Facing adversity head on: mom's wisdom

Shay

Foulk: So your role is a little bit different in your guys' operation being the mom, right? In so many operations, dad gets to be in that role, gets to be the leader, gets to say this is how it's going to be and we're going to do it this way, right? That's right. Talk to me, talk to us a little bit about the differences, you know, what's different? I mean, you're you're in a situation where, where you're the, the mentor and basically the leader of the operation.

Unknown: Yeah, and one of the things that I didn't bring up earlier was that I have worked with the Farm Business Association doing accounting and taxes for probably 40 years. And, um, so it's a little bit different perspective. I kind of have always done the books and stuff like that for our operation. Um, Bruce was always the productivity manager and he did all the stuff outside, but I also drove tractor and everything and I was out there. I used to do all the spraying for a few years.

Shay

Foulk: Um, and you still drive the semi today?

Unknown: I still drive semi. I can run the grain cart. I just won't get in the combine. There's too much technology for me. I'm getting too old for it. Yeah. Um, but what I see with some of the dads and kids that are like Jensen my daughter's ages is that the dads have hold of everything and they won't let go. And it's just, um, I kind of hate to see that. I can understand it, but it's like if these kids don't have just a little bit of help while they flap their wings or whatever, how are they ever going to learn to fly if we don't let them do it?

Shay

Foulk: Right. And it's a little different perspective from a mom's viewpoint than from a dad's viewpoint.

Unknown: It is. It really is. I don't want to basically step in and say, "You have to do this, you have to do that." But bring it to me and justify it and we'll talk about it. I don't want to be a mom that spoils her kid either. It's like, "You know, anything you want to do, just go ahead and do it because I don't understand it either." Anyway, I don't want to be that mom either. And I've seen both.

Shay

Foulk: Right, right. And you got thrust into this role.

Unknown: You better believe it.

Shay

Foulk: All at once. Yeah. You're here and you get to do it, and whether you want it or not, you got it.

Unknown: Yeah, and it's like anything else, you know, if you've got it to do, just get started and do it.

Shay

Foulk: Mm-hmm. And you've helped some other people that have had losses in their family operations.

Unknown: Yeah, I've worked with probably 12 widows now that have been either clients of the Association and stuff like that, and I help do the mediating between the lawyers and the clients. It's a hard thing to do, and when it just happens to you with no— you don't expect it, you— somebody needs to kind of be there and help hold their hands. And I said, if nothing else, I can do that much and help. I don't tell them what to do, but I can ask the questions.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah, exactly. And having lived through it, it gives you a whole different perspective because you can say you understand, but unless you've been there, you could never understand.

Unknown: That's right. That's absolutely right.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. Well, again, thank you.

Unknown: Appreciate it. Okay, thanks, Chris.

Shay

Foulk: Welcome everybody to another episode of the Ag View Pitch, and today we have Vance Yelm who farms in Northwest Iowa, and you farm with your son. And today what we'd like to do is just kind of get a background, a little story about the dynamics of your operation. We've worked with you guys for a couple of years, and, and we do this series, Dad's Wisdom, and your guys' story is a little unique, and, and we'll get to that here in a little bit as to why your story is unique, but yet it's a, it's a story that a lot of operations deal with. And so I'd like to have you introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your farm operation as it is today.

Unknown: Okay, my name is Vance Yelm. Uh, we farm up near Lake Okoboji, not too far from it. We started out— I was farming with my dad before my husband and I got married. He was farming with his dad. When we got married, we basically combined our two operations and went away from both of our parents and started out on a different farm. We raised pigs out in the field for, oh, I suppose 30 years. The bank at that time said that they would loan us as much money as we needed, so we bought a farm, but they wouldn't loan us money on a building, a hog building, so we raised them out in the pasture. Like I said, 40 years, 30 years, give or take. Um, we also had row crops, corn and beans. One of our things was when we were in our younger years of marriage, we used to go to the Pro Farmer conferences and their seminars. Got a lot out of that stuff because it made us put down goals.

We always had to write it down. Really hard to do, and usually it got done in the car on the way home. Yeah, but it got done, and I still have those goals in notebooks from back then. Well, anyway, moving on, we got through the '80s, um, bought another farm in the early '90s. My husband was killed in a farm accident in 2003. 2002, and, uh, right, it was, it was the summer following 9/11. Um, we were putting cement out in one of the cattle yards, a new cattle yard, when 9/11 happened. And we had been at one of the Pro Farmer meetings that year, and I had signed us up for a Brazil trip in January, February of the following year, which would have been 2002. And we went on that trip, and then it wasn't, you know, but 3, 4 months later that he was killed. But it was always one of those things that I was so glad that we went because he really wanted to see that, and so we got to do it.

Um, moving on. Yeah, so then moving on, um, I started working with my brother. The kids were all graduated and moved on with their lives. Jens went into the Marines and finished his college.

Shay

Foulk: And Jens is your oldest son?

Unknown: Jens is my son, yes. He's actually the youngest of the 3 kids, but he is my son. But we always told the kids that they had to work for someone else or do something else before they would come back to the farm, because we wanted them to see what somebody else was thinking and how somebody else ran things. Um, so So yeah, I figured that being in the Marines probably covered it.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah, that's working for somebody else for sure. That's working for everybody else, right?

Unknown: So he called one night when he was over in Iraq, and he said, Mom, do you think there might be room for me to come back? And I said, well, I think— as I was dancing around the room, I think we maybe can find a place for you. Well, and things worked out. We learned a lot the next few years and then we decided that we'd probably better break off from my brother, brother's operation. And, uh, yeah. And, um, so now we, and, and it, we were really kind of, I'd bought a couple more farms and we'd sold a couple of farms and then we bought a couple more farms and we were just kind of in one of those places where we weren't sure what to do, and we needed somebody outside the family, outside of our own comfort zone to kind of look at things and help us walk through a few things. Mm-hmm. And Jens went to TPAP that year, 4 years ago, 3 years ago, and, uh, came back with all these ideas.

And I said, my God, it reminds me of when we went to the Pro Farmer seminars.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah.

Unknown: But way more in depth. And he said, well, we need to talk to Chris Barron. We need to get an appointment with him. And I said, ah, you know what? Sounds good. So we did. And that's how we got hooked up with you guys, Chris.

Shay

Foulk: Oh, appreciate that. And, and I appreciate the story as to where you're at. Where do you guys at on acres right now where you farm your corn, soybeans, and where you're located at exactly?

Unknown: Lake Park, Iowa is our town. We've got, Do you want the owned? Do you want the operated one?

Shay

Foulk: Oh, just, just about acres that you're operating.

Unknown: Probably around 1,500 acres.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah.

Unknown: We've got quite a bit of pasture too that we don't really run cows on because we've learned that we can't do it all.

Shay

Foulk: Well, and you guys have had a couple of challenging years too, right? So 2018, 2019, you know, you just leave the planter sit in the shed and you stand by the door and watch it rain, right?

Unknown: It's what it's been.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah, yeah. And a lot like a lot of the people that are listening, it's just been, you know, 19 is a year to forget. I mentioned that to you guys today and you said, well, 18 is a year to forget too, you know. So for some of these operations, it's really been an economic challenge to survive and to get through this. And so, but before we kind of get into some of the current decision-making, if it's okay, I want to rewind back and, and touch on some of the things that you talked a little bit about and kind of how you and your husband started farming and raising pigs outside and how farming has changed. You know, you talked about going to some of these conferences and coming back with goals. What are some of the things that you implemented that you feel like are probably some of the best things from a business perspective that you did in the operation?

Is there any, you know, one or two things that you can say, wow, what we learned there that we applied really made a difference in our business?

Unknown: Well, I'd like to think it's different now, but we learned that we needed to operate as a business. Yeah, it's, it's a way of life, but it's also a business, and you have to look at the business principles. That was one of the biggest things, that and Pro Farmer always had their landowner newsletter, and we had gone to a couple of their seminars and of course got all jacked up about buying land, and so that And that's what we did.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. And your timing was pretty good on that, right?

Unknown: Well, I think so. Most of it was, yeah.

Shay

Foulk: Right, right. And that's really a key because I know there's a lot of people that look at land acquisition. You got to look at the, how that affects working capital if you step into a land purchase and you got to look at the rate of return or another way to put it is the cap rate, right? So, you know, if it's only going to generate a 3% return, but you could put money in another area that might generate a 7% or 8% return. Um, what compelled you to go down the land path rather than maybe renting some ground and buying some equipment and generating, trying to generate revenue at a faster pace, or was that even a thought?

Unknown: You know, to a certain extent. I mean, we always had nice machinery, but it wasn't brand new. It wasn't fancy. It was enough to get the job done. Um, but we always felt like the land stuff was our retirement account.

Shay

Foulk: Right.

Unknown: And that's what we used it for. We never really put money into a retirement account or anything, and maybe that's wrong looking back at it, but I'd rather have the land and my kids can use it.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah, and it's a way to support that. So, no, I appreciate that. I think that's interesting. Did you ever have a period of time when, you know, you were trying to pay the land off? You know, so we went through the '80s, right? And there were some challenges. Were there any issues or were there some sleepless nights and did we make the right decision and what, you know, or, or, or, you know, it was a little different than that.

Unknown: Yeah. Um, towards the end of the '80s, it was probably the worst part of the depression, the egg depression for us. Um, and our land, we had bought it and we'd bought it from my parents and it was on contract and they had it financed with an insurance company. My dad died, and so they wanted to get everything all split up. And I can remember sitting in the room with my mom and brother and sister and husband, and we all sat there, and the— there were 3 insurance companies and, uh, uh, farm FSA, whatever it was at that time, um, the, the land loan— I can't remember what it was called. FHA. FHA, yes. Okay. And they kind of all said, well, you know, you owe more on this than what it's actually valued at right now.

And we kind of looked at each other and, yeah, well, we could have backed out at that time very easily, but they would have— we would have gone down, my parents would have gone down, my brother would have gone down. So we kind of looked at each other and said, you know what, we signed the contract. So we need to just stick with it if we can. And that's when the bank kind of basically stepped in and said, okay, we'll lend you the excess money over and above because you've shown that you will repay stuff.

Shay

Foulk: And that's where the lenders are looking at historical and hoping that you can continue that same path.

Unknown: Yeah, we were too.

Shay

Foulk: Right, and at that point in time, probably a zero working capital position or maybe even a negative working capital.

Unknown: Pretty much, yeah.

Shay

Foulk: And we're seeing some operations that are struggling with that, working capital either at a really low number and in some cases the working capital is gone. So then at that point it's either restructure or have the bank set some, take some of the loans and kind of consolidate things and stretch things out over a longer period of time. So there are some ways to handle this, but Is there any advice from having lived through that of what discipline does that require? What do we need to be doing differently in our operations to make sure either number one, we don't get there, or number two, we work through that?

Unknown: Don't bury your head in the sand.

Shay

Foulk: Okay.

Unknown: It's not gonna go away if you don't do something about it. Right. That was the biggest thing. It's like, you know, get proactive. You need to sell some land, fine, do it. You know, you need to sell machinery, fine, do it. But get ahead of it. Right.

Shay

Foulk: Yep. And stay ahead of it.

Unknown: And try and stay ahead of it.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. Right. And you know, and it's, it's tough. I mean, I know there's operations out there that had a great year this year. Yields were good. Basis was good. Things are good. And then you don't have to go too far down the road and the situation's entirely different. And so we all have our own situations are all dynamically different and everything. And so it's definitely the financial component is a big deal. I kind of want to switch gears here to another topic and it's more of an emotional one, I think. But, you know, you talked about farming with your husband the whole time and, you know, in 2002 things changed, right? Big time in your life. Would you be okay with explaining or talking to us a little bit about you know, what occurred, what happened, how did you handle that, how did you get through that, you know, what did you do?

Unknown: Well, you know, there was about 6 months that I was in shock and I don't remember what the heck I did. You know, there were things that went on that I'm looking back on it and I could see it happening, but it wasn't really happening to me. And like I said, the kids were— Jems was in his senior year, so he finished out his senior year. My brother was there and he basically said, well, we'll, we'll work with you, we'll do this, we'll do that. And so I basically said, because he's family, right? And okay, let's go, you know. And so it worked really well for about 5, 6 years, and then it kind of was to the iffy point. And it was always, I always said, you know, as long as it's working for both of us. It'll work, but we have to keep talking, right? And one year, I don't know, I was— I started having health problems and I couldn't hardly walk.

I think I probably had Lyme disease but kept getting negative results back and stuff like that. But I couldn't hardly walk because I had arthritis so bad. Then I had problems with my heart, and so I ended up in the heart hospital one fall. And it was like my family, my parent, my mother, my brother, my sister, nobody asked how the hell I was.

Shay

Foulk: Mm-hmm.

Unknown: And it was like my mother was kind of a sociopath anyway, and she always laid the guilt trip on me about everything, and she totally alienated my children. But it was kind of one of those things, I didn't want to see it, right? And I'd lived with it all my life, so I kind of figured, well, I can live with it. But, um, it was like, oh fine. So, uh, we kind of basically decided that was the fall that we were gonna break relations and, um, had my son-in-law come in combine instead of having my brother in and started to make a change, made a big change. And so then Jentz and I started talking about, well, you know, what do we need? You know, I had half the machinery that we needed for a full operation.

Shay

Foulk: And back up a second, so Jens was in the Marines, right, at the time?

Unknown: He was out by that time. Okay. He spent like 6 years in. Okay. And over a period of 6 years, and so then he came back and he was driving truck and stuff like that for my brother's operation and all, you know, whatever. I, I just don't even want to go into some of that stuff, right? But, um, and he said, God, I'm, I'm not sure I can handle this.

Shay

Foulk: And I said, well, you can handle it better than I can, as far as, as far as coming back and taking, taking the reins of the operation and get started.

Unknown: And he kind of did it.

Shay

Foulk: So, um, well, he more than kind of did it because we're working with you guys and he's doing a great job.

Unknown: You better believe it.

Shay

Foulk: What, you know, what do you think, you know, in family business is the really toughest one, right? And you said a key thing in the beginning. Communication. Right, and you said a key thing in the beginning about communication. Yeah. Right, and so that's one of the things we see a lot in family operations is the breakdown occurs from within, not from outside. Absolutely. It comes from—

Unknown: And you're just like, yeah, my brother stopped talking to me. He wouldn't talk to me. I'd stop and go down there and talk and he'd just turn around and walk away.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. And that's kind of the key thing is before, you know, and I can ask you this advice, you know, for those out there listening that are in family dynamics, having lived through this, you know, communicate, right? Make sure that you keep the lines of communication open all along the way. Is there any other Well, there is another thing.

Unknown: It was kind of— and I can't remember what show I was listening to on the radio, but the guy said, you know, basically if you have a 5-year partnership, that's probably the mean average of what a partnership is going to last. So if you're going to form a partnership, have an exit strategy at the end of 5 years so that you can back out for any reason whatsoever and keep it amicable. Because if you have that strategy in place—

Shay

Foulk: well, and a lot of times I think in family we get thrust into these situations. So, right, you all of a sudden your husband passes away and now you're in a situation, um, you're probably not thinking clearly. All of a sudden the dynamics of, of the situation drive the direction, right? And so many times that happens in business where our family dynamics start to drive the direction as opposed to we all sit down, we have a conversation and we say, what's the vision? Where is this going? What would this look like? And that's one of the things that we try to help coach people on in operations, specifically family operations, but also collaborative businesses where if we can all sit down together and say, what's the picture of what we are in right now look like?

And literally draw a picture of the dynamics of what exists and then say, "If we could change this, what would that look like?" Pretty much everybody has a different view of that, but if we can funnel that down into a common vision, then all of a sudden we can build a bridge to get where everybody wants to go. I think, not to step into your conversation and what you're saying, but having said that, You know, I think all of us in business could get where it is we need to go, but when the family dynamics are part of that equation, it gets really difficult to do that when we don't have that structure in place.

Unknown: Very messy.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. Is there anything else, you know, as far as, you know, transition or things that you've learned from your parents as, you know, you talked about the farm operation transitioning to you as you think about transitioning over to your kids? Because, you know, like you said, you've got Jen's the youngest one in the family. You have two other daughters that one's kind of actively engaged sort of in the operation and one's really not as actively engaged. What are, what are some of the concerns you have and what worked well as things transitioned over to yourself and to your husband and how do you see that being different in today's world?

Unknown: Well, you know, when I was a little girl, I don't know how old I was, maybe 6, 7, I can remember going out with my dad and he had an older guy from Milford that was doing some tiling and he was using a spade. Now, to me that looks like hard work.

Narrator: Yeah.

Unknown: And it amazed me how he would just keep at it and he'd just have this little line of It was only about 2.5 feet deep, this tile, but it's something my dad said to me at that time. He said, this is probably one of the most important things we'll ever do on this farm is put this tile in. And I've always remembered that. So anytime we've gotten some land or something, it was like, you know what, if it needs tile, let's go. And now some of the older tile on the farms that we have is just giving up and we're looking at pattern tiling everything we have again. But it's been 60, 70 years since some of this tile has been put in and it's not going to last forever. And we think, I think that's probably one of the most important things I can do while I still own it.

Shay

Foulk: Mm-hmm.

Unknown: Is pass it on a little bit better to, to my kids.

Shay

Foulk: Right. No, that's, that's great. Do you, do you think that the kids, I think Jens, he's the one that gets to plant when it rains every day, right? Yeah. So what's the process for getting that explained to maybe the sibling that is the least connected? Do you think there's an understanding there or what can we do?

Unknown: Yeah, I think she totally understands it because she knows that she'll get it. The one girl is kind of involved, so she absolutely understands it. The other one is involved in farming, it's just not our operation as much. As much, right? But she understands that when she gets some of the land, which she will, um, it's going to be better, right? And it's going to be more valuable to her.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah, you're making it better.

Unknown: Yeah, right.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. So another question: if you could go back to 25 years old, 30 years old, and could tell yourself something about business, about life, or about anything that you think could improve your decisions and where you go, what would that be?

Unknown: Well, I'd probably have to go back to earlier than that. When I was 18, my 14-year-old brother was killed in a farm accident also, and it basically threw the whole family into a tailspin. I mean, my parents started drinking and they never did quit. And of course it was okay for us kids to drink then because you did what your parents did, right? Mm-hmm. And I wish I'd seen at that time that I didn't have to do that, that I could have gotten serious about farming before, like, I got married.

Shay

Foulk: Okay.

Unknown: I really wish I could have seen that on my own, but I basically kind of quit drinking when we got married just because we started having kids and there wasn't time and there wasn't money. And you know what? You just get busy.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah. And you start to change priorities, right? Absolutely. Things change when all of a sudden you have kids. And the younger listeners on here will figure that out. When all of a sudden the kids come along and life—

Unknown: You better grow up.

Shay

Foulk: Life changes, doesn't it? Yeah. Right, right. Well, anything else? Any other advice? If you had a little bit more time in your day, what would you do with it? Another hour, another 2 hours? What would you do with that time?

Unknown: You know, that's a really good question. I always say there's not enough hours in the day, but I guess I'd have it filled with something.

Shay

Foulk: Yeah, so if we gave you 2 more of them or 3 more of them, what would they be?

Unknown: I, I don't know, Chris. That's a good question. I've never really thought about it because I've never had enough time.

Shay

Foulk: Right, right. And that's one thing I think we all, as a commodity, have but not enough of, right? And so it's thinking about, you know, what, what things can we be doing differently? And, and, um, you know, you've, you've definitely shared a lot of wisdom, a lot of experience, a lot of, a lot of life learnings with us. Is there anything you'd want to leave us with that is something that somebody told you, uh, you know, a parent or a mentor or somebody that was a good lesson, anything that you can think of or anything that you'd wanna—

Unknown: Well, I always like that old axiom of, you know, change the things that you can and forget about the things that you can't change and just enjoy life better. Just take the time to go out and watch the moon at night or to see the sunset.

Shay

Foulk: That's really good advice.

Unknown: You know, 5 or 10 minutes.

Shay

Foulk: Right, right. Now that's great advice because I think all of us do too much of at harvest time, at planting time, I, you know, it's either dark or it's light, right? We don't see the sunset or the sunrise and we're out there, but a lot of times we don't even see it. Yeah. Because we're so busy being focused on what we're focused on. So great advice, you know, that's really good advice. Appreciate that. So again, you know, you're a farmer working with your son And watched you guys for a few years now and you're doing a great job and you've done a great job with your son and coaching him along the way. And I think you got a lot of years ahead of you to keep the farm operation improving every year. So thanks a lot for your time and I sincerely appreciate you sharing your life story and some of the learnings and some of the challenges. So thanks a lot.

Unknown: Well, thank you, Chris.

Shay

Foulk: You bet. So, well, thanks everybody for listening, and I hope this podcast from the Ag View Pitch brings to everybody some, some good lessons on, on the operation and some things that we can all do better and improve on. And hope everybody has a good day, and thanks again for listening, and we'll catch you next time on the Ag View Pitch.

Narrator: Thanks again for listening, everyone. If you would like to hear more content from Ag View Solutions, Solutions, listen to our other podcasts such as Dad's Wisdom or our current Harvest Series. Ag View Solutions works as an integral part of operations like yours, side by side for farm profit management, business collaboration and structuring, facilitating industry-leading peer groups, and coaching and consulting tailored to your farm's unique needs. We know that no two farms are the same, and we are here to help make your farm be the best it can be. You can learn more at agviewsolutions.com. Email us at agviewpitch@gmail.com or call Chris Barron at 319-533-5703. We really look forward to talking with you.