Key Takeaways from Cultivate’24 | Advanced Grower Solutions
The Advanced Grower Solutions team enjoyed attending Cultivate’24. We were able to see a lot of our customers, talk to growers looking for software and services, catch up with partners and suppliers, and reunite with old friends.
Here are a few themes that coalesced during Cultivate’24.
1. Traffic
The Cultivate’24 show was just buzzing with people this year. I haven’t seen this level of booth traffic in the last few years. Usually, the traffic ebbs and flows but this year we had a steady flow of traffic literally all day each of the first two days.
2. Forecasting
Ken Lane and I had great attendance at our Cultivate’24 Forecasting Workshop. So naturally, it spawned many discussions both in the classroom breakout sessions for working on individual grower forecasts as well as customers stopping by the booth to discuss their forecasting situation.
I believe that analytical forecasting is going to be more important for growers to deal with changing market conditions. We are grateful for Ken Lane’s partnership to help growers do the analytical and market work to come up with forecasts that take advantage of opportunities and mitigate risks.
3. Inventory
Inventory management is still a very hard problem to manage in our industry. Several prospects came by the booth to discuss inventory and the challenges associated with it and how software and processes can improve the visibility and movement of it through the product life cycle.
4. Customer Support
Any customer purchasing a complicated system is going to want good, competent, and responsive customer support.
Invariably, prospects come by discussing our products and the topic of customer support comes up. This year was no exception. Sometimes they complain about a competitor not giving the attention they need and wanting to know how we are different. Other times they are concerned about support responsiveness and knowledge when considering a new purchase.
5. Payments
There was a lot of discussion around payments and how growers collect monies owed.
Many growers are taking more and more credit cards to provide convenience to their customers and improve their cash flow. They are concerned about the fees that come with taking credit cards.
6. Integrations
Connecting systems was also a theme of discussion. Whether connecting backend data flows for availability or shipping or moving data back and forth between a direct-to-consumer e-commerce, there was a lot of talk about integrations. Integrations are valuable to growers because they improve accuracy and reduce back-office effort to handle what are usually data-intensive tasks.
7. Partnerships and Affiliations
It was also a year of new affiliations and partnerships. Advanced Grower Solutions is fortunate to partner with forecasting expert Ken Lane from Hathaway and Lane Direct to educate and provide consulting to growers on a variety of aspects of forecasting to improve business results.
We are also grateful for the partnership we have with Pivot Point Business. Their work with growers for financial and exit planning is crucial to growers achieving their goals. Chris, Todd, Larry, and all the gang over there are very knowledgeable and a great asset for growers to utilize as they plan for their futures.
Further, our payments partner Propelr was with us this year, Jennifer Cunningham was on hand at Cultivate to talk to growers about their payment situation, educate them on what was possible, and work with them to reduce the fees they pay while retaining the convenience.
Finally, congratulations to the Growmentum team, whom I work with. They were the Cultivate’24 Technology of the Year winners!
‘It’s Too Early to Panic’
Dr. Charlie Hall’s presentation was spot on as usual and his in-depth analysis of the economic state of the industry was very informative.
He was able to show the positive results we have seen as well as where the industry is encountering headwinds. He also shared detailed sales results, key economic factors including housing statistics as well as how the raw material costing index has changed, showing inflation has slowed for some of the key input materials. The data was a mixture of good news and cautious optimism.
Dr. Hall’s reminder, based on the economic and industry statistics was ‘it’s too early to panic’.
For additional information and an expanded look at Cultivate’24 takeaways, make sure to read the original article on the Advanced Grower Solutions website.
