Consumer sentiment is down around the country, and farmers were among the first to feel the pinch. As a result, many are looking for ways to finance their crop input purchases. But small and mid-sized ag retailers have historically not had many options for offering an input financing program.
That changed this month.
Growers Edge launched a new partnership with farm credit cooperative Compeer Financial and Evergreen Financial Group, a bank serving the Chicago area and beyond, to power an input financing program designed with the unique needs of small and mid-sized independent retailers in mind.
Here’s an overview of how you can tap into this program to increase revenue this season and beyond.
How it Works: No-Recourse Loans, Plug-and-Play Tech, 2-Week Setup
Our new input financing offering operates on a non-recourse model, which means you, the ag retailer, don’t have to put up any financial guarantee for the loans you make available to your customers. This is one of the ways we’re making input financing more accessible to small and mid-sized independent retailers.
Another way is that we’ve made it easy to get your program up and running. The turnaround between having your intro call with Growers Edge and your first customer getting a credit line is about two weeks. In that time, you’ll sign the necessary paperwork (only three documents) and our team will get the lending system set up.
That setup involves getting your branding into the platform (which operates on a software-as-a-service, or SaaS, model – see Figure 1), training your finance team on how to review applications, and getting the application live so farmers can apply for funds.
Figure 1: Screenshot of borrower interface for input financing
We can talk you through the details if you’d like to know more. Feel free to set up a call whenever it works for you. Meantime, let’s take a look at how input financing can help you grow.
6 Key Benefits of Input Financing for Small and Mid-Sized Ag Retailers
Our new input financing product offers six key benefits for small and mid-sized ag retailers:
- Get essential products into your customers’ hands faster: This season, more farmers are punting on biologicals, fungicides, micronutrients, and anything else that can be considered “discretionary.” Help them have bigger yields by empowering them to purchase the ideal inputs today.
- Improve your cash flow: Input financing offers an alternative to internal credit. If your accounts receivable is a mess right now because of past-due accounts, input financing can help: it eliminates the hit internal credit can cause to cash flow, which helps you run a smoother operation.
- Your credit line is unique to your store: Customers can’t use it anywhere else, so you won’t be left holding the bag on orders placed with the intention of paying with non-proprietary credit.
- Flexible credit terms: You’ll have the option to buy down interest rates or leave them as is. For the 2025 growing season, our partners are even subsidizing that buy-down, meaning you can invest some upfront cash to create an attractive offer for your customers. (Want details? Get in touch.)
- Option for a no-cash setup: If you’re not in a position right now to buy down rates, that’s fine. You can still make input financing available to your farmers for the “cost” of training your team (Figure 2) and getting the paperwork in place.
- No monthly payments until loan maturity: Loan terms are attractive for farmers, with no monthly payments required ahead of loan maturity.
Figure 2: Retailer view of input financing dashboard
Feeling Left Behind by Input Financing? Give Us a Call!
Existing input financing offerings often don’t work for small to mid-sized independent retailers. If that describes you, please reach out. This product is explicitly designed with you in mind. You play a critical role in your farm community and we’re in a difficult economic cycle right now.
We’d love to get you set up, hear what you think, and work alongside you to make this the best possible product for you and your customers.