is anyone using Ag Exchange group

[therealnorthernf]

I have been to their web site it looks like an interesting marketing tool.. what are your thoughts?

http://www.agexchangegroup.com/

[malleefarmer]

Similar to www.cleargrain.com.au ?

This works well basically ebay for grain almost.

You dont who mthe buyer is and vice versa, money goes in a trust acccount from buyer then grain is released from cleargrain, never any no payment issues

[cbnotafarmer]

Similar to www.cleargrain.com.au ?

This works well basically ebay for grain almost.

You dont who mthe buyer is and vice versa, money goes in a trust acccount from buyer then grain is released from cleargrain, never any no payment issues

I'm actually a small shareholder in the company and not involved with day to day operations, but I'll try my best to explain the company. I'm also not from an agriculture background so bear with me.

The company is not a clearinghouse or brokerage in any way. Ag exchange does not get involved in transactions in any way. The company does not solicit bids from buyers and try and place them with farmers, so the system has zero commission as the agexchangegroup is not involved in the transaction. The bids come direct from the buyers and there is complete transparency.

The company was started by people who worked on the buyer side and came from agriculture families. The grain buying process has a lot of inefficiencies and prices obviously reflect those inefficiencies. They went to the U of S and engaged 3 computer science professors to see if they could take their ideas and build a centralized platform for buyers and farmers to trade grain on-line. These professors and a handful of PHd students spent 3 and half years building the platform.

The farmer starts by entering his home quarter and there is a full inventory data management system that links to the market. Once set up they can search bids within whatever distance from their farm that they want. The buyers on the system will also see every farmer on the system. Buyers will send bids direct to the farmer. They come on their dashboard and direct via text message. When you get a bid from a buyer, you click on the link and if it's a canola offer the system brings all the bins you have with the canola or whatever the commodity is within the specific grading factors that make up the bid.

This is where it gets unusual for the farmer. You get a bid, you know it is from a specific buyer. If you want to accept the bid, you are forced to view the contract from the specific buyer, but you can complete the transaction by simply entering your 4 digit pin code. There is no need to sign contracts. If the bid stated delivery to terminal, you haul it in and final grading is still at terminal. Once the delivery has taken place you log on to your dashboard and your inventory is automatically reconciled by the technology platform and the transaction is logged so at the end of the year you can run a report and every single transaction can be consolidated on one page for you to hand to your accountant instead a box of cash tickets. The money flows direct from specific buyer to the farmer.

We just had a farmer from NE Sask get a bid from a buyer in Winnipeg and the bid stated pick up at farm. This farmer called their local buyers to see what price they could get. The offer from the company in Winnipeg was 9500 dollars higher than their local market. They had never dealt with the company, but the price was 15% higher than what the local buyers were offering so they accepted the bid and the company in Winnipeg contacted the farmer, arranged for the trucks to pick up at their farm. The farmer said they would have never got this bid if they weren't on the system. This is what it's designed to do. The platform opens up markets to farmers. Again zero commission was paid to Ag exchangegroup an no money flowed through the company. We just provide the tools to facilitate the transaction.

On the system the farmer can target higher prices. Right now you enter a GPO and commit your inventory to one buyer. On the system because it's electronic you can set those same targets, but you can send it to 5 buyers at once or however many you choose. The farmer is in complete control. If you don't like a buyer, don't send them the target. You never have to worry about over-committing your inventory, because the instant one buyer picks it up the system shuts it off to all the other buyers you targeted to. You can upload 3rd party grading reports on the system for buyers to see along with your targets.

You can search the website to see what buyers are on the system. Now not all the buyers are on the system, but when a buyer comes on the system they have to train on our system an integrate it with their current technology and the electronic buying process is different than they have ever bought grain before.

The company makes their money by charging 500 dollars a year flat fee for a service to receive bids, 1000 dollars if you want to add the ability and target and send out your own asks, and 1500 dollars for full inventory data management. Each buyer also pays a flat fee for every terminal on the system.

Right now the company is offering free trials to get farmers on the system. The system offers compete transparency so you always know who is sending you bids and you have to view their contract. The system is non-commission, so none of the farmers on a free trial pay anything to the company. There are currently just over 800 farmers and about 5 million acres on free trial in MB, SK and AB.

The buyers want farmers, and the farmers want buyers. With every farmer that signs up to a free trial, we are giving the system to you for free, but farmers are helping us sign buyers. We are actively engaged with all the major buyers and we are starting to get noticed with 5 million acres. Providence just signed on to the system, and we expect to sign some more major buyers as we add farmers to the system.

Any feedback on the company would be appreciated.

[cbnotafarmer]

There's a lot of info on the twitter site that probably explains things better than I could.

https://twitter.com/agexgroup?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7 Ctwgr%5Eauthor

[sumdumguy]

Similar to www.cleargrain.com.au ?

This works well basically ebay for grain almost.

You dont who mthe buyer is and vice versa, money goes in a trust acccount from buyer then grain is released from cleargrain, never any no payment issues

No payment issues? As long as Cleargrain is solvent.

[Klause]

Ag exchange... Give us all your grain on hand info all the quality info and where it is stored.



And pay us.

We then sell this info to grain companies. And they pay us for it too.


You have to be completely nuts to think this is a good idea.

[cbnotafarmer]

Ag exchange... Give us all your grain on hand info all the quality info and where it is stored.



And pay us.

We then sell this info to grain companies. And they pay us for it too.


You have to be completely nuts to think this is a good idea.

Thanks for the feedback. Just a point of clarification, a farmer does not have to disclose his inventory to buyers. He can indicate which commodities he will accept bids on.

Farmers can also run searches within 50 or 100 kms etc over whatever time say 30 or 90 days to see what prices have been paid by buyers for a given commodity. Now you only get aggregate information from transactions done through the system and with only 5 million acres on the system there isn't relevant information regarding buying activity, but in the future there could be statistically significant information on buying activity as well.

One of our sales staff used to work at a major buyer and they triggered a target price on a GPO for a farmer in the morning and he had 2 super-bees locked in. He had 3 other targets for the same amount at three different buyers. By the time he cancelled the other contracts and got back to the buyer, they could no longer offer the same price they triggered on his target with them. On our system, he could have sent targets for 8 super-bees to all 4 buyers simultaneously. In this instance the buyer that picked up the 2 super-bees might have picked up all 8 at the higher price. This is just a tangible example of how our system could potentially help a producer.

Buyers buying costs on the system could be reduced by as much as 70% if the system was fully adopted. This is the real advantage to buyers. Now this increases the pie for everyone. The buyers will no doubt pocket some of these cost savings, but in a competitive market place where companies strive to acquire market share, in theory it should make higher prices available for farmers as well.

There are lots of companies asking for 1,2, 3, 4 dollars an acre for it's services or a percentage commission and I'm sure some are worth and some are not. At 500 to 1500 a year the fee is fixed. Right now anyone can try it out for free for 6 months. If there's no benefit, don't become a paid member. If you do receive that one or 2 bids, outside your local market, that pays you more then you are probably more likely to become a paid member.

This technology is not so different than technology in any other industry. It is designed to reduce inefficiencies and create cost savings.

[cbnotafarmer]

If anyone is interested in a free trial to the system, contact Brianne. The contact information is on the website. If you want a demo contact the sales person closest to you. If you just want information over the phone, Brianne grew up on a farm and worked on the buying side as well, so she's very knowledgeable about the industry.

https://www.agexchangegroup.com/about.html