The best retailers are already planning for 2027.
With the 2026 crop in the ground, the focus is shifting to what comes next: building programs, setting sales goals, and getting in front of growers early. Leadership is already finalizing plans while the sales team is still executing this season. Pre-pay seed sales, program commitments, and grower conversations don’t wait.
The retailers who show up to those early planning meetings with something real to offer are the ones who lock in the business before a competitor has the chance.
The challenge hasn’t changed
Growers hesitate on premium inputs when the risk feels too high. It doesn’t matter how strong your agronomic recommendation is. When margins are tight and the weather is unpredictable, growers pull back. They buy down. And you leave acres and revenue on the table, not because you didn’t have the right answer, but because they couldn’t afford to be wrong.
That’s the gap. Not knowledge, not trust in your agronomist. Risk.
What changes when the warranty is in the room
When you lead with a strong agronomic recommendation and back it with a yield warranty on a field-by-field basis, the conversation shifts. The grower isn’t being asked to take a leap of faith. They’re looking at a plan with protection behind it: the right seed, the right fertility, the right crop protection. The whole acre. And if it doesn’t perform, there’s a payout.
One of our retail partners put it simply: their Growers Edge program helped them sell more fungicide than they ever had before. That’s not a fungicide story. That’s what happens when growers trust the plan enough to follow it all the way through. When the downside is covered, they stop optimizing for fear and start optimizing for yield.
You win the whole acre instead of half of it.
What this looks like in practice
The retailers using Crop Plan Warranty aren’t just adding a product to their lineup.
They’re changing how the sales conversation starts.
Instead of leading with price and hoping the grower commits to the full program, they lead with the program and prove the value is protected. They walk into early planning meetings with something competitors don’t have: a reason for the grower to say yes.
Growers who commit early tend to follow through. They’ll still watch the weather and market trends and second-guess a fungicide pass when conditions get tough. That’s just farming. But with a financial backing behind the plan, it takes out the risk and gives them the opportunity to capture that upside. And when the season goes well, you get the credit for helping them follow through on the plan.
June is when this gets built
The retailers who win next season aren’t waiting until fall.
June is when you identify which fields are candidates, which growers are on the fence about committing to a full program, and where the warranty changes the math. It’s when you set the program up so you’re ready to go before anyone is sitting across the table from a grower in January.
The retailers who move now show up to those early planning conversations with more than a price sheet. They show up with a reason to commit.
Interested in how a Crop Plan Warranty program could work for your operation? Get in touch. We’d love to walk through the options with you.