December 2009 Newsletter
Amazing…going to work in the dark and going home in the dark. A little over a month ago my coat was still stored in the closet and now it is freezing outside! 2009 is almost gone and for most, not a pleasant memory. Ever since I moved here from Iowa and started Scholten’s Equipment in 1982, I always felt the Pacific Northwest was somewhat insulated or isolated, if you will, from the economic adversities that happened in the rest of the country. 2009 however, has not spared this area from economic turmoil. The Midwest, ironically, has so far survived the present economy quite well except the livestock and dairy people. Equipment sales and auctions there have been quite brisk. A typical conversation between my father and I, after I send him to an auction in the Midwest is “obviously no recession here?” This after an unsuccessful attempt to buy something I didn’t give him near enough money for! Irony upon irony we are now selling some stuff to the Midwest.
Our sales in 2009 are already off over 25%. In the first week in October I did the hardest, toughest thing I have ever done in 27 years of business. I met with all our employees. We laid off 9. We substantially reduced the hours for another 11. The remaining 15 were affected as well. We cut their pay, suspended benefits, suspended paid holidays and paid vacations. I put this decision off longer than I should have because I couldn’t bring myself to make it. Four salesmen are working every other week. We may have to make more cuts. Presently, I am wrestling on what to do with the Burlington store as well. Financially we would be better off to close Burlington. I am going to put that decision on hold till the first of the year hoping we can stir up some business by then. We are definitely in survival mode.
The Sunday after laying off our employees it really hit me. I went to church without my wife because she was in Phoenix helping our daughter Cindy move to a house Cindy just bought. Sitting in church without my wife was very unusual: I had no one to sing with, her voice wasn’t there to harmonize with. The person I belong to wasn’t there. Suddenly I realized what those employees felt like after I laid them off! They didn’t have anywhere to go the next day. They no longer belonged to a company they busted their butts for. I realized the emptiness they possibly felt as well. Until that moment in church without my wife, I had never put myself in their shoes, I felt terrible.
I have been in a bit of a funk ever since laying off our employees. My brain just stalls once in a while. It is easy to hire people, but telling them you no longer have work is tough. It is difficult and different. It is like I let them down. I considered all of them my friends, we were family. To their credit, those laid-off, have been willing to do anything to keep their jobs. I have found out how much they liked it here. It has been very emotional. Some worked in this building longer than I have and some I go to church with. My goal: to hire them all back! We have a lot of time invested in each other and they know what they’re doing. We need to figure out a way to get their jobs back.
Here is our plan: Till we can hire everyone back we are dramatically reducing our shop rates for all non-emergency work to $60.00 an hour, plus a 10% parts discount on all part orders over $500.00 that we are dealers for. On top of this preferred Farm Plan customers will qualify for 90 days same as cash. Fix it now and pay later.
We are even going to go one step further. Do you have a project you thought wasn’t worth fixing? Or maybe we told you it wasn’t worth fixing? We want an opportunity to requote or bid a new cost of repair on that piece of equipment. Presently if we can repair it and just break-even, we will guarantee the price, and if I can get someone back to work that would make me happy. If we can just break-even, that would be a great deal for you and good for our techs…it is better than sitting at home! So here is the deal it is $60.00 an hour or we will bid the job, and the bid is all you pay regardless if it costs us more! Call now…we are hungry!
Advanced notice: we are going to be closed the Saturday’s after Christmas and New Years. Other than those two days the sales department is now open on Saturdays until 4pm.
We are planning to have a Kubota Excavator Operator Service Maintenance School scheduled for January 14th in Lynden and January 21st in Burlington from 4-7pm. There will be food and drinks. Several work stations, to include track maintenance, pin maintenance, service tips, updates on problem areas, one station will have the house removed so you can see what that is like, and we’ll be offering some specials as well. It is an R.S.V.P. Steve Brown is heading it up; give him or Amy a call if you need an invite.
Tom has been putting all of our toys, cups, clothes and specialty items on our website and on EBay. So yes, you can shop Scholten’s Equipment online! He has also been cataloging and listing old parts, freight damaged parts, left over misordered parts like hoods, decals, seats, hydraulic components, old manuals, even some neat Claas Calendars, you name it. It is cheap! Check it out, we even have some old as/is tractors on there. Website is www.scholtensequipment.com. For parts ordering go to www.scheq.com.
Our son Mike, who graduated from college last spring, just took a job with RDO the John Deere dealer in Hermiston, OR. His job title is “Transaction Account Manager” an official name for an “in store” salesman. Yes, he is working for the “enemy”. His first day was December 7th and he was pretty excited. His dad is a little jealous. If you’re ever in the area stop by and say hi. Mike is quite a toy collector and I noticed he took all the John Deere toys along, but none of the other colors. He assures me he doesn’t have “green” underwear yet! He is a bit of a natural and should do fine, I just hope his head is not too big when he comes home at Christmas and he can still get in the door! Congratulations Mike…mom and I already miss you. We need to find someone else to line up equipment at the store!
You will notice we have our second “Hit List” out. Stuff we need to move that’s been here too long. Most priced at cost or less. We sold 16 pieces off the 1st “Hit List”! The 2nd list is bigger, 45 items this time, a complete new list, except a couple items that have been relisted at an even lower price! It has got to go so check it out. Some of the items are brand new and well below cost!
Used self-propelled choppers were hot items this year. While we only sold 2 new Claas harvesters, we managed to sell 12 used ones! That was phenomenal! A big thank you to all of you. We do have several left, a couple on the list, so give us a call.
The Kubota excavator picture is not quite as pretty. We sold 50 plus in 2008! And even more than that in 2007! But we have only sold a fraction of that in 2009. That means we have way too many on hand which we are paying interest on. We’ve got to sell now! Kubota is trying to help us with 0% interest and 0 down for 60 months. A great time to buy! We have 33 new Kubota excavators on hand right now to choose from. That’s scary. I don’t like showing my cards, but there are probably not many deals, we are going to walk away from…if you know what I mean! We probably can’t take your wife and kids but we are willing to trade just about anything, we have to! Maybe a dog, a horse, a competitor, two for one, a car or a truck, a lot, property, a boat, trade down, the office girls want a cat, you name it we’ll try it? What do you have in mind?
Don’t forget if you’re fortunate enough to have made some money in 2009 you can write-off up to $250,000 worth of purchases this year.
We need to keep our trucks busy as well. So if you need to have something moved, either to here or from here, to or from anywhere in the US or Canada let me give you a price. If we can’t haul it with our own trucks, I can broker it for you, and assure you it gets hauled safely and delivered in one piece.
We are still doing a lot of order buying. Recently found a JD 8400, Claas 870, JD 7420, Semi-Trailer tilt bed, 26’ Cultimulcher that different customers were looking for. Check out some of our latest buys: Kubota L39 TLB, Claas 890, Claas RU600, Kubota BX2350 with loader and mower, Kubota 9540 with loader, Krone 6210 20’ center pivot mower, presently bidding on some distressed JCB inventory as well, all like new!
Congratulations to Ben Hesse of Synergy Acres, our Claas customer in Moses Lake, for making the Claas calendar. He is Mr. March! Thanks for the ringing endorsement as well. The new Claas calendar is pretty cool. If you want one you can order from us on-line.
Congratulations to the Lynden Lions Football team winning their third state championship in four years!! Quite an accomplishment! Willy and I enjoyed watching the games.
Congratulations to Jeff Stremler who used to work for us. Jeff graduated from Cascade Christian Services’ Independence Program. He is now living on his own. We went to his open house. Jeff you inspire me every time I see you!
The Bellingham Herald had an interesting front page article on “government waste” the other day. Although that wasn’t the title. Years ago, the federal government implemented a program to reimburse communities financially impacted by the spotted owl issue. It was intended to supplement communities that derived most of their income from logging, in states like WA or OR. Today, many years’ later, states like Nevada are receiving huge amounts of money under this program. Equaling 20 times what their annual receipts from logging are? Every year Nevada is receiving that money! And get this; they weren’t even affected by the spotted owl issue? Do you know who the leading politician is for Nevada? The only way to fix government waste? Term limits, period. And we want this same federal government to manage our health care?
2010 may start out a little slow, but shows promise to be much better than 2009. The milk price looks to average $4.00 cwt higher than 2009 and maybe even higher than that! That’s really good news. They are still not done harvesting corn yet in the mid-west and may not finish till year end. Crops have set records in spite of the difficult harvest. My dad reports never seeing so many corn piles, “there are piles of corn everywhere”. The corn price is softening which bodes well for livestock producers. 2010 will be good.
While 2009 may leave most of us with a bitter taste in our mouths, we are still in a country that allows us many freedoms. I have to be honest, 27 years of fairly steady growth made us a little “fat and sassy.” The Lord definitely has his way, of teaching us humility! Again we see how totally dependent we are on God’s grace and mercy. What a gift he has given us, the reason for celebrating Christmas.
The Scholten Family wishes you a Merry Christmas. May 2010 bring you blessings of work and service to others.