Nice to see you, Chris.

Chris: Yeah, well, it's good to be here, and we just come off a day of working on the business instead of in the business, you know. And so that's something we always talk about the importance of, you know, looking at, you know, where, where is the business going, doing those strategic planning and all that kind of stuff. And so coming off of that day, that was really good. So with that said though, I'm gonna have you introduce yourself and just tell a little bit about your farm, and we'll kind of go into a few topics from there.

Scott

Church: Uh, well, like Chris said, I'm a farmer from East Central Illinois. I do farm with my son. We— it's kind of an odd situation where we work together but farm separately, if you can imagine that. We're not a partnership. But, um, I kid my brothers, I'm the only brother that never completed college. I'm officially a college dropout, uh, many moons ago.

Chris: But how many moons ago was that? Uh, well, what did you—

Scott

Church: this is my 48th crop. Oh, okay. Um, But, uh, but we laugh, we laugh about that now.

Chris: But, um, that's a lot of crops.

Scott

Church: My dad wasn't very happy with me at the time, uh, because it actually became at a semester break. And I told him, I said, uh, I don't think I'll go back. And he goes, what do you mean you're not going to go back? Because I was basically going for free on a football scholarship. And he said, what are you going to do? And I said, well, I like the farm. I'm going to farm. And my dad looked at me, and you had to know my dad. But my dad looked at me and he goes, with who? And I said—

Chris: I was hoping to come home.

Scott

Church: I said, well, the plan was with you. And I can remember this, Chris, to my dying day, the lecture I got. Again, he wasn't very pleased because I decided to drop out of college. And, uh, he said, well, I'm gonna give you a few words of wisdom since we're on the wisdom topic. Yeah. And he goes— you gotta remember, my dad was tough love. And he was like, I'm not renting you a farm, I'm not helping you rent a farm, I'm not buying you a farm, I'm not helping you buy a farm. I'm going to give you the opportunity. And he said, I'm going to show you how to do it right, because my dad was highly recognized in the county for the best farmer around. So, so I'm going to show you how to do it right. You're on your own, boy. Well, uh, I took— I, I don't want to take all the credit because without Jared wouldn't be where he's at without me, and I certainly wouldn't be where I'm at without him.

But, but, um, we went from He let me have 50 acres and to just a shade over 6,000 now. So awesome. That's kind of where I ended up. And, uh, I don't know if Dad really meant to have that kind of an impact, but it was either a sink or swim attitude. And I'm not suggesting that that was the way to go, but that's the way I was treated. And, uh, well, there was a time or two I was thinking, man, I'm starving to death. And I didn't have much farm income. I I hail adjusted for country companies in the summertime. I helped carpentry, work for a carpenter in the wintertime because I had very basically little farm income. And so that's kind of my— even though our, our heritage was, um, quite lengthy, I had family that had died in our community pre-Civil War that were farmers. And so Um, my son's fifth generation, and, uh, we primarily, uh, we've taken the avenue many years ago.

We, we grow all non-GMO soybeans for tofu and baby powder and, and, um, I guess whatever else they use that for. And then we grow all food-grade corn for— it goes to food chips, Kellogg's Corn Flakes, and grits. I tell my, my friends, I said, just keep eating the chips and the grits and corn flakes, I'll be able to stay in business. Yeah. So that's kind of how— that's our— that's kind of our focus, um, as far as production goes.

Chris: Yeah, that's a— there's a good diversity of, of things. And I like how you mentioned, you know, um, Jared. So your son is fifth generation, and we just had a meeting here today, and you had, uh your son E— or your grandson was here today, and he's 14 and sat in a full day, you know, 7, 8 hours of a business meeting.

Scott

Church: I was pretty impressed with that too, Chris. Yeah, that was the best thing. I, I mean, I thought to myself, this is such a good move that we brought another generation right here to learn what— to learn the next phase, right?

Chris: And that's, that's the thing. I think that, you know, from a wisdom standpoint And your perspective, I like to hear that because I think that next generation, you know, when you're in the midst of transition, when you're in the midst of succession planning and strategic planning, having that next generation, it doesn't really matter how old they are as long as they can comprehend and they want to. It was interesting, you know, I, I asked Ian, I'm like, you know, so what do you want to do? You know, he said, I want to farm, you know, and, and there was no hesitation there. So that's what's cool to see.

Scott

Church: So it is And we're lucky enough in our household that, that, uh, my granddaughter is going to be attending Purdue University next— this coming fall— and it's a pre-veterinarian school. And then we've got 5 grandsons, and our hope is that we can do the work with Ag View Solutions and get the proper groundwork laid, that we can make it a— an easier transition for 1 or 2 or I don't care if all the boys do it, you know, but at least so they'll have another avenue to get in the business. It was much easier when I, you know, when, when I, when I took over my dad, we had the machinery appraised. I can remember it like yesterday, two different appraisals, we averaged them, it was $155,000. And, uh, I started— I'd already owned half the machinery anyhow because I'd been buying in, but Now you're talking millions, right?

And it's, it's a completely different avenue that we have to approach nowadays because of the costs and complexities that we presently are faced with.

Chris: Yeah, the taxes, the taxes, the more people being involved, right? You know, as the operations grow and you bring additional family, extended family into the equation, that really, really changes things. Yeah, exactly. So another question I want to ask is, I want to go back, you know, again to the generational thing. You know, you talked about the transition over to you. If you were able to go back— so how old were you when you started farming then?

Scott

Church: I was 20 years old.

Chris: Okay, so if you could go back and tell, say, your 22, 23-year-old self something, you know, because you saw the high interest rates then, obviously, and some of those things, and, and with you know, and as we record this right now, we're in the midst of what I would classify as, is pretty close to hyperinflation. We've got a lot of things going on right now. So if— so first of all, let me ask this question: if you go back and tell your 22, 23-year-old self something of advice, what would you tell yourself?

Scott

Church: Well, I'm going to go back, and I lived through the Jimmy Carter days of high inflation, and, um, Oh, I— in a way, it was good news. It was, it was a good lesson that I learned from my dad because my dad was never one to overextend. And I knew some— in fact, I have some relatives that decided to take off, buy a lot of land at that time with little to no down payment, and and 19.75% interest hit. Well, let's just say that was— let's just put it this way. They still owed the mortgage and had to sell the farm at a tremendous loss. And it— I— and my dad, I remember, was in auction one time, and I was wanting to buy this 40 so bad I could taste it. It was just right down the road. And Dad's like, He was like, go ahead and you go ahead and bid on that and go ahead and buy if you want to, but don't get my name tied to it. I said, when you go broke, you don't call me.

Well, I didn't buy it, but looking back, my thoughts would be don't overextend because there's an old saying that $7 corn can break a farmer quicker than $3.50 corn because they think happy days are here again. And I've seen it up and I've seen it down, and I've sold corn for $1.90 and I've sold corn for $8.60, you know, in my career. But as— of course, my dad's long passed, obviously. But Dad, you know, even in his long in the tooth, he said, you know, because my dad was never really much of a risk taker, he's very conservative. He had money, he had stocks, he had some land, he had a diverse portfolio. But my dad was always under the impression, don't overextend, and don't— basically don't allow yourself to get so overextended in even the good times or the bad, whatnot, right, that you'll tank the farm.

But he did say later on his life, you know, I wish I'd taken more risk and maybe bought a little bit more land. And, and, and so therefore I've kind of taken the same approach, but I've I've, I've done— I've spent money like a drunken sailor sometimes that my dad would probably turn over in his grave. Luckily, it's all pretty well worked out. But I probably, during the times like these, like we're facing right now, input costs, interest rates creeping up and things like that, I would just add a little word to the wise. I if you're sitting on cash and you want to go out and buy 160, go for it. But if you're not sitting on cash and you're borrowing the bulk of it— and our ground in our neck of the woods is running as much as $19,000 an acre now— uh, I think you could have a recipe for disaster.

Chris: Yeah. And we're recording this in March of 2022, and so You know, it's going to be interesting. You know, people listening to this in a year from now, it's going to be— they're going to know what we don't know this minute, right?

Scott

Church: Exactly.

Chris: Oh, exactly. You know, this interest rate and everything is really crazy. And like I said, you lived through that, that interest rate, and, and saw a lot of embargoes.

Scott

Church: Yeah. You know, we— you know, Trump had the tariffs and Carter had the embargoes, and, and I've seen everything in between. And, um, Um, we all made it, uh, but there, as you remember, in the '80s, um, if it wasn't for the, the PIC payments and everything else, we farmed for— we broke even farming and we lived off the government payments, right? You know, so, but, um, I, I, I'm not saying— I'm not suggesting that these younger guys totally pull their horns in, but I would, I would caution them, just don't get crazy overextended. And because history repeats itself, and we could be looking at, instead of $7 corn, we could be looking at in a couple of big crops, $4 corn, right?

Chris: How do you, you know, in your experience, you know, land rent has always been a, a challenge for a lot of, you know, you mentioned young producers, that's always been something that, you know, if you can't buy the land, then maybe you need to rent some of it, or or whatever. How do you, um, navigate that? I mean, the, the rents are, are going to be really high right now for a while. And, you know, is there anything that you've learned over the years in terms of navigating rent, or is it— or sometimes you just need to walk away from some of these, these things? What's your, what's your opinion there?

Scott

Church: But sometimes you can be more profitable farming less. I'm talking net, net money return, right? And I think you have to have a hard calculator involved. And, and again, some people, um, are on such an ego trip to talk about acres. Why farm so many acres? Yeah, but did you make any money? Well, no, but I farmed 10,000, right? Who cares? I mean, I'm not into recreational work. I'm— I've been down that road.

Chris: Yeah.

Scott

Church: Um, Again, there's so many outside factors that play into that. I mean, everything from how close it is to your homestead. Is it— we have a lot of system drainage farm ground at home. Is it system drain? Productivity index rate. There's so many things play into it. And, and we just don't, we just don't rent ground just to rent ground. It's gotta have some profitability prospect behind it before we would extend ourself, especially in these kind of times, 'cause in our neck of the woods, it's getting common to see rent with a 5 in front of it.

Chris: In your area?

Scott

Church: Yeah. And it's like, whoa, wait a minute, am I renting this or am I trying to buy it? Yeah. So.

Chris: Right.

Scott

Church: And sometimes, now if ground was cheaper, on a dog, you know, let's say, let's just pull out a number like $12,000. Well, I'd rather buy it at $12,000 than rent it at $500 or whatever, the high fours, or I'd rather buy it, right?

Chris: But, um, um, and when, and when people are listening to this from North Dakota and South Dakota, they're like, you're— the rent is what, is it $50? No, it's not $50. It's starting with a 5, isn't it? Another zero.

Scott

Church: No, I'm talking, uh, it's getting commonplace to see anywhere from 510 to— I've heard as high as 540. And it's just nuts. And I don't— I'm not in the business to— I don't have to do it like that, so it doesn't interest me a whole lot.

Chris: Yeah. And those numbers, right? One of the other things I want to hit on with you, Scott, is, um, the whole idea of just the workload and all the things that are going on. And, you know, you can, you know, even look at your operation, you look at Jared, your son, he works his butt off. And we see that same thing in every operation. And we're always all trying to figure out like, how do we get to that next level so we can, you know, have the right amount of employees? It's hard to find good employees anymore, people that want to work, people that want to do what we do. Um, and so, you know, do we get larger equipment? Do we have more employees? How do we manage? How do we manage all that? And then on top of that, it's quality of life too, right?

Scott

Church: Oh, it is.

Chris: So talk a little bit about your experience of, you know, if you're telling these younger guys how to balance their life between family and work and all that, what's your perspective?

Scott

Church: In retrospect, I'm a poor example. Okay, well, I'm gonna tell it like it is, guy, you know that. Yeah. And, and the reason I say that is because I put— when I was younger, starving I put so much emphasis on work hard, rent more, buy more, farm more, I missed out. And when I say I missed out, I don't mean I was— I don't think— I don't mean I was an absentee parent. Any kid had a— I mean, I remember having a cheerleader at one school and a basketball player on the court at another school. And, and, but thank God I had a great wife because Basically, I worked all the time and she raised the kids. I mean, she was the foundation, not me. I was the workhorse. I was the money guy. I was— I loved— that's my biggest problem as I, as I transition away. My biggest problem is I've got no hobbies and I still love to work. That's all I do is work. Um, but, uh, but it's getting old.

Yeah, but, um, Uh, you have to have a blend. You do have to have a blend, and you have to be cautious of that blend because sometimes you can be— you can put so much emphasis on the fun stuff that the business goes down the tube. And I, I'm going to go back to quote my dad one time when— and again, you didn't know my father, and that's okay, but It was a situation where my wife was gonna take my daughter to ballet lessons and we were still harvesting corn and whatnot, you know? My dad made it very clear, "Hey, without getting this crop in timely and getting our stuff done, you can't pay for those ballet lessons." Right. And so when he said it, and you realize how many decades ago that sunk in my head? And so I put so much effort on the performance and the production and the business and growing the business that I, I'm sure I know I left, I left proper family time on the table.

Chris: Well, we talked today a little bit about generational dynamics too, didn't we?

Scott

Church: We did.

Chris: You know, and there's, you know, look at how different the generation, you know, you're in the boomer generation.

Scott

Church: Yes, I am.

Chris: And you look at all the way to Gen Z, you brought a Gen Z with you today, right? I did. You know, and look at the difference how, you know, how they grew up, you know, Snapchat and everything. Exactly. And how you got the, the iron hand occasionally, probably more than once.

Scott

Church: Um, and that's what we learned today. You brought out some very good illustrations of, of how my generation was raised and how it affected our ability to communicate to even my son's generation. And Ian being a Z or whatever he is, uh, I call him like Tommy TikTok, you know. Um, yeah, and they're smarter, sharper, quicker, brighter, all the things above. But one thing that I still want to instill in my grandkids and even the listeners out there, don't let your kids be slackers. And when I say that, Work, earn your keep. And I was never afraid to do a dirty job. I'd work with the hired help and get filthy. Just, I'm not, I'm not above that. I don't want, you know, I'll get in the dirty trench right with you and work with you because I don't want anybody to— don't let your employees or whoever think that you're better than they are.

And now granted, I'm getting old and I can't do it, do as much anymore, but But same way with your, like my grandsons and stuff like that, like, come on boys, you're gonna work. I don't care if it's picking up sticks or whatnot, you're gonna learn the work ethic to carry on, which I think in my small mind will create success. And take the work ethic, even if you work in town, one of my youngest brothers is a big corporate banker out of Chicago for Global Lending for the food group. And he took that, he took that farm work ethic to the city of Chicago. They thought, where'd this kid come from? You know, he, and he's in his, I don't know, he's 62 years old now. And it's like he climbed the corporate ladder because he knew how to work hard, just plumb hard work. So I don't know, I, our operation probably stresses hard work too much. Yeah, but that's just us.

Chris: Yeah. And, and there's different types of hard work too, right? You know, we talked today about working, and we started a podcast that way too, with working on the business versus working in the business. Today you guys spent the whole day working on the business, correct? Is there any, anything, you know, that you've learned over the years that, you know, people need to stay focused on when they are working on the business, you know, whether it be marketing or whether it be, you know, strategically planning where the business is going or managing the communication or any of those things that you've learned that you would, that you would stress?

Scott

Church: I think as your business grows and your size grows and your, your staff grows, you have to concentrate more on a lot of things that we learned today in our— in our— well, I think this is our third session. I think that then, you know, I mean, we're very production-based oriented, as we've discovered. But as far as— yeah, there's so many— there's so many avenues that you could go. Oh yeah, go down there. Yeah. But, um, as you grow either going to spread yourself very thinly with— because if you're so production-oriented as we are, it's pretty darn hard to focus on stuff like this because nobody wants to take the time to do it. But this probably will— what we're doing, what we've done the last several times, will promote and grow your business quicker, bigger, and faster than being out in the shop laying underneath a piece of machinery working on it.

Chris: One of the things we always ask people to think about is, are you doing the $300 an hour jobs or the $30 an hour jobs? And they all need done. The $300— they're— the $30 an hour job's important, right? You know, changing the sweeps on the field cultivator, right, or doing the repairs on the strip-till bar, or whatever it is. Those things are very important. However, somebody's got to run the business.

Scott

Church: And that's where the money's made.

Chris: Yeah, yeah.

Scott

Church: Even though I'd rather be changing sweeps any day.

Chris: Yeah, I know.

Scott

Church: That's where the money's made.

Chris: Exactly. Any, any advice on that, you know, for the younger guys? How, you know, because one of the things people always ask, and, and we even had that conversation from your son today, you know, um, how do we get to, you know, you're the one that's doing everything, how do you get to letting somebody else do that? I mean, we just did a podcast on, uh, you know, and I talked about that on, on ego, insecurity, security and control. Those are the kind of the three things that screw us all up. Any, any thoughts on that or advice?

Scott

Church: Um, well, my personality is I'm hyper-management to a fault.

Chris: I remember one time, sometimes our best attributes are our worst attributes too, right?

Scott

Church: And I over-communicate, and I want to make sure this is done just the way I did it and perfectly and this and that. And it's almost like, you know what, You've almost got to give enough rope to these people, employees or whatnot, so they quite won't quite hang themselves but get close. And it's hard for a person like myself, which is very Type A driven, to take anything less than an A+. I don't mean academically either, but in the job, in the process. And that's what probably the hardest thing for a person like me. But, um, you've got, just like Ian, my grandson, you know, I remember the first time I started out with a John Deere A, a 3-bottom plow and a trip rope to raise the plow up. I was 10 years old, and I plowing wheat stubble. Okay, my dad went like one round with me and said, okay, you got it, keep going.

Well, what, a year or so ago, you know, I had— I can't remember, it was in one of our— either our Big Deer quad tracks or two-track, I can't remember. But you know, Ian's pulling— I had him up there pulling a 55-foot field cultivator. Of course, he's got the iPad up there watching the Bears game, and he's pushing the GPS I asked everything else and I said, what a difference this is from when I was a kid versus this kid. But in other words, you've got—

Chris: You weren't watching the Bears game from that 3-bottom plow?

Scott

Church: No cab, by the way, uh, that old 2-popper. But, um, I said, you know, you try to teach them, but you gotta— if, if they hit that big field cultivator on telephone pole, you can't kill them. But you try to say, look, there's a telephone pole up there. Don't, don't take it off. But you've almost got to let them make the mistake.

Chris: Yeah.

Scott

Church: To learn from the mistake.

Chris: And, and one of the things that I think is important there too today that we talked about is, you know, Ian, your grandson at 14— is he 14? He's 14. Yes. You know, he's out running that, you know, millions of dollars worth of equipment. It's also important that he sits down and understands what's paying for those million dollars of equipment. How the businesses run and all that stuff. Because if they're, if they're old enough to run the equipment, they ought to be able to be old enough to understand how to manage the equipment.

Scott

Church: And I'm not saying that, that, uh, Ian is proficient in machine operations at all, but what I am glad to see is— and I want to suggest that, and if any of these— well, like my son, if you're dealing with a, a, an operation that's my son's age and if they've got a young son or daughter, bring them to one, bring them to one of these sessions and or, or whatever. And I think, I think that I, I was watching, checking out Ian from the side view, and he was dialed in. And I don't think he had a clue what he was in for when he— he probably thought, oh my God, I'm going to be bored.

Chris: I'm going to be in school all day.

Scott

Church: Of course, on spring break right now.

Chris: Right. Well, then he came to school all day.

Scott

Church: Exactly. But But I think that— I think it would— I would highly recommend that. Yeah, I really would. And I was a little dubious when I thought, is this really going to work? And I think it was the best time spent was doing something like the— I mean, yeah, he can go knock a field cultivator sweep off or whatnot. Any pinhead can do that, including me. But this, I really think that if you're going to develop the next— and I'll just call it ag executive in the operation. In the operation.

Chris: This is what's—

Scott

Church: start them young. Start them young. And honestly, Chris, I've said this to you, I think, before in our phone conversations. I wish I would have started this succession several years ago. And I— and one of the reasons that I would recommend doing this, as well as I'm giving advice to these younger guys is start early, and this will help other generations come into the farming operation if they so desire more easily than just say, well, here I got the machinery repays, you owe me $2.5 million, give me a check, I'll pay the taxes, I'm going to Florida. Yeah. So I mean, I think, I, I think that, um, uh, I would— I wish I would have started this process sooner. And remember, I called you. Oh yeah, you did call me.

Chris: Yeah, yeah. No, we haven't had too much, too much trouble in having to call anybody. There's, there's, you know, and that's the thing we see. We talked about that, you know, today too, didn't we? That, you know, the, the biggest challenge for a lot of operations getting to that next generation, you know, very few, you know, less than 3% make it to the fourth generation, and it's usually 2 things. It's usually a lack of good quality communication, and it's also a lack of transition planning. Yeah. And those are the 2 key things that break that up. But with that said, um, you know, there's a couple other things I wanted to ask just on, you know, any, any family advice or anything along those lines. I kind of already asked, but anything else you want to touch on on that before I ask the final question here?

Scott

Church: Uh, Well, we— our operation, we know that we have communication issues.

Chris: Maybe it's weird nobody else does.

Scott

Church: No, maybe it's a power struggle. Um, I don't— and, and I'll be honest with you, as the old guy on the block, you know, you think, hey, I work my tail off here, man, don't chip at my ego. Yeah, you know, but on the same token, you've got to give the younger generation credit for helping you get to that pinnacle. Yeah, exactly.

Chris: And, and it's a team, it's a team effort.

Scott

Church: It's a team effort. And I think that I've also lacked in that area that I'm trying to improve on. Hard to teach an old dog a new trick. You know, you can beat this dog.

Chris: It just takes time.

Scott

Church: But, uh, but yeah, I mean, that's— I guess if I could make any recommendation like that, don't wait too long. And, and, and I know it sounds like a promo for Ag View Solutions.

Chris: Well, no, they don't— and people don't have to work with us. Just work with anybody that can help you. Transition.

Scott

Church: Yeah, you know, and, and, um, I know some operate— recently, a few years ago, finally passed away, but I knew an operation where a guy was 85 years old and he had a 50-whatever-year-old son, was basically a paid hired man. That's— that was never in my realm or anything like that. My dad didn't treat me that way either.

Chris: But, uh, yeah, you need to be able to delegate responsibility, not work. There's a difference between, you know, you're responsible for this area, you know, and, uh, and try to work—

Scott

Church: try to work smarter within your realm, you know. I try to— I mean, yeah, I like to work hard, but try to work smarter as you work hard. Like, which is going to save me the most time, the most efficiency? Efficacy levels are a big thing. Can we do this, this, and this in order to get that done quicker? Things like that.

Chris: So my final question for you here is gonna be an interesting one. Knowing what we're headed into to the degree we do, so the world we're in right now with all the crazy stuff going on, with your experience, with your life experience, what would you like to leave the listeners with to pay attention to and think about in the next couple of years as they try to grow their farming operation?

Scott

Church: Wow.

Chris: Told you I might have a tough question for you.

Scott

Church: Holy cow. Well, you got to remember, when I grew up, we didn't have all this globalization, right? We didn't have— we didn't have people twittering and tweeting everything and, and things like that. Um, just— that's a, that's a tough question, man. That takes a lot of thought. Um, but you're kind of stymied me there.

Chris: Yeah, well, that's all right.

Scott

Church: I mean, I didn't realize she was going to fastball me on the last one.

Chris: Well, no, I didn't mean to fastball you, but all I'm saying is, is If you're gonna leave— if you— this is the final question. What would you leave the young producers with as your final thoughts as a producer? What do they need?

Scott

Church: Be smart. Don't overextend. We're in a global situation right now that I have— of course, I didn't witness World War II, obviously. But I am Vietnam era. But this is a whole different dynamic than what it was when we were all in Vietnam. Mm-hmm. But don't overextend. And, you know, I think what carries— and you're gonna say, how is this— how does this segue into that? But, you know, I think it's important too, as young guys, to— because We always laugh. We say, well, we live in Mayberry, you know, but be active in your— be active in your community a little bit as well. Don't just be so isolated on farm, farm, farm, farm, farm. And, you know, I think that that segues itself into maybe other opportunities. Um, I've been a Lions Club member at our local Lions Club for like 42, 5, 2, 3, 4 years.

You know, I always tell everybody I started when I was in 4th grade, but, uh, But I mean, community involvement, things like that help. But I'm just concerned about what we're dealing with now with the economics, the globalization, and we— this could all turn on a dime. And, and so you just kind of have to have a happy blend and know— and you know what, know your limitations, know your expertise. You know, I'm pretty good at the production side. I don't like the accounting side of it, but it's important. I think we do a good job at accounting and things like that, but, but know your limitations. And if you're— and if you have— if you struggle in an area, whether it's marketing, or— we hire, we hire marketing specialists. One guy's out in Montana, he's from Indiana originally, but I mean, we have daily calls with them.

And something that we don't— I don't profess to know every— it's very hard in the ag industry to be good at every aspect of what you do. You can't hardly do it because as diverse as we are anymore, complex, complex. So don't be afraid to reach out to a professional. Or you know what, if you're a young guy, don't be afraid or embarrassed to come to the I'll call myself the older generation. Don't be afraid to say, hey, you mind if I pick your brain, so-and-so? And, and just sit down and let— don't be afraid to ask an older fellow in your neighborhood that you think is respectable, maybe, and fairly productive and, and whatnot, and, and ask that. But on my final thought is, it's okay to be on the cutting edge but don't be on the bleeding edge.

Chris: Good advice. That's a great, a great way to wrap up. Scott, Scott Church, Dad's Wisdom from Illinois. Really appreciate your, your wisdom and your insight. Thank you very much.

Scott

Church: Thank you, Chris. Thanks for having me.

Chris: You bet. Thanks everybody for listening again to another Dad's Wisdom, and we will catch you again next time on the Ag View Pitch.