The Modern Acre: Recent Episodes
Tim & Tyler Nuss
Every week, you’ll hear from the entrepreneurs, innovators, and leaders that are changing the food and agriculture industry on and off the farm. Your hosts are Tim and Tyler Nuss. They are brothers, 5th-generation farmers, and entrepreneurs who have scaled tech startups, developed international supply chains, and built brands. The Modern Acre is Ag Built Different.
Tim and Tyler talk to the CEO and Co-Founder of Heritable Agriculture, Brad Zamft, PhD.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
Tim and Tyler talk to Mackenzie Burnett, Founder and CEO of Ambrook, about rapidly scaling customers and deploying new strategies during a growth phase.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
Tim and Tyler talk to Cole Jones, Founder and CEO of Local Line, about Chipotle's local sourcing program which includes peppers from Nuss Farms.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Local Line - https://www.localline.co
Tyler talks with Bailey Stockdale about their $13M Series B announcement.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Leaf - https://withleaf.io
- Leaf's Series B - https://www.agnavigator.com/Article/2026/06/11/bayer-invests-in-ai-backbone-company-leafs-series-b-round/
Tim and Tyler discuss some signs that we may finally be at the bottom of the agtech cycle. Plus, we talk about Shane Thomas' principles for the modern agribusiness professional.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Principles for the Modern Agribusiness Professional
- Herbet Diess Electric Tractors
Tim and Tyler have Danny Berstein back on the pod to talk about the latest with Reservoir.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Reservoir - https://reservoir.co
Tim and Tyler talk to Francisco Jardim about his journey as the MD at SP Ventures and how they have successfully raised for a 3rd fund investing in agtech.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- SP Ventures - https://spventures.com.br
Tim and Tyler talk to Chris Abott of Pivot Bio and Geraldo Mattioli of Kula Bio about what is happening with fertilizer and how biological solutions can address current farmer challenges.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Pivot Bio (Pivot on AgList)
- Kula Bio (Kula on AgList)
Tim and Tyler talk to Shay Foulk about the launch of Farm Profit Manager.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- ShayFoulk.com
Daniel Lee and Dan Kelly talk with Tim and Tyler about their AI-First startup Numanac.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Numanac
Corbett Kull joins the podcast to share updates on Camo Ag.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Camo Ag
Tim and Tyler discuss the official closing of Monarch Tractor and if any agtech startup has achieved product-market-fit.
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This episode is presented by Ambrook.
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Links
- Monarch Tractor shuts down
- Not one agtech startup has product-market-fit
Tim and Tyler talk with Ian Miller about the latest in the plant gene editing sector, including recent funding rounds, new traits, and more.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- Pairwise - https://www.pairwise.com
- Farmer Mode Hats - https://farmermode.com
Tim and Tyler recap their experience at the World Agri-Tech Innovation Summit and cover AgFunder's Investment Report.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
Tim and Tyler discuss HubSpot's acquisition of Starter Story, what is going on with creator-run businesses, and if they should consider a sale.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- Sign Up for the Yield Webinar
Tim and Tyler discuss the executive order on glyphosate and RFK's response on the Joe Rogan podcast.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- Executive Order - https://www.agweb.com/news/business/trumps-glyphosate-executive-order-frames-food-security-national-security
- RFK Jr. on Rogan - https://open.spotify.com/episode/2EMhiBlQv3ck1ohBjyFdf4
- RFK Jr. Leg Press - https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/rfk-jr-won-t-stop-034717419.html
Tim and Tyler talk with Nick Horob about selling his company Harvest Profit to John Deere and his recent focus on building with AI in agriculture.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- AI on Your Farm - https://aionyourfarm.com
- Full Stack Ag - https://fullstack.ag
Tim and Tyler talk out Tim's recognition as the Top Producer of the Year (Next-Gen) and attending the Top Producer Summit in Nashville.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- Top Producer: Tim Nuss - https://www.agweb.com/news/business/2026-top-producer-next-gen-award-winner-tim-nuss
- Top Producer Summit - https://events.farmjournal.com/top-producer-summit-2026
- Weskan Grain - https://weskangrain.com
Tim and Tyler talk with Adam Bergman, Managing Director of EcoTech Capital, about the state of AgTech.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- EcoTech Capital - https://ecotechcap.com
- The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly - https://ecotechcap.com/news-%26-articles
Tim and Tyler talk with Tim Bucher, Founder and CEO of Agtonomy, about what trends he saw at CES and Agtonomy's recent Series B round.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy. Yield for Growers.
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Links
- Agtonomy - https://www.agtonomy.com
Tim and Tyler announce Yield Energy, the next chapter for Polaris Energy Services. Yield turns irrigation pumps and other on-farm energy assets into virtual power plants to help growers be more profitable.
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This episode is presented by Yield Energy.
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Links
- Yield Energy - https://yieldenergy.com
- Yield for Growers - https://yieldenergy.com/growers
Tyler hosted a fireside chat with David Friedberg at last year's World Agri-Tech Innovation Summit. David discusses innovation in genetics, AI, and the current state of agtech investing.
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This episode is presented by AgList, the only independent platform to discover and review ag biologicals.
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Links
- World Agri-Tech - https://worldagritechusa.com
- Register using code ACRE10 - https://worldagritechusa.com/book-tickets
Tim and Tyler discuss what they've learned from Sam Parr, the podcaster and entrepreneur. They also announce a new job opportunity, Head of Growth, at AgList.
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This episode is presented by AgList, the only independent platform to discover and review ag biologicals.
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Links
- AgList Head of Growth Job - https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/4330467635/
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tune in for our end of year award, recap, and predictions show! Part 2:
- Biggest Change for 2026
- Podcast Recap and Goals
- AgList Recap and Goals
- Polaris Recap and Goals
- 2025 Obsession
- 2026 Predictions
- Misogi
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Farmer Mode - https://farmermode.com
- AgList - https://aglist.com
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
Tune in for our end of year award, recap, and predictions show! Part 1:
- Favorite Episode of the Year
- Business We'd Invest $10,000 In
- Ag Person of the Year
- Favorite Business Person
- Craziest Person We're Following
- Favorite Content
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Justin Mares podcast
- Reservoir podcast
- New Leaf Symbiotics podcast
- Devon Wright podcast
- Farm Journal Top Producer of the Year
- Zach Dell on Invest Like the Best
- Michael Dell on Founders
- Jack Raines
- Alex Hormozi
- Catalyst
- DER Task Force
- Grant Horvat
Tim and Tyler breadown the 2025 farm season on Nuss Farms and how Tim is thinking about managing risk, agtech, regenerative, vertical integration & more.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Farmer Mode hats - https://farmermode.com
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim and Tyler unpack the announcement from the USDA and MAHA unveiling a $700M fund towards supporting regnerative agriculture. They also discuss regenerative and organic product pricing and the idea of a local certification.
Use code FARMERFRIDAY for 25% off Farmer Mode Hats!
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- 25% off Farmer Mode hats - https://farmermode.com Use code FARMERFRIDAY at checkout
- Announcement - https://www.usda.gov/about-usda/news/press-releases/2025/12/10/usda-launches-new-regenerative-pilot-program-lower-farmer-production-costs-and-advance-maha-agenda
Tim and Tyler catch up on the latest with Monarch Tractor and recap Tim's CTRI annual meeting.
Use code FARMERFRIDAY for 25% off Farmer Mode Hats!
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- 25% off Farmer Mode hats - https://farmermode.com Use code FARMERFRIDAY at checkout
- California Tomato Research Institute - https://tomatonet.org
- AgList - https://aglist.com
- Monarch News - https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/19/monarch-tractor-preps-for-layoffs-and-warns-employees-it-may-shut-down/
Tim and Tyler check in on their fitness, content their consuming right now, and address the Monarch Tractor lawsuit reported by TechCrunch.
UPDATE: https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/19/monarch-tractor-preps-for-layoffs-and-warns-employees-it-may-shut-down/
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Monarch Lawsuit - https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/18/monarch-tractor-sued-over-tractors-that-were-unable-to-operate-autonomously/
Tim and Tyler talk about Ceres AI recent $13M funding round and the appointment of an AI agent to their board.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Ceres AI - https://ceres.ai
- Ceres Imaging Podcast - https://www.themodernacre.com/202-innovations-in-aerial-imaging-with-ashwin-madgavkar-ceo-and-founder-of-ceres-imaging/
Tim and Tyler talk about Tyler's experience at the Western Growers Annual Meeting this week and recap the "Shark Tank" event from the show.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Western Growers - https://www.wga.com
- TRIC Robotics - https://www.tricrobotics.com
- Drift Sense - https://drift-sense.com
- Lumo - https://lumo.ag
Tim and Tyler talk to Rob Hurlbut, Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Agriculture Capital, all about his learnings from over ten years investing in farmland.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Agriculture Capital - https://agriculturecapital.com/
Tim and Tyler talk to Brent Smith, CEO of New Leaf Symbiotics, about their "behind the scenes" go-to-market strategy and his take on the fragmentation and M&A landscape in biologicals.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- New Leaf Symbiotics - https://newleafsym.com
- New Leaf on AgList - https://aglist.com/partner/newleaf-symbiotics
Tim and Tyler talk to Tyler Niday about their new product announcements and recent acquisiton of farm-ng.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Bonsai Robotics - https://www.bonsairobotics.ai
Tim and Tyler talk to Shely Aronov about founding and scaling Innerplant.
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This episode is presented by Corteva R&D.
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Links
- Innerplant - https://innerplant.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Vincent Ricchiuti of ENZO Olive Oil and P-R Farms.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience.
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Links
- ENZO Olive Oil - https://enzooliveoil.com
- P-R Farms - https://www.prfarms.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Michael Key, CEO and Co-Founder of Impello Biosciences.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Impello Biosciences - https://impellobio.com
- Impello on AgList - https://aglist.com/manufacturer/impello-biosciences
Tim and Tyler talk to Rob Trice and Chris Taylor of The Mixing Bowl and announce a new collaboration between AgList and The Mixing Bowl!
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- The Mixing Bowl - https://www.mixingbowlhub.com/
- The Interactive Landscape Map - https://aglist.com/landscape
Tim and Tyler discuss Orchard Robotics recent $22M funding announcement and corresponding Linkedin promotion video.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Orchard
- Linkedin Announcement
Tim and Tyler talked with David Friedberg last year about joining Ohalo, lessons from The Climate Corp, and what will in in ag.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Ohalo - https://www.ohalo.com
- Climate Corp Podcast - https://www.themodernacre.com/302-the-story-of-the-climate-corporation/
- YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@themodernacre
Tim and Tyler discuss building and launching AgList, the yelp for agriculture. They discuss updates their making, including new features, pricing, and more.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Mackenzie Burnett about founding and scaling Ambrook and how she recently raised a $26M Series A.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Ambrook - https://ambrook.com
- Series A - https://ambrook.com/blog/company/america-the-beautiful
Tim and Tyler talk to Matt Woolf about the ag economy in California specialty crops.
Takeaways
- Post-COVID, nut pricing is stabilizing while vegetable pricing normalizes.
- USDA estimates can be inaccurate due to abandoned orchards.
- The Big Shrink report explores the impact of population decline on agriculture.
- Population growth has historically supported agricultural markets.
- Fertility rates are declining due to economic and cultural factors.
- Public policies to reverse population decline have shown little effect.
- Farmers should focus on quality over quantity in exports.
- California agriculture faces significant regulatory challenges.
- Ag tech innovations are rapidly evolving and improving efficiency.
- Farmer sentiment is low due to high input costs and low commodity prices.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Terrain - https://www.themodernacre.com/aacwebsite
Tim and Tyler talk to Gaji Balakaneshan about building Midwestern BioAg from a legacy inputs retailer to a soil health solution provider.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Midwestern BioAg - https://midwesternbioag.com
- Midwestern BioAg on AgList - https://aglist.com/manufacturer/midwestern-bioag-1
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Jack Richardson all about Sweetgreen, their Infinite Kitchen model, personalization, and how he thinks about their overall strategy.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Subscribe to The Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Mark Brooks about his framework for investing in food and ag based on his recent AgFunderNews article, The quiet trends reshaping ag: a field guide for builders, backers, and business leaders.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- AFN Article - https://agfundernews.com/the-quiet-trends-reshaping-ag-a-field-guide-for-builders-backers-and-business-leaders
- Mark on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/markbrooks/
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Nicholas Spoden about scaling a biological startup.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Lygos - https://www.lygos.com
- Lygos on AgList - https://aglist.com/manufacturer/lygos-inc-1
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim and Tyler unpack the success (and controversy) of RxBar and David Protein.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- RxBar - https://www.rxbar.com/
- David Protein - https://davidprotein.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Cole Jones about all things local food and commerce.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Local Line - https://www.localline.co
Tim and Tyler talk about their experience using Function Health.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Function Health - Use code FUNCTIONDAY for $135 off!
- AgList
- Upstream Ag
Tim and Tyler talk to Drew Anderson about founding and scaling Cleveland Kitchen, an Ohio-based food company specializing in fermented and culinary vegetable products.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Check them out HERE.
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Links
- Cleveland Kitchen - https://www.clevelandkitchen.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Keith Yamamoto and Chase Hurley about water dynamics in California and launching their new water insights app, Hydra Score
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Hydra Score - https://hydrascore.com
ANNOUNCEMENT: AgList is now 10x more powerful. Introducting AgList AI.
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Tim and Tyler share how exactly they are using AI for their businesses, including specific tools and use cases.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- AgList - https://aglist.com
- Farmer Mode - https://farmermode.com
- ChatGPT - https://chatgpt.com
- Gemini - https://gemini.google.com/app
- Replit - https://replit.com
- Manus - https://manus.im/app
- Lindy - https://www.lindy.ai
ANNOUNCEMENT: AgList is now 10x more powerful. Introducting AgList AI.
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Tim and Tyler talk to Joe Coelho and Dave Booher about how and why Joe decided to adopt the MyLand soil health solution.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- MyLand - https://myland.ag
- American Pistachio Growers - https://americanpistachios.org
- AgList - https://aglist.com
ANNOUNCEMENT: AgList is now 10x more powerful. Introducting AgList AI.
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Tim and Tyler talk to Dr. Keri Carstens, CEO of Jord Bioscience, about all things biologicals.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Jord Bioscience - https://www.jordbioscience.com
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Zak Laffite, President of Wonderful Citrus, about all things ag.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Wonderful Citrus - https://www.wonderfulcitrus.com
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Adam Koppel about founding a regenerative ag startup, why outcomes are important, and his several ag hot takes.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Agrology - https://www.agrology.ag
- The Modern Acre Co-op - https://themodernacre.com/co-op
Tim and Tyler talk to Brian Reisinger about his book Land Rich, Cash Poor: My Family's Hope and The Untold History Of The Disappearing American Farmer.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Brian Reisinger - https://www.brian-reisinger.com
- The Modern Acre Co-op - https://themodernacre.com/co-op
Tim and Tyler talk to Amanda Nigg about her ag-focused online fitness business, her partnership with Red Bull, and her thoughts on MAHA.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Farm Fit Momma - https://www.farmfitmomma.com
- Red Bull Rancher Strong - https://www.redbull.com/us-en/events/rancher-strong
Tim and Tyler talk to Andrew Sunderman about the background of the $2B PTx Trimble deal that finalized a year ago.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- PTx - https://www.ptxag.com/
- Farmer Mode Hats are in stock! https://farmermode.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Eric Morgan of Rooted Ag about all things regenerative, the importance of cover crops, and why there's still a lot to learn about biologicals.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Rooted Ag - https://www.rootedag.com
- Farmer Mode Hats are in stock! https://farmermode.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Ali and Niki Wente of Wente Vineyards about the state of the wine market, sustainable farming, and growing the family business.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Wente Vineyards - https://wentevineyards.com/
- Wine Sisters Book Club Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wine-sisters-book-club/id1792737894
- PREORDER Farmer Mode Hats - https://farmermode.com
Farmer Mode hats are here! Preorder yours now: https://farmermode.com
Join The Modern Acre Co-op as an annual member and get a Farmer Mode hat for free!
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This is a special bonus episode! We are airing an episode from The Modern Acre Co-op, our membership community. Every week, Tim and Tyler share their "pick of the week" and discuss a news event from the week. Enjoy the sneak peak and if you enjoy this type of content, consider joining the Co-op.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Shopify CEO AI Memo - https://x.com/tobi/status/1909251946235437514
- Function Health - https://www.functionhealth.com
- Chris Laudando Post - https://www.linkedin.com/posts/laudando_agtech-ip-laserweeding-activity-7317929874273312768-fIZS/
- Farmer Mode - https://farmermode.com
- The Modern Acre Co-op - https://themodernacre.com/coop
Tim and Tyler talk to Todd Robran on agtech markets and how his company Growers Edge is approaching growth.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Growers Edge - https://www.growersedge.com
- Farmer Mode Hats - https://farmermode.com
Farmer Mode hats are here! Preorder yours now: https://farmermode.com
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Tim and Tyler talk to Justin Mares about founding Kettle & Fire and growing it into the largest bone broth company in the world, his thoughts on regenerative ag, and Justin's business ideas in food & ag.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- Kettle & Fire - https://www.kettleandfire.com
- TrueMed - https://www.truemed.com
- Justin's Substack - https://justinmares.substack.com
- Farmer Mode - https://farmermode.com
Tim and Tyler talk to Dane Hague about how the past few years have gone raising capital, finding traction, and expanding into new markets.
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This episode is presented by PF Partners. Unlock the exclusive AgTech Go-to-Market webinar HERE.
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Links
- MyLand - https://myland.ag
Tim and Tyler talk to Bill Brady about his philosophy for building teams, boards, and companies, while also digging into his current company, Kula Bio.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Kula Bio - https://www.kulabio.com
- Kula Bio on Aglist - https://aglist.com/manufacturer/kula-bio
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim and Tyler recap their experince and takeaways from World Agri-Tech last week and share some updates for the multiple "hats" they wear.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Nuss Farms - https://nussfarms.com
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
- AgList - https://aglist.com
- World Agri-Tech - https://worldagritechusa.com
Announcement: We launched yelp for biologicals @ AgList.com!
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Tim and Tyler talk to Adam DeGroot about his family's collection of ag and trucking businesses.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- DeGroot Farms - https://degrootfarms.com
- DeGroot Logistics - https://degrootlogistics.com
- Dock411 - https://dock411.com
We launched Yelp for Biologicals! Check it out at AgList.com.
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This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "The price is right (even when it's low) - A framework for commodity crop prices in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva, Mineral, and now, Innerplant.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Topsoil - https://topsoil.substack.com
- Ariel on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/arielpatton/
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Tim ( https://www.linkedin.com/in/timnuss/ ) and Tyler ( https://www.linkedin.com/in/tyler-nuss/ ) talk to Andrew Duff ( https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-duff-um-reb2000/ ) about the biological space, why mycorrhizal fungi matters, and why Groundwork BioAg was an early believer in AgList.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Groundwork BioAg - https://groundworkbioag.com
- Groundwork BioAg on AgList - https://aglist.com/manufacturer/groundwork-bioag
- AgList: Yelp for Biologicals - https://aglist.com
- World AgriTech - https://worldagritechusa.com/program/
We launched Yelp for Biologicals! Check it out at AgList.com.
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A principal with Pinion, Brian leads the firm’s Government and Public Affairs service area. With a background in environmental law and regulations, he identifies and educates business owners on how to influence and change political systems for a market advantage. Recent successes include:
- Saving U.S. farmers an estimated $5 billion, collectively, by initiating the Farmers for Tax Fairness coalition to oppose changes to cash accounting, resulting in an ag exemption in the House tax reform draft bill.
- Leading an ongoing effort to change tax code to allow thousands of mutual ditch, irrigation, and water companies to access private investment to upgrade aging water infrastructure.
- Led a coalition instrumental in the passage of the United States-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement (USMCA). USMCA is critical for U.S. agriculture and ensures preferential market access for our farmers.
- Pulling together a partnership of tribes and dairy farmers to develop a biogas facility and turn dairy manure into 450 kilowatts of power. This effort eliminated a lawsuit threat, increased dairy herd size, and enhanced salmon protection.
- Helping establish a habitat exchange to offset habitat impacts from mineral development by providing incentives to landowner and industry for land and water stewardship.
Brian is a founder of Vela Environmental, a consulting firm supporting long-term business sustainability that became part of the firm in 2013. During the past 20 years, he has served as chief of staff, legislative director, and environmental and energy adviser to U.S. Senator Max Baucus. A leader in sustainability, he was awarded the Loeb Fellowship at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and selected as a U.S.-Japan Leadership Foundation Fellow.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Pinion - https://www.pinionglobal.com/people/brian-kuehl/
- Resources for Affected USA Employees - https://www.linkedin.com/in/constancebowen/ & https://www.linkedin.com/in/toby-cain-9734b644/
We launched Yelp for Biologicals! Check it out at AgList.com.
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Arun Ohri was Tim's pick for 2024 Ag Person of the Year on our annual Acre Awards.
Arun Ohri (Arunohri@hotmail.com) is a farmer who owns both Jubilant Earth Nursery and AAA Land Management. He was raised by a family of farmers who grew peaches on 20 acres in Yuba City.
Thirty-six years ago, they also planted walnut trees in what Ohri describes as really bad conditions – “muck.” Those trees have since adapted to rough conditions. Ohri stresses these aren’t genetically modified trees — they have naturally evolved to be able to thrive in poor soil and Jubilant Earth Nursery now sells them.
Ohri says these seeds are hardier and make going organic more easy. On his own 1600-acre farm, he currently grows walnuts and almonds. About 400 acres are organic, and he’s working on transitioning the remaining 1,200 acres.
Arun has recently scaled his biological product, Worm Fuel, and also has a DTC nut butter company, Amazing Nut Company.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Amazing Nut Company - https://amazingnutcompany.com/
- AgList - https://aglist.com
Come find us at World Ag Expo at the Polaris Energy Services booth in the PG&E Pavilion at the Gate B entrance!
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Clay Mitchell is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Fall Line Capital. He is a fifth-generation Iowa farmer who has spent his entire career becoming one of the most innovative, progressive and respected farmers in the world. Clay led the revolution in precision agriculture from a variable-rate approach to an automation approach. In refining commercial grain farming at The Mitchell Farm, he has conducted highly introspective agronomic studies that have driven innovation in the use of auto-steering, next-generation control systems for farming inputs, wireless farm networking, grain storage automation, no-till farming techniques and controlled-traffic farming systems.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Fall Line Capital - https://www.fall-line-capital.com
- Clay on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/clay-mitchell-4b66b34/
We launched Yelp for Biologicals! Check it out at AgList.com.
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This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "The price is right (even when it's low) - A framework for commodity crop prices in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva, Mineral, and now, Innerplant.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Topsoil - https://topsoil.substack.com
- Ariel on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/arielpatton/
- AgList - https://aglist.com
We launched Yelp for Biologicals! Check it out at AgList.com.
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Jack Richardson is kicking off a new and improved version of The Modern Acre newsletter. After starting his career in venture banking, Jack has spent the last five years in AgTech, first at a food waste startup and now in precision technology at an Ag OEM. He's spent most of his career in strategy roles where he's explored ways to make business models work. Outside of his specific roles, he's written about the space more broadly – you may have come across his prior writing on LinkedIn.
In tandem with the contributing to the monthly newsletter, Jack will join us on the podcast every month to break down his latest research and dig into the strategy behind the topic he's covering. This month we dig into breaking down the fascinating business of Erewhon. Check out the newsletter here.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- AgList - https://aglist.com
- Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
- Tyler on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tyler-nuss/
- Tim on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/timnuss/
We're so excited to announce a project that's been in the works for almost a year: AgList.com.
AgList is an online platform that allows farmers to discover and endorse biologicals. Tune in to hear more about why we built it and how you can join the fun on AgList.com.
Special shout out to our launch partners, who believed in our vision before it was built and provided crucial feedback: Pivot Bio, Vestaron, Groundwork BioAg, Kula Bio, Certis Biologicals, Corteva Agriscience, Sound Ag, and Indigo. THANK YOU!
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- AgList - https://aglist.com
- A Letter from Tim and Tyler - https://aglist.com/about-us
- Newsletter AgList Overview - https://themodernacre.substack.com
- Tyler on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tyler-nuss/
- Tim on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/timnuss/
John Kempf is the founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture, a regenerative agronomy consulting company, and the host of the Regenerative Agriculture Podcast. He is known for developing crop nutrition management systems that increase yields and profitability while reducing the need for fertilizers and pesticides. He has been teaching growers around the world the principles and practices of these regenerative agriculture systems for the past 15 years. It is John’s mission to have regenerative agriculture become the mainstream globally by 2040.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- John Kempf - https://johnkempf.com
- Advancing Eco Agriculture - https://advancingecoag.com
- Danny on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-kempf-6b59a450/
- Tyler on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tyler-nuss/
- Tim on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/timnuss/
Danny Bernstein is the Managing Partner of Reservoir Ventures and the CEO of the Reservoir, an ecosystem of nonprofit and for-profit ventures tackling California’s most urgent challenges and opportunities.
Before founding the Reservoir, Danny spent 20 years in Silicon Valley leading business development, partnerships, and developer programs at Google and Microsoft. At Google, he worked across products like Search, Chrome, Firebase, and Google Identity after the acquisition of Meebo, a Web 2.0 startup that was sold to Google 2012. At Microsoft, he led critical product lines for Microsoft Teams.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- The Reservoir - https://www.reservoir.co
- Danny on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dannybernstein/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Paul Mikesell is the founder and CEO of Carbon Robotics. Paul has deep experience founding and building successful technology startups. Paul co-founded Isilon Systems, a distributed storage company, in 2001. Isilon went public in 2006 and was acquired by EMC for $2.5 billion in 2010. In 2006, Paul co-founded Clustrix, a distributed database startup that was acquired by MariaDB in 2018. Prior to Carbon, Paul served as Director of Infrastructure Engineering at Uber, where he grew the team and opened the company’s engineering office in Seattle, later focusing on deep learning and computer vision.
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This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more HERE.
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Links
Carbon Robotics - https://carbonrobotics.com
Paul on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-mikesell-4b63a9/
Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Listen: Spotify | Apple Podcasts
Tune in for our end of year award, recap, and predictions show! Part 2:
- Biggest Change for 2025
- Podcast Recap and Goals
- Nuss Farms Recap and Goals
- Boring Business of the Year
- 2024 Obsession
- 2025 Predictions
- Tim's Surprise Category
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Tegner Mill - https://www.tegnermill.com
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Tune in for our end of year award, recap, and predictions show! Part 1:
- Favorite Episode of the Year
- Business We'd Invest $10,000 In
- Ag Person of the Year
- Favorite Business Person
- Craziest Person We're Following
- Favorite Content
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Zac Ellis Episode - https://themodernacre.com/352
- David Friedberg Episode - https://themodernacre.com/351
- Ohalo - https://ohalo.com
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
- Travis Potter Episode - https://themodernacre.com/378
- FlavCity / Bobby Parrish - https://www.flavcity.com
- Peter Levels - https://x.com/levelsio
- Bryson DeChambeau - https://www.youtube.com/@brysondechambeau
- Craig Fuller on MFM - https://www.mfmpod.com/he-got-fired-by-his-dad-so-he-built-a-60myr-empire/
- The Psychology of Money - https://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Money-Timeless-lessons-happiness/dp/0857197681
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Walt Duflock is a 5th generation California farmer (cattle, wine grapes, leafy greens), 30-year Silicon Valley startup veteran (eBay and 3 other acquisitions), and 7 years as an AgTech Innovation leader at SVG-THRIVE and Western Growers (where he’s focused on solutions for labor, water, and food safety)
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Western Growers - https://www.wga.com
- Walt on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/waltduflock/
- CA Ag Labor Deck - https://www.linkedin.com/posts/waltduflock_agtech-ecosystem-california-has-a-large-activity-7271332885318512640-eP9S?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Mike Hemman is the SVP of Netafim North America. Mike joined Netafim in 2019 as the President of Netafim USA and was promoted to Senior Vice President of North America in 2024. He has been instrumental in driving strategic growth and expanding profit margins through innovative market strategies, customer segmentation, product lifecycle management, and improvements in supply chain and manufacturing efficiencies. With multiple decades of experience in the crop protection and seed industry, Mike has held key commercial leadership positions at DuPont, Corteva, and Pioneer Seed.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Netafim - https://www.netafimusa.com
- Mike on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/agexecutiveandchangeleader/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Cody Agee is the Owner & CEO at Sierra Dairy Laboratory. After getting his degree in finance and a career in investment banking at J.P. Morgan, Cody decided to search for a business to buy. He ended up acquiring Sierra Dairy Laboratory and joins the podcast to tell the whole story.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Sierra Dairy Laboratory - https://www.sierradairylab.com
- Cody on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/cody-agee-62451142/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "How to do better napkin math - A framework for units and measures in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva, Mineral, and now, Innerplant.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Topsoil - https://topsoil.substack.com
- Ariel on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/arielpatton/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Travis Potter is the founder of Tractor Beverage, an innovative beverage company that offered the first and only Certified Organic, Non-GMO beverage solution for foodservice. Travis is now working on his next project - bringing Green Lightning to market. Green Lightning has developed on farm technology that produces liquid fertilizer from only air and water.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Green Lightning - https://www.greenlightning.ag
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Tracey Wiedmeyer is the Co-Founder and CEO of Gripp. From independent growers to national co-ops, Gripp is focused on providing the ultimate platform for connecting operations teams, keeping tabs on their equipment whereabouts, interactions, and bringing organization to their unique collection of operational knowledge & routines.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Gripp - https://www.gripp.ag
- Tracey on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/wiedmeyer/
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Big announcement! Tyler and Tim are joining Polaris Energy Services as CEO and Head of Corporate Development, respectively. They break down all of the details of the move and share more about how Polaris enables California farmers to get paid and save more money.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Polaris Energy Services - https://polarisenergyservices.com
- Hourly Flex Pricing Pilot - https://polarisenergyservices.com/hourly-flex-pricing
- Follow Polaris on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/company/polaris-energy-services/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Stemilt Growers is a family-owned and operated tree fruit growing, packing, and shipping company based in Wenatchee, Washington. The company was founded in 1964 by the Mathison's, a multi-generational farming family who have grown fruit for more than a century. Today, Stemilt grows and markets fresh apples, pears, cherries, stone fruits and organic tree fruits. Stemilt is proud of its signature fruits and brands, including: Rave®, SweeTango® and Pinata® apples, Skylar Rae® cherries, A Half Mile Closer to the Moon® cherries, and Lil Snappers® kid-size fruits.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Stemilt - https://www.stemilt.com
- West on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/west-mathison-38a0146/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Chris is the Founder and President of L&A, his third start-up in the AgTech space. He previously founded Robodondo, which was acquired by Motivo Engineering in 2017, then built & rapidly grew Motivo’s B2B AgTech business into their primary vertical and led early market research for the technology that would become Monarch Tractor. Chris left Motivo in 2019 to cofound Stout Industrial Technologies, establishing their core technical team, strategic industry partnerships, intellectual property, and overseeing the completion of the initial series development of the Stout Smart Cultivator before continuing his relentless pursuit of creative destruction with his most capable team yet.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- L&A - https://www.laudando.com
- Chris on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/laudando/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Kyle McMahon is the founder of Tractor Zoom and leads the company as CEO. Kyle is a 3rd generation entrepreneur and actively farms in southeast Iowa. Prior to starting Tractor Zoom, he was the Director of Acquisitions for Summit Agricultural Group where he led a team to buy and sell farmland across the Midwestern corn belt. Kyle co-founded Buch-McMahon Lawn and Landscaping and is a graduate of Iowa State University.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- TractorZoom - https://tractorzoom.com
- Guillermo on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kyle-mcmahon-0440954b/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Guillermo Valenzuela is the VP of Sales and Marketing at WiseConn. WiseConn specializes in precise irrigation solutions that drive sustainable farming practices. WiseConn empowers sustainable farming through precise irrigation solutions. They provide a user-friendly system for easy monitoring and control, offering farmers the most complete irrigation management system available. Established in 2006, WiseConn has a global presence, serving regions in Latin America, the US, Europe, and Australia.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- WiseConn - https://wiseconn.com
- Guillermo on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/gvalenzu/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Joe Gardiner is the Co-Founder of Covers & Co., a cover crop and forage seed supplier dedicated to helping farmers implement the Principles of Nature into their operations to improve soil resiliency & farm profitability.
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This episode is presented by Corteva Agriscience. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Covers & Co. - https://www.coversandco.ca
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Disclaimer: This is not investment advice!
This week, we change up the format a bit. Tim and Tyler each choose 5 companies in food and ag that they believe have strong upside. Let us know what you think of the picks!
Note: this is for fun and not an exhaustive list. It's not that serious.
- Sweetgreen - https://www.sweetgreen.com
- Agtonomy - https://www.agtonomy.com
- Ohalo - https://ohalo.com
- Gripp - https://www.gripp.ag
- Thrive Market - https://thrivemarket.com
- Podcast: https://themodernacre.com/357
- LandScan - https://landscan.ai
- Leaf - https://withleaf.io
- Lumo - https://lumo.ag
- Maui Nui - https://mauinuivenison.com
- Podast: https://themodernacre.com/338
- Make Hay - https://www.gomakehay.com/home
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Kevin Wright is the COO of Farmland Services at Manulife. Manulife Investment Management manages a diversified global portfolio of timberland and agriculture with forests covering 5.5 million acres across the United States, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, and New Zealand, and farms covering nearly 400,000 acres of prime farmland across the United States, Australia, Canada, and Chile
Kevin leads the teams responsible for operations, management, and support of the North American row crop portfolio. In this capacity, Kevin oversees the teams that manage, operate and support clients’ row crop properties in the United States and Canada. In his expanded role as Interim North American Regional Operation Lead (“NARO”) and Chief Operation Officer (“COO”) of the Western U.S. Permanent Crops, Kevin will be responsible for leadership of the MAS leadership team and the commercial enterprise, as well as overseeing the manufacturing of the returns in our tree nut and tree fruit platforms. Prior to joining the firm in 2020, Kevin was president of E. Ritter Agribusiness, Inc., a fifth-generation family owned vertically integrated agricultural business, where he led the management of the family’s agricultural land and business portfolio.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Manulife - https://www.manulifeim.com/timberland-agriculture/global/en
- Kevin on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-wright-087b6b31/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
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Disclosures
- The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the speakers, are subject to change as market and other conditions warrant, and do not constitute investment advice or a recommendation regarding any specific product or security. There is no guarantee that the investment strategy discussed will be successful or achieve any particular level of results. Any economic or market performance information is historical and is not indicative of future results, and no forecasts are guaranteed. Investing involves risks, including the potential loss of principal.
- Financial markets are volatile and can fluctuate significantly in response to company, industry, political, regulatory, market, or economic developments. The information provided does not take into account the suitability, investment objectives, financial situation, or particular needs of any specific person.
- All overviews and commentary are intended to be general in nature and for current interest. While helpful, these overviews are no substitute for professional tax, investment or legal advice. Clients and prospects should seek professional advice for their particular situation. Neither Manulife Investment Management, nor any of its affiliates or representatives (collectively “Manulife Investment Management”) is providing tax, investment or legal advice.
Ewan Lamont is SVP, Head of Sustainability Solutions at Indigo. At Indigo, Ewan manages the Sustainability business unit which enables farmers to monetize practice changes they make on their farms. Working with local agribusinesses and downstream partners, Indigo offers the largest and longest-running Scope 3 and carbon farming programs, founded on a suite of patented technologies and industry-leading quantification algorithms.
Prior to joining Indigo, Ewan was Chief Operating Officer of Myanma Awba, the leading agriculture group in Myanmar, based in Yangon. He has also held various commercial leadership roles around the world with large agribusiness Syngenta with Global HQ, regional and country positions. Ewan started his career in the finance world, driving cross-border M&A and corporate advisory engagements for blue-chip companies seeking to enter the Chinese market. This included target screening, valuation, due diligence and deal-making, concluding with a number of successful foreign acquisitions of Chinese companies.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Indigo - https://www.indigoag.com
- Ewan on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/elamont/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Modern Acre Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
This is a special bonus episode! We are airing an episode from The Modern Acre Co-op, our membership community. Every week, Tim and Tyler share their "pick of the week" and discuss a news event from the week. Enjoy the sneak peak and if you enjoy this type of content, consider joining the Co-op.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Tyler's Pick: https://www.hubermanlab.com/episode/dr-layne-norton-tools-for-nutrition-fitness
- Tim's Pick: https://paulgraham.com/foundermode.html
- News: https://agfundernews.com/fbn-and-adm-launch-a-new-company-to-connect-grain-buyers-with-more-regeneratively-grown-goods
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Carter Williams is the CEO and Managing Director at iSelect Fund, who invests at the convergence of agtech and human health.
Carter has spent his entire career working on innovation. First as a young engineer at McDonnell Douglas, next in his leadership roles at Boeing managing R&D and starting Boeing Ventures. Later as a successful entrepreneur and venture investor. Throughout his career, he has directly managed investments of over $600 million in early-stage ventures and corporate research, resulting in several billion dollars of new product revenues. As part of Boeing Phantom Works, Carter led Boeing’s technology planning process, involving all aspects of internal and external technology development and manufacturing research. This eventually led to his role in founding and managing Boeing Ventures. After Boeing, he was President of Gridlogix, initially a small 4-person startup that grew over 3 years, exiting successfully to Johnson Controls in October 2008. Gridlogix became Johnson Controls Panopics system.
Before leading iSelect, Carter was Senior Managing Director at Progress Partners, an energy and technology investment banking firm. He was a Managing Partner at Open Innovation Ventures and a Director at Clayton Capital Partners. Carter is the past President and Founder of the MIT Corporate Venturing Consortium and Co-founder of the MIT Entrepreneurship Society. He has an M.B.A. from the MIT Sloan School and a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He also writes about innovation at the substack Creative Destruction.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- iSelect Fund - https://www.iselectfund.com
- Carter on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/carter/
- Carter's Substack - https://creativedestruction.substack.com
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
An economist and a banker walk into a bar.... Just kidding. Matt Wolf, crop analyst at Terrain, and Jill Jelacich, Head of Regional Banking at American Ag Credit, join the pod (way better than a bar) for a wide ranging conversation about the current state of the ag economy and how American Ag Credit is approaching the changing market landscape with their customers.
Correction: The carryin in 2022-2023 was 836 mm (instead of 860 mm)
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- More on Terrain and American Ag Credit - https://themodernacre.com/aacwebsite
- Matt on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-woolf-829626246/
- Jill on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jill-jelacich-36490380/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Jack Richardson is kicking off a new and improved version of The Modern Acre newsletter. After starting his career in venture banking, Jack has spent the last five years in AgTech, first at a food waste startup and now in precision technology at an Ag OEM. He's spent most of his career in strategy roles where he's explored ways to make business models work. Outside of his specific roles, he's written about the space more broadly – you may have come across his prior writing on LinkedIn.
In tandem with the contributing to the monthly newsletter, Jack will join us on the podcast every month to break down his latest research and dig into the strategy behind the topic he's covering. This month we dig into understanding the produce section in the grocery store. Check out the newsletter here.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Jack on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-richardson-18527684/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Tyler Niday is the Founder and CEO of Bonsai Robotics. Bonsai provides vision-based automation and autonomous solutions to combat growers’ biggest challenge: the labor crisis. Bonsai partners with existing manufacturers enabling greater performance, efficiency, and insight than ever before. Prior to founding Bonsai, Tyler held various positions at Blue River technology, developing their product.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Bonsai Robotics - https://www.bonsairobotics.ai
- Tyler on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tyler-niday-16a67650/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
A new edition of Acre Insights is here! We have a loaded docket today with wife-inspired business ideas for ag, how to make ag more fun, and defining regenerative in California.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Buy Nuss Farms Watermelon - https://pickedtoporch.com/products/watermelons?variant=43732339916853
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Mom Walk - https://www.themomwalkcollective.com
- Buy Nothing - https://buynothingproject.org
- Rejuvenation Olympics - https://www.rejuvenationolympics.com
- G. Bailey Stockdale's LLM Leaderboard - https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gbstockdale_agronomy-llm-leaderboard-update-meta-llama-activity-7223526906082594816-hH4J?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in communications from Sacramento State University, Dan moved to Kerman, CA to work on a ranch for his now father-in-law. Working on his father-in-law’s ranch, Dan learned quickly about the farming industry and realized his heart’s desire was working with primarily almond, pistachio, grapes, and cotton. He also gravitated toward research, development, and applications primarily on nutrition programs, irrigation, water treatment, and regulations that come with the agricultural industry. In 2010, Dan took what he learned in the field and went to work for an irrigation company and began working with water treatment products and drip irrigation systems. It was there that he learned the importance of maintaining irrigation systems. Shortly after, Dan was intrigued and wanted to be part of the fast-growing company in Meras. In 2012, Dan went to work for Meras and quickly realized the relationship between water treatment management and service, and its effect on crop yield and crop health. Dan has helped Meras build a team of like-minded individuals with similar mindsets in doing what is right for the grower.
Dan’s “hands- on “experience allows him to continue to grow and learn about what is new in the industry. Water quality, irrigation systems, water related challenges are always changing. Dan is constantly keeping up with not only new rules and regulations, but also research and development on new products and equipment to properly treat the ever evolving water related issues. Dan is licensed by the Department of Agriculture as a Qualified Applicator in Aquatics. Additionally, he continues his education and licensing in irrigation maintenance, pumps, food safety, chlorine dioxide training, and water treatment chemistries.
Dan started out installing equipment, servicing irrigation systems, and remediation micro irrigation systems. He has worked his way through the Meras org chart to involve service, sales, managing the sales team, President of Meras Water Solutions, and now CEO. His passion for creating a good customer experience continues to be his main goal in developing and improving water treatment programs.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Meras - https://meras.com
- Dan on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-lindberg-43927b89/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Devon Wright is the Founder and CEO of Lumo, a hardware and software smart valve agtech startup. Lumo's mission is to massively improve fresh water efficiency and food security. They do this helping farmers optimize irrigation so they can continue to meet our growing food demand with an increasingly volatile water supply.
Prior to this, Devon co-founded Turnstyle Solutions and grew it to one of the largest local marketing platforms of its kind before being acquired by Yelp in 2017. He helped build and run the Yelp Restaurants division with an incredible team of leaders until 2022.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Lumo - https://lumo.ag
- Devon on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/wrightdevon/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "After 40 harvests - A framework for succession planning in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and Mineral.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Topsoil - https://topsoil.substack.com
- Ariel on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/arielpatton/
- Kevin Bearley on the Pod - https://themodernacre.com/344
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
In 2000, Steve Brazeel founded SunTerra Produce, which has grown from a one-person produce brokerage firm into an industry-leading, full-service platform handling sales, marketing, farming, food safety, harvesting, storage, and distribution activities for specialty crop producers on over 5,000 acres throughout the US and Mexico.
Born out of SunTerra‘s participation in the USDA’s ground-breaking Farmers to Families Food Box program, Project FoodBox was launched in 2020. Since the program’s inception, the SunTerra/Project FoodBox teams have delivered over 55 Million pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables to families in need through its network of food banks and other non-profits.
Steve is also the Founder and CEO of Elevated Foods. Elevated Foods was founded with a vision to invigorate great brands and position them for sustainable long-term growth. In an industry facing increasing disruption, we see the opportunity to build a fresh produce company for a new age, one that brings together differentiated yet complementary brands and aims to make them stronger than they would be on their own. We’ve identified a common thread between our farms –the capacity to Elevate our food system. From land stewardship and nutritional quality to career development and community well-being, Elevated aims to increase the health of our planet and its people. In 2022, Elevated was awarded a $20,000,000 grant as part of USDA’s Partnerships for Climate Smart Commodities program.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- SunTerra - https://sunterraproduce.com
- Project Food Box - https://projectfoodbox.org
- Elevated Foods - https://www.elevatedfoods.com
- Steve on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevebrazeel/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Scott Nelson is the CEO and Co-Founder of Make Hay. Launched in partnership with Purdue University and High Alpha Innovation, Make Hay is a SaaS marketing platform that enables brands to produce authentic and trusted agricultural-related content at scale, all while amplifying and empowering the voices of America's Agriculture Industry.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Make Hay - https://www.gomakehay.com
- Scott on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/scott-nelson-aa8800a/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Jack Richardson is kicking off a new and improved version of The Modern Acre newsletter. After starting his career in venture banking, Jack has spent the last five years in AgTech, first at a food waste startup and now in precision technology at an Ag OEM. He's spent most of his career in strategy roles where he's explored ways to make business models work. Outside of his specific roles, he's written about the space more broadly – you may have come across his prior writing on LinkedIn.
In tandem with the contributing to the monthly newsletter, Jack will join us on the podcast every month to break down his latest research and dig into the strategy behind the company he's profiling. This month we dig into Thrive Market. Check out the newsletter here.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Thrive Market - https://thrivemarket.com
- Jack on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-richardson-18527684/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Grant Mulligan is a Director of the Investment Group at AlTi Tiedemann Global, a global wealth and alternatives manager. Grant focuses on the firm’s climate sustainability impact investments, specifically nature-based solutions and decarbonization technology. Prior to joining AlTi, Grant was a Project Director at NatureVest, the in-house impact investing team of The Nature Conservancy. He advised institutional-scale timber and agriculture/water funds on how to deliver durable conservation outcomes alongside financial returns. Grant began his career as a wildlife biologist.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- ALTi - https://alti-global.com
- Grant on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/grantmulligan/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
- Subscribe to the Newsletter - https://themodernacre.substack.com
Matt Aronson is the Chief Revenue Officer of Verdant Technologies. Verdant is committed to reducing global waste and enhancing sustainability through their proprietary technology, HarvestHold, which extends the usable life of fruits, vegetables, and flowers. Tune in to hear more about their approach to food waste and how Matt and the team are focused on scaling profitably.
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This episode is presented by American AgCredit. Learn more HERE. Check out Matt Woolf's episode on the California ag market HERE.
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Links
- Verdant - https://verdant-tech.com
- HarvestHold - https://harvesthold.com
- Matt on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewaronson/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Luiz Beling is the new CEO of Apeel Sciences, a leading company in supply chain innovation for the fresh produce industry. With over two decades of agriculture industry experience, Beling brings a wealth of knowledge and skills in driving innovation and fostering strategic partnerships. Beling most recently held leadership roles at Farmer's Business Network and Bayer Crop Science, where he led large teams across multiple geographies that accelerated business growth and increased customer satisfaction.
Luiz joins the pod this week to share more about why he joined Apeel, how they are evolving the business, and their plan for growth.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Apeel - https://www.apeel.com
- Luiz on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/luizbeling/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Kelly Damewood is the CEO of CCOF (California Certified Organic Farmers), one of the first organic certification agencies.
Kelly has spent over a decade working towards a single goal: helping organic farmers thrive. After her own experience running a small farm, she went to law school determined to help farmers who farm in a better way. In her previous role as CCOF’s policy director, Kelly spearheaded key initiatives such as passage of state legislation to improve an outdated regulatory program for organic farmers and creating a groundbreaking project to drive organic production and consumption in California. She holds a Juris Doctor degree from Vermont Law School and a Master of Laws degree in agricultural and food law from the University of Arkansas School of Law.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- CCOF - https://ccof.org
- Kelly on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellydamewood/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Zac Ellis is the Sr. Director of Agronomy at Olam and oversees thousands of acres of almond production. The Olam Group is a leading food and agri-business supplying food, ingredients, feed and fiber to 20,900 customers worldwide. Their value chain spans over 60 countries and includes farming, processing and distribution operations, as well as a sourcing network of an estimated 5.0 million farmers.
Zac spends a large portion of his time investigating and implementing agtech, while also focusing on how to farm sustainably. He joins the podcast to share more about his journey, what agtech is working for Olam, and his takes on regenerative and organic practices.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Olam - https://www.olamgroup.com
- Zac on Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/zac-ellis-32100727/
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Dave Friedberg is CEO, Chairman, and co-founder of Ohalo Genetics ( https://ohalo.com ), which is accelerating evolution to unlock nature's potential. Dave excels at developing and deploying agricultural technologies that boost farmer productivity while reducing humanity's land, water, and energy footprint. Dave is also CEO and founder of The Production Board (TPB), a venture foundry that builds and invests in technology businesses in food, agriculture, and life sciences. He helps set strategy, define TPB’s investment theses, and manage key TPB investments. He is also a director on the boards of Lavoro (Latin America's largest ag inputs retailer) and Pattern Ag (the leading predictive agronomy company focused on soil biology). Prior to TPB, Dave was founder and CEO of The Climate Corporation, the world’s leading digital agronomy software platform, used by farmers across 200+ million acres worldwide. Monsanto acquired The Climate Corporation in 2013, when he joined Monsanto (now Bayer) as a member of the executive leadership team.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Ohalo Genetics - https://ohalo.com
- All in Podcast - https://www.allinpodcast.co
- Dave on X - https://twitter.com/friedberg
- The Climate Corporation Episode - https://themodernacre.com/302
- Join the Co-op - https://themodernacre.supercast.com
Help us celebrate our 350th episode by doing one (or all!) of the following:
- Share a recent episode with a friend or colleague
- Join our membership community The Modern Acre Co-op
- Subscribe to our new newsletter focused on food & ag strategy
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Tim Bucher is the CEO and Founder of Agtonomy, a hybrid autonomy and tele-assist platform for agriculture vehicles. They partner with established equipment manufacturers to transform tractors and agriculture machines into autonomous and remote-controlled equipment that is accessible to local farmers.
Tim is a lifelong farmer who also spent the bulk of his career in the tech industry in Silicon Valley. He worked for a number of successful startups and founders, including Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Michael Dell.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
Help us celebrate our 350th episode by doing one (or all!) of the following:
- Share a recent episode with a friend or colleague
- Join our membership community The Modern Acre Co-op
- Subscribe to our new newsletter focused on food & ag strategy
—
Tim Bucher is the CEO and Founder of Agtonomy, a hybrid autonomy and tele-assist platform for agriculture vehicles. They partner with established equipment manufacturers to transform tractors and agriculture machines into autonomous and remote-controlled equipment that is accessible to local farmers.
Tim is a lifelong farmer who also spent the bulk of his career in the tech industry in Silicon Valley. He worked for a number of successful startups and founders, including Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Michael Dell.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
Jack Richardson is kicking off a new and improved version of The Modern Acre newsletter. After starting his career in venture banking, Jack has spent the last five years in AgTech, first at a food waste startup and now in precision technology at an Ag OEM. He's spent most of his career in strategy roles where he's explored ways to make business models work. Outside of his specific roles, he's written about the space more broadly – you may have come across my prior writing on LinkedIn.
In tandem with the contributing to the monthly newsletter, Jack will join us on the podcast every month to break down his latest research and dig into the strategy behind the company he's profiling. This month we dig into Mt. Joy. Check out the newsletter here.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Subscribe to the newsletter!
- Jack on Linkedin
- Mt. Joy Episode with Grant Jones
- Join our membership community
Austin is an expert on agricultural and antitrust policy. During the 2020 presidential campaign, he advised candidates Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, and Pete Buttigieg on agricultural policy before ultimately serving as Co-Chair of the Biden campaign’s Agriculture Antitrust Policy Committee. He is a Fellow of the Thurman Arnold Project at Yale University, an initiative that brings together faculty, students, and scholars to collaborate on research related to competition policy and antitrust enforcement. He also serves on the Board of Directors for Common Good Iowa and the Socially Responsible Agriculture Project. In 2022, The Advocate named him a "Champion of Pride.”
He recently published his debut book, Barons: Money, Power, and the Corruption of America’s Food Industry, which profiles a series of powerful magnates to illustrate the concentration of power in the American food system. The book has received universal acclaim. Publishers Weekly gave it a Starred Review and the host of Bloomberg's Odd Lots commended the book, remarking that “I have come away with a completely different idea of agriculture that I cannot unsee." The book has received praise from across the political spectrum, including a rave review from The American Conservative.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Austin's Website
- Join the Co-op
Michael Lavin is the founder and managing partner of Germin8 Ventures, a purpose-driven venture capital firm that believes in the power of technology to fix the global food system. Founded in 2018 and backed by C-level executives, entrepreneurs and technologists across the food and agriculture industries, Germin8 is building a portfolio of entrepreneurs and businesses with the potential to profoundly change the future of FoodTech and AgTech.
Michael oversees all aspects of Germin8’s investing, operations and strategy in addition to actively participating on the boards of its portfolio companies. Prior to Germin8, Michael served as an investment banker and financial consultant at Mesirow Financial, a global financial services firm managing more than $100 billion of assets, where he executed numerous M&A, capital raising and restructuring transactions for early stage startups, middle market and Fortune 500 companies with a particular focus on food and agriculture, industrial technology and aerospace.
Michael is an advisor, mentor and member at several accelerators and incubators including Rabobank’s TERRA Accelerator, Alchemist Accelerator, Techstars Farm to Fork Accelerator, 1871, The Good Food Accelerator, Family Farmed and The Hatchery. He received a bachelor’s degree in finance and a master’s degree in finance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Michael is based in Chicago but splits his time between the San Francisco Bay Area, Europe, Tel Aviv and other hubs where food meets tech.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Germin8 Ventures
- Michael on LinkedIn
- Join the Co-op
Jason Giannelli is the farm manager for two large California farming operations, Old River Farming and R & G Fanucchi. Jason shares more about what's happening on the ground in California right now with SGMA, farming practices, and regulatory pressures.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Jason on LinkedIn
- Join the Co-op
Chris Tolles is the CEO and Co-Founder of Yard Stick. Yard Stick measures soil carbon. Scientists and farmers alike know that climate-friendly agricultural practices have the potential to remove atmospheric CO2 at gigaton/year scale. When these practices are adopted, more carbon is stored in soils, improving soil health and fighting climate change. But significant measurement challenges have held soil carbon efforts back - until now. By reducing the cost of soil carbon measurement by 90%+, Yard Stick will dramatically expand the opportunities for evidence-based regenerative practices to simultaneously improve ecosystem health, increase farmer income, and combat climate change.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Yard Stick Website
- Join the Co-op
Kevin Bearley is a Principle at Pinion and partners with business owners to create sophisticated income and tax solutions that include structuring organizations, transitioning businesses, and maximizing tax benefits at present and into the future.
Kevin navigates complex family dynamics and advises family business owners that fair doesn’t always mean equal. When putting together estate plans, he focuses on ensuring operating assets and cash flow are accessible to on-farm heirs for long-term, prosperous farm operations, while also providing a monetary benefit to other off-farm heirs. Kevin Bearley listens closely to family business goals and develops financial strategies so the family business will survive and thrive in future generations.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Pinion Website
- Join the Co-op
Did you miss World Agri-Tech in SF last month? Do not fret, because Tim and Tyler break it all down for you with their takeaways from attending the show.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- World Agri-Tech
- Join the Co-op
Pat McCullough is the CEO of ProducePay, the marketplace transforming the global produce industry into a more connected and sustainable supply chain. Prior to being appointed CEO in January, Pat served as a board member and advisor to ProducePay for two years. An esteemed global business leader, McCullough brings to this role more than 25 years of corporate experience and deep expertise in international business development, structuring and joint ventures from leadership positions held at startups and Fortune 500 companies such as Ford Motor Company, Berkshire Hathaway and Just Energy.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Produce Pay Website
- Join the Co-op
The Food Manufacturing Guy is a food manufacturing CEO with extensive experience in vertically integrating a food brand. He also has built a following on X for spicy takes on the food industry while keeping his account anonymous. Tune in for his first ever podcast interview where we dive into some of his takes.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- The Food Manufacturing Guy on X
- Join the Co-op
Marc Kermisch is the Global Chief Digital and Information Officer at CNH Industrial, a leading global manufacturer of agricultural, construction, and financial services vehicles and equipment. Tune in to hear how he and CNH are thinking about innovation in agriculture.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Marc on Linkedin
- CNH Website
- Join the Co-op
Feroz Sheikh is an accomplished CTO, thought leader and an entrepreneur. He has founded and led multiple technology-driven ventures, raised VC funding and took them to successful M&A. He has worked philanthropically, making education accessible to 200 million children in India using digital technologies. He is currently focusing on driving digital transformation across agriculture globally as the CTO of Digital at Syngenta.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Feroz on Linkedin
- Syngenta Website
- Join the Co-op
Jack Richardson is kicking off a new and improved version of The Modern Acre newsletter. After starting his career in venture banking, Jack has spent the last five years in AgTech, first at a food waste startup and now in precision technology at an Ag OEM. He's spent most of his career in strategy roles where he's explored ways to make business models work. Outside of his specific roles, he's written about the space more broadly – you may have come across my prior writing on LinkedIn.
In tandem with the contributing to the monthly newsletter, Jack will join us on the podcast every month to break down his latest research and dig into the strategy behind the company he's profiling. This month we dig into Maui Nui Venison. Check out the newsletter here.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- Subscribe to the newsletter!
- Jack on Linkedin
- Maui Nui Episode
- 7 Powers Blog Post
- 7 Powers Book
- Join our membership community
Matt Woolf, Ph.D., is Terrain’s specialty crop analyst, focusing on tree nuts, fruits and vegetables. He is a native of California’s Central Valley, where his family grows almonds, pistachios and a variety of row crops.
Matt has an extensive academic, teaching and research background in economics. He earned bachelor’s degrees in political science and economics, a master’s degree in international and development economics, and a Ph.D. in economics from the Australian National University. He has experience in economic modeling, macroeconomic analysis, data science techniques and their applications in agriculture.
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This episode is presented by Pinion. Learn more HERE.
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Links
- The Wonderful Company Episode
- Join the Co-op
This is the story of The Wonderful Company and Stewart and Lynda Resnick, the billionaire power couple that started one of the largest private holding companies in the world. In addition to owning notable brands like POM, Teleflora, Fiji Water, and more, the Resnicks are also one of the largest farmland owners in the US and are market leaders across almonds, pistachios, pomegranates, mandarins, and lemons.
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This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
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Show Notes:
(01:26) The Story of the Wonderful Company
(03:24) Stewart Resnick
(06:37) Lynda Resnick
(11:19) Flowers by Wire: Teleflora
(18:34) The Franklin Mint: “Startups are a bitch”
(24:23) Early Farming Days
(31:18) Roll International and Water Controversy
(38:53) POM
(45:50) Fiji Water from Fiji, not Cleveland!
(49:45) Mandarins, Cuties, and Halos Oh My!
(54:43) The Wonderful Company and Wonderful Pistachios
(56:36) Stewart’s Big Personality
(59:00) Revenue
(59:32) Other Ag Businesses
(1:00:04) Wine and Lemons, too?!
(1:01:27) Recent Lawsuit
(1:02:17) Closing Thoughts and Analysis
On this edition of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler do a quick check in on their reading competition. Then, they discuss how there are "really interesting vibes" happening in agtech right now as well as break down the news that Trinitas Farming in California filed for bankruptcy.
Links: * The Story of The Climate Corporation * Traction * Verity * Habits of the Household * Psychology of Money * Rubies in the Orchard * Tyler's wife Ruth's Book Recs * Trinitas Farming Bankruptcy * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Cole Jones is the Founder and CEO of Local Line. Local Line is the all-in-one local food-sourcing platform for Restaurants, Grocers, and Distributors. Use Local Line to discover and buy from thousands of family farms that sell every kind of product category including produce, meat, dairy, and more. Whether you're a single-location independent grocery store or a nationwide chain, Local Line helps retailers of all sizes build scalable farm-to-fork supply chains.
Links: * Cole on Linkedin * Local Line Website * Cole's First Interview
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our first interview with Cole.
Peter Askew is a domain name investor turned dude ranching, ranch employing, onion farmer. Tune in to hear his story and his unique approach to building VidaliaOnions.com.
Links: * Peter on X * Vidalia Onions * Peter's Projects
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Agriculture, but make it precision - A framework for precision ag with Greg Chiocco."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Links: * Join the Co-op * Subscribe to Topsoil * Greg Chiocco on Linkedin
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Philip Taylor, Ph.D. is the Executive Director of Mad Agriculture. He co-founded the organization in 2016 with his life partner, Nicole Brinks, to reimagine and restore our relationship to the land, sea, and each other through good agriculture. Prior to founding Mad Ag, Philip was a career global ecologist who specialized in ecosystem and soil carbon cycling. His research ranged widely, from understanding soil ecology and ecosystem biogeochemistry to exploring solutions to the sustainability challenges of agriculture. Philip’s work has been published in numerous journals, including Nature, Nature Climate Change, and Ecology, and he has diverse international experience in both private and public sectors, having led research and business efforts throughout North America, Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia. Now, he is bringing his entire being into Mad Agriculture—his life’s work, until he returns to the soil.
Links: * Phil on Linkedin * Mad Agriculture * Mad Markets
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Katherine Sizov is the Co-Founder and CEO of Strella. Strella predicts produce shelf life to reduce food waste and improve quality with proprietary sensors and software.
Links: * Katherin on Linkedin * Strella Website * Igino Cafiero of Bear Flag on John Deere Acquisition
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
On this edition of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler discuss their experience getting produce boxes through Farm Fresh to You, David Friedberg's recent move to become CEO of Ohalo, and our thoughts on the Starlink-Deere deal.
Links: * Farm Fresh to You * Ohalo * Jorge on the podcast * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Jorge Heraud is the vice president of automation and autonomy within the Intelligent Solutions Group (ISG) at John Deere. He leads the development of automation and autonomy products that make Deere customers more productive, profitable, and sustainable. Prior to his career with the company, Jorge was the CEO and co-founder of Blue River Technology (a John Deere company), which was acquired by Deere & Company in September 2017 and is now run as an independent subsidiary. He earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Universidad Catolica del Peru and three master’s degrees in electrical engineering, engineering management, and business from Stanford University.
Links: * Join us in SF at World Agri-Tech on March 19-20, 2024! Get an extra 10% off the early bird ticket prices with ACRE10. * Jorge on Linkedin * John Deere Website * Igino Cafiero of Bear Flag on John Deere Acquisition
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Bobby Chang is an entrepreneur, founder, and design strategist with a keen eye for branding and transformative product development. He excels at taking innovative concepts and turning them into commercial successes, operating at the crossroads of design, business, and technology.
His career boasts a breathtaking diversity, spanning consumer sectors from Apple retail to ventures in the uncharted territories of biotech. He has nurtured seed round startups like Killspencer and collaborated with industry giants like Nike.
As a co-founder of Incase, Bobby forged strategic partnerships with Apple, showcasing his expertise in building valuable alliances and navigating the intricate dance of market dynamics. His commitment to social progress shines through in collaborations with platforms like the Summit Series and UNICEF.
Currently, he advises a diverse portfolio of companies while spearheading a regenerative agriculture community project, embodying both innovation and sustainability.
Links: * Bobby on Linkedin * JustOne Organics * Regenitech * Breezy Point
Sponsor: * This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. * Check out our interview with Cole.
Join the Co-op for the full episode!
David Leon of Biome Capital Partners and Tim Luckow of Farm lead our recent Co-op members call discussing how they are building their investment firms focused on regenerative farmland.
Links: * Join the Co-op!
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Peter Young is the President of Belkorp Ag, a John Deere dealership that offers a complete line of John Deere agricultural, golf, and turf equipment. Belkorp Ag serves the Central Valley and the North Coast of California from eight locations.
Belkorp Ag is a member of the Belkorp Group of Companies. The Belkorp Group of Companies is a 2nd generation family-owned business located in Vancouver, BC. Belkorp’s origins date back to the 1940s. The Belkorp Group has grown over the past decades and has diversified holdings throughout the United States and Canada.
Links: * Belkorp Ag * Peter on LinkedIn * Join the Co-op
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Joe Mosher is the Founder and Principal of Mosher Consulting Group and host of The Pacesetter Pod. Mosher Consulting Group helps food and agribusiness companies grow their businesses, deliver profitable results, and set their people up for future success.
For more than 15 years, Joe has supported executives in executing their strategies and realizing value from their M&A activities. He is focused on the small to middle market food and agribusiness sector.
Links: * Joe on LinkedIn * Mosher Consulting Group * Join the Co-op
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Matt Nicoletti is the Director of Business Development at Penny Newman Grain Company. From its beginning in 1878 as a mercantile store in Fresno, CA, Penny Newman Grain has grown to become a leading merchant in the international market for grain and feed by-products. They are supply chain experts and develop unique logistical solutions to deliver a maximum return for producers whilst minimizing input costs for end-users. Their newest division, Farm Products, offers a portfolio of innovative crop fertility inputs that help growers improve their profitability through regenerative methods. Penny Newman’s Farm Products Division was born out of a recognition that optimum crop fertility and resilience can be accomplished through alternative methods to those being offered to growers today.
Links: * Penny Newman Website * Acre Awards Part 1 * Acre Awards Part 2 * Join the Co-op
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Tune in for our end of year award, recap, and predictions show! Part 2:
- Biggest Change for 2024
- Podcast Recap and Goals
- Nuss Farms Recap and Goals
- Boring Business of the Year
- 2023 Obsession
- 2024 Predictions
- Ag Business Ideas
Links: * Edward Silva on Future of Ag podcast * Seana Day and Mark Brooks on AgTech investing
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Tune in for our end of year award, recap, and predictions show! Part 1:
- Favorite Episode of the Year
- Business We'd Invest $10,000 In
- Ag Person of the Year
- Favorite Business Person
- Craziest Person We're Following
- Favorite Content
Links: * Kevin Schwartz on the podcast * The Climate Corporation * Agtonomy * Maui Nui * Ohalo * Brent Beshore * Andrew Wilkinson * David Senra Founders Podcast * Reg Zeller * Jesse Itzler * Jeremy Giffon on Invest Like the Best
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Lundberg Family Farms is a leading grower of organic rice and maker of best-selling packaged rice and rice snacks. We talk with Brita Lundberg, Communications Manager and Bryce Lundberg, VP of Agriculture regarding the company’s origin story, regenerative ag efforts, approach to marketing, and how they continue to innovate and grow the family business.
Links: * Lundberg Website * Join the Co-op
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Dan White is the Co-Founder and CEO of Clean Crop Technologies, an agtech startup that uses electricity to fight food waste and food safety risk. Clean Crop's proprietary 'Clean Current' technology combines electricity and food-grade gasses to remove contaminants from seeds and foods to increase crop yields, reduce food waste, and increase food safety.
Links: * Dan on LinkedIn * Clean Crop Website * Join the Co-op
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Tim Bucher is the CEO and Founder of Agtonomy, a hybrid autonomy and tele-assist platform for agriculture vehicles. They partner with established equipment manufacturers to transform tractors and agriculture machines into autonomous and remote-controlled equipment that is accessible to local farmers.
Tim is a lifelong farmer who also spent the bulk of his career in the tech industry in Silicon Valley. He worked for a number of successful startups and founders, including Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Michael Dell. We dig into his background and the story of founding and scaling Agtonomy.
Links: * Tim on LinkedIn * Agtonomy Website * Join the Co-op
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Farming is a team sport - A framework for roles on the farm."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Links: * Join the Co-op * Subscribe to Topsoil
Sponsor: This episode is presented by Local Line. Learn more HERE. Check out our interview with Cole.
Bill Camarillo is the President and CEO of Agromin. Agromin, with facilities throughout California, manufactures earth-friendly soil products for farmers, government entities, landscapers and gardeners. Agromin is the organics recycler for over 200 California communities, making it one of the largest organics recyclers in the state.
Bill shares his story of getting into the compost industry, growing Agromin, leaning into the regenerative ag and climate smart ag movements, and much more!
Links: * Bill on LinkedIn * Agromin Website * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Kevin Wolz formerly led the Savanna Institute as its Co-Executive Director. In 2022, he joined Canopy Farm Management as its Chief Executive Officer. Canopy is a business launched by the Savanna Institute and Grantham Environmental Trust to expand agroforestry services in the Midwest. While CEO of Canopy, Kevin continues his contributions to Savanna Institute’s mission as a lead scientist. Kevin’s academic background has blended biology, agroecology, and engineering, with a focus spanning a wide range of methods and applications – from biogeochemical cycling and ecological monitoring to biophysical modeling and economic analyses. He was the founding Chair of the Institute’s Board of Directors. Kevin enjoys experimenting and learning on his own two agroforestry farms on long-term-leased land in Champaign County, IL.
Links: * Kevin on LinkedIn * Canopy Farm Management * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Ali Cox is an agriculture and food ingredient marketing visionary and founder of Noble West, an award-winning marketing consultancy that believes that agriculture deserves better. The company specializes in the entire agriculture ecosystem and is at the forefront of regenerative water use, upcycling, zero waste greenhouses as well as hydroponic and organic farming. Ali and the team of brilliant changemakers are considered the industry leaders when it comes to strategic and creative services including brand identity, campaign development, content planning, media planning, production and more. Often referring to their specialized offerings as B2G (Business to Grower), Cox’s deep and unique knowledge in the area of Grower Marketing is setting the standard industry-wide.
Links: * Ali on LinkedIn * Noble West Website * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
On this edition of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler discuss some of their latest learnings in business and investing. Tim shares a recap of being full time at the farm this year and looks ahead to next year.
Links: * Acquired Podcast * Founders Podcast * All-In Podcast * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
As Pivot Bio’s Chief Executive Officer, Chris is focused on increasing farmer profitability and resiliency, as well as driving a dramatic improvement of the agriculture supply chain’s environmental sustainability by replacing synthetic fertilizers with new crop nutrition technologies.
Chris has invested in and helped build companies across the ag and food value chain from on-farm biological and digital solutions to midstream processing and logistics, down to the food ingredient and brand manufacturers. With a distinct focus on agriculture, fertilizer efficiency and agtech, deep industry relationships, and capital market expertise, Chris has served as an investor and advisor to dozens of sustainable technology companies.
Prior to joining Pivot Bio in 2023, Chris was Co-Head of Continental Grain's Conti Ventures, where he helped build the company’s portfolio as a diversified global investor in food and agribusiness. Chris launched his career in agriculture on Wall Street at Piper Jaffray & Co., EcoAlpha Asset Management and Craig-Hallum Capital Group. As an advocate for creating programs to support youth, Chris serves on the board of InnerCity Tennis. Chris holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Minnesota.
Links: * Chris on LinkedIn * Pivot Bio Website * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Ben Gordon is the CEO of Fractal Ag, a farmland investment platform that brings investors alongside farmers to drive impact and returns. Ben previously co-created Corteva Agriscience's carbon program while also leading Business Development. His background includes experience in agriculture technology, management consulting, and private equity due diligence. Ben previously served as an Infantry Officer in the US Army. He was raised in North Dakota where the original family homestead is still farmed by extended family. He lives in San Francisco, CA.
Links: * Ben on LinkedIn * Fractal Ag * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Join the Co-op for full episode!
Seana Day of Culterra Capital and Mark Brooks of FMC Ventures led a Zoom call with our Co-op members discussing the latest in investing in agtech. We cover:
- Impact of flat and reduced valuations
- Need for lower middle market in ag
- Are OEM incumbents done acquiring?
- Is agtech shifting away from software solutions?
- Exits in agfintech
- Robotics having a moment
- Emerging geographies
- How AI impacts investing strategy
Links: * Farm Tech Landscape Map * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Nic De Castro is the Founder and CEO of LandTrust. LandTrust exists to enable the enjoyment, profitability, and sustainability of America’s undeveloped private lands. For farmers and ranchers who are looking for a practical way to add income to their operations, LandTrust is a website that connects landowners with respectful sportsmen looking to pay for access to their land. Unlike government programs, leases, or outfitters, LandTrust is a partner that helps build a valuable new income from sportsmen while keeping landowners in full control.
Links: * Nuss Farms Farm Tour on LandTrust * Nic on Linkedin * LandTrust * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Kevin Schwartz has been an investor in the food and agribusiness industry for more than two decades. Today he leads Paine Schwartz Partners as Chief Executive Officer and Managing Partner. He is further the Chairman of Paine Schwartz Partners’ ESG Committee driving a truly differentiated approach to sustainable food chain investing with material emphasis on the development of positive impacts.
Links: * Kevin on LinkedIn * Paine Schwartz Partners * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Weeds will decide the winners - A framework for weed control in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Links: * Join the Co-op * John Kempf's Podcast Episode * Subscribe to Topsoil
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
On this edition of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler break down their takeaways from attending the RFSI Forum last month in Denver focused on the investing landscape in regenerative agriculture. They also share some sound bites from Brian Dawson, Rosario Bennett, and Jack Richardson on their biggest takeaways as well.
Links: * RFSI Forum * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Robby Sansom is Co-Founder & CEO at Force of Nature, a regeneratively sourced meat company based in Austin, TX.
Robby’s roots run deep in the natural food community. Previously, as CFO/COO at EPIC, Robby spent much of the last decade studying regenerative agriculture at ranches all over the world. Through this education, Force of Nature was co-founded with the intention to accelerate the creation of a global regenerative supply network. Force of Nature works in partnership with land stewards, ranchers and farmers committed to creating a positive return on the planet. With Force of Nature, consumers now have the ability to invest in environmental regeneration by consuming meat that is good for the planet.
Born and raised in Austin, TX, he received both a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree from the University of Texas. When he’s not building businesses aimed at saving the planet, Robby can be found on a trail, ocean, mountain or field, always making time to appreciate nature and explore his surroundings. Robby is also a land steward at ROAM Ranch where he owns regeneratively managed bison.
Links: * Robby on LinkedIn * Force of Nature on Instagram * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Marcus Lovell Smith is the CEO of Neutral Foods, the first carbon neutral food company in the United States that debuted nationally in 2021 with organic whole and 2% milk products available in more than 2,000 grocery stores from coast to coast. An accomplished leader in sustainable agriculture, technology, and entrepreneurship, Marcus has a personal connection to the agricultural world and a passion for the urgent need to reshape its impact on the planet. Steadfast to make a difference in climate change, Marcus and his team at Neutral are partnering with farmers and ranchers to apply the latest in agricultural science, reduce their carbon footprints and boost the supply side of more sustainable dairy and beef products to meet growing demand from consumers looking to improve their carbon footprints. Marcus lives on a family farm in New Hampshire, Boggy Meadow, that produces artisanal cheese. He moved to the family farm 20 years ago and spent the first four years as a full-time dairy farmer and small business owner. Marcus has a personal understanding of farmers' challenges and an unwavering commitment to forging sustainable practices that protect the environment. Marcus remains a Special Advisor at Breakthrough Energy Ventures. Previously, he was the CTO of Google Fiber, a role that helped revolutionize fiber-optic internet and television services. He also served as the CEO of Diagnostics for All, a nonprofit organization dedicated to saving lives in the developing world. Marcus has navigated Neutral Foods through its initial funding rounds. Under his guidance, the company closed a Series A funding round, securing $12 million, with Breakthrough Energy Ventures leading the investment. Notably, investors such as LeBron James, John Legend, and Questlove recognized the transformative potential of Neutral Foods, contributing, among other investors, to earlier seed rounds totaling approximately $8 million. Marcus is currently an Entrepreneur in Residence at Harvard University. He has been featured in The New York Times, CNBC.com, and on multiple live broadcasts of Cheddar News and local news stations nationwide.
Links: * Marcus on LinkedIn * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Peter Williams is the President of MyLand and has been with the company for three years, where he focuses on strategy, corporate finance, sales and marketing.
Peter has over twenty-five years of experience with a career that spans engineering, sales and investment banking, prior to launching, running and exiting a diverse group of businesses. As an advisor, Peter has been involved in over $13 billion in private and public equity and debt financing transactions; and has advised on numerous mergers & acquisitions with an aggregate transaction value of approximately $3 billion. These transactions covered a broad range of industries including electric and gas utilities, chemicals, agriculture, fertilizer, aerospace and defense, biofuels, clean technology, and construction.
Links: * Peter on LinkedIn * Become a Premium Subscriber
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
We are excited to share the first edition of our new podcast series focused on telling the stories of ag companies. The story of The Climate Corporation spans decades, multiple name changes, acquisitions, controversy, product pivots and more. Hear about the company that David Friedberg founded and sold to Monsanto for $930 million, plus the history and future of digital agriculture.
Links: * Join the Co-op! * David's Letter to the Company * Contributors: Rhishi Pethe, Nathan Faleide, and Mark Young * Our interview with Corbett Kull * Our interview with Craig Rupp
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Beyond the carbon buzz - A framework for environmental sustainability in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Links: * Join the Co-op * Subscribe to Topsoil
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Episode 300 is here. Check out the new look website and Co-op. Plus, we talk about why we recently made the decision to quit organic at Nuss Farms.
Links: * Join the Co-op! * Check out the Shop
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Tom Ryan is a 23-year veteran of the Land O’Lakes, Inc. federated system. Tom has held multiple leadership roles in sales, agronomy, marketing and operations across Land O’Lakes. Prior to joining Truterra, Tom headed WinField United’s business operations team including customer experience, business analytics and data science. Tom also led WinField United’s Strategic Retail Alliance efforts executing partnerships, alliances and joint ventures across WinField United’s aligned retail network.
Tom currently serves as the President of Truterra, Land O’Lakes’ sustainability division focused on creating new value streams by driving farmer adoption of climate-smart practices and forging customer connections between farmers, ag retailers, Food and CPG companies. Tom has a strong track record as an executive with industry-spanning experience in agronomy and ag retailer services. He is also an active partner and multi-generation farmer who practices sustainability and soil health practices on his own farm in southwest Minnesota.
Links: * Truterra Website * Tom on LinkedIn * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed
Sponsor: This episode is presented by MyLand. Learn more at MyLand.ag. Check out our interview with Dane.
Sarah Day Levesque is the Founder and Managing Director of RFSI – Regenerative Food Systems Investment – and has spent more than 15 years working to connect agriculture and food systems stakeholders to the information and networks they need to be successful. For the past six years, Sarah has worked closely with a community of ecological farmers in her role leading the development and execution of educational and event experiences at Acres USA. In late 2018, Sarah started Regenerative Food Systems Investment to address to address a lack of attention, awareness, and capital being given to investment opportunities in regenerative agriculture and food.
Before joining Acres USA in late 2016, Sarah spent a decade in agricultural media, where she played a key role in the development of successful event and media brands, including Women in Agribusiness and Organic & Non-GMO Forum, and also served as Editor-in-Chief of Global AgInvesting Media.
Sarah holds an M.S. in Agriculture and Resource Economics and an M.S. in International Agricultural Development from University of California, Davis. When she’s not working, you can find her running, hiking, coaching youth basketball, or playing ball with her family.
Links: * RFSI Forum 2023 (Use code THEMODERNACRE at checkout for 10% off!) * Sarah on LinkedIn * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Join the fitness challenge on Twitter
Sponsor: This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com. Check out Mick's e
Dan Schultz is an agribusiness psychotherapist that helps agtech companies design their category and commercialize products differently.
Links: * Dan on LinkedIn * Schultz Collaborative * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Join the fitness challenge on Twitter
Sponsor: This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Cassidy Johnston grew up in a suburb of Denver but has now been ranching for over a decade. She serves in the gap between the ranch and the table to build relationships and form bold partnerships to answer the question, “Where does my food come from?”
Cassidy received her Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Studies from the University of Colorado Boulder. She was a student researcher at the Leeds School of Business Research Division, graduating early with honors. While there, she completed a thesis titled “Building a Rancher-Environmentalist Alliance to Protect Ranch Land Environments from Development,” and that paper was the proverbial spur in the flank that started her journey in the ranching industry.
She and her husband, Robert, have lived and worked on ranches in Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico and have three little boys. Besides being an agriculture consultant and speaker, she is a bull and semen rep, podcaster, book enthusiast, and collector of weird socks.
Links: * Cassidy on LinkedIn * Cassidy on Instagram * Cassidy's Website * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Join the fitness challenge on Twitter
Sponsor: This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Alain Goubau is the CEO of Combyne Ag, which builds farmer-centric grain marketing management software.
Alain grew up on a mixed dairy and grain farm in Ontario, Canada. Prior to Combyne Ag, Alain led operations at 2 agtech and wind energy startups. He has also led various operational and strategy engagements within McKinsey & Company’s agri-business team. Earlier in his career, Alain was a field engineer and project manager with Air Liquide, building chemical plants across the globe.
Leveraging his background in agriculture, technology, engineering, and law, Alain is a passionate builder of teams and innovations at the intersection of agriculture, energy, and tech.
Combyne Ag unifies inventory, contract, delivery, and settlement record-keeping to inform pricing and contracting risks, inventory-to-cash conversion cycles, and operational planning. By providing up-to-date crop marketing positions and informing decision making, Combyne helps farmers and their crop marketing advisors optimize the value of every bushel of grain they market. Through its Combyne Connect software integration capabilities, Combyne is designed to neutrally connect into both on-farm apps and grain buyer software systems. Using this same technology stack, Combyne also acts as a digital link between on-farm and off-farm data records, enabling biofuel, animal feed, and food supply chains to track grain quality and sustainability related attributes from farm to processing.
Combyne Ag was recently acquired by Bayer Crop Science’s Digital Farming Solutions and continues to operate as an independent business unit.
Links: * Rate & Review the NEW Spotify Feed * Join the fitness challenge on Twitter
Sponsor: This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Data: the new oil or a new byproduct? A framework for data from the field."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Connect with Ariel Topsoil Newsletter | LinkedIn
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Dane Hague is the CEO and co-founder of MyLand, a soil health company. MyLand’s innovative and patented technology and unique Soil as a Service approach allows farmers to easily and rapidly implement regenerative agriculture practices and improve their soil health by harnessing the land’s own native ecosystem, because No Two Farms are Alike. MyLand uses live, native microalgae to improve soil health more rapidly. Through their technology and service, MyLand helps tackle two of the world’s biggest challenges: food security and climate disruption.
Connect with MyLand Website | LinkedIn
Follow our Fitness Challenge on Twitter!
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Anthony Howcroft is the CEO of SWARM Engineering. SWARM is a Software-as-a-Service platform that uses next generation cognitive computing to tackle challenges in the agri-food supply chain to save costs, reduce waste, and deliver environmental benefits. The SWARM platform is structured around a multi-agent approach which utilizes a curated market of algorithms to optimize key processes such as load planning, inbound and outbound logistics, demand/supply planning, maximizing yield, and pricing optimization. SWARM provides an easy way for business users to define problems, and rapidly match them to advanced solutions without any software coding, knowledge of advanced AI, or machine learning.
Anthony has more than 25 years’ experience in technology, in a mix of corporate and startup roles that cover software engineering, sales and marketing. He was co-founder and VP Sales of DATAllegro, the data warehouse appliance vendor acquired by Microsoft for $260M in 2008. He subsequently ran Microsoft’s Big Data team in EMEA for 5 years, showing triple digit growth each year. After a 3-year stint mentoring CEOs in California, he launched SWARM. He has a Creative Writing Diploma from the University of Oxford and has lectured on the use of narrative in business. His non-fiction book Questions: A User’s Guide was published in October 2020, achieving Amazon bestseller status, and the research behind the book is being used to enhance the approach of the SWARM Challenge Modeler product.
Connect with SWARM Website | LinkedIn
Giveaway! Rate & Review the podcast and send proof to tyler@themodernacre.co. The first 5 entries will win Anthony's book Questions
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Brenda Tjaden, founder of Prairie Routes, led this Co-op members call talking about how to monetize and model regenerative agriculture. This is jam packed with info and member Q&A.
Subscribe to Brenda's Substack
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Maria Cho is the CEO of Triplebar, a synthetic biology company based in California. It is a venture-backed startup with funding from The Production Board, a VC firm with a focus on sustainability, especially in the food and agriculture industries. Triplebar Bio works at the interface of biological and engineering sciences to engineer and discover microbes that produce a wide range of molecules across the food, agriculture, and pharmaceutical industries.
Maria is a veteran business leader with more than 15 years building industry-leading teams and a biologics expert with unique range of commercial experience, from therapeutics to cosmetics to CRO/CMO.
Connect with Triplebar Website | LinkedIn
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Where the crops go: A framework for demand in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Connect with Ariel Topsoil Newsletter | LinkedIn
Links Podcast with Justin Mares
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Check out Tim's LinkedIn post on our experience at Nuss Farms with regenerative agriculture.
Stephen Hohenrieder is the Founder and CEO of Grounded Capital which invests long-term private financial capital with a systems-based, holistic approach to achieve Impact across Five Areas of Focus: Places, Energy, People, Food and Nature. Stephen leads day-to-day operations and portfolio strategy for the firm, he is also focused on certain private equity and private credit holdings where he contributes his experience investing in regenerative food and agriculture over the past decade. Stephen has spent the past twenty-five years investing on behalf of family offices and their related entities, serving as the CEO and CIO of individual family offices, building a registered investment advisor to serve multiple families, as a general partner of two private equity firms, and through his work at Grounded Capital.
Connect with Grounded Capital Website | LinkedIn
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Tim and Tyler dial up the ag takes on this edition of Acre Insights, including the state of indoor farming, the latest greenwashing by CPG's, and Kiss the Ground's new film on regenerative ag. But first, Tyler shares the details of going viral on his family's vacation to Europe.
Links Europe Vlogs
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
Derek Azevedo is the Executive Vice President of Bowles Farming Company. Prior to joining Bowles in early 2017, Derek spent 12 years working with farmers throughout the Central Valley as a business development representative for the world’s largest tomato processor.
Bowles Farming Company is a family owned and operated farming operation located near Los Banos in the Central Valley of California. The farm is currently being managed by the 6th generation of the Bowles & Lawrence families. They produce primarily annual crops with a focus on tomatoes (processing and fresh), melons, Extra Long Staple cotton, alfalfa and much more.
Connect with Bowles Website | LinkedIn
This episode is presented by DPH Biologicals. Learn more at DPHBio.com
In April 2021, Mick Messman was named President and Chief Executive Officer of DPH Biologicals, bringing twenty-five years of experience in crop protection, seed treatment and biologicals after serving in commercial leadership roles at two leading multi-nationals and emerging agtech companies. Today, Mick is leading DPH Biologicals to deliver more value to partners and growers through collaborative relationships and access to its trusted biological platform.
DPH Biologicals aims to become the industry’s most trusted biologicals provider, based one of the industry’s most trusted technologies that has delivered unmatched results to improve soil structure while increasing nutrient uptake across a wide range of crops, soil types and growing environments. For more than three decades, we have delivered value to the row and specialty crop, turf and ornamental markets. With unique applicability across broad soil types, our technology platform, TerraTrove™, built on SP-1 Classic™ formulation, has been refined across millions of acres to make it the most complete biofertility solution available. We are committed to building upon the DPH Biologicals heritage to help meet the needs of a growing population and address global concerns of climate change, food security and clean water.
Connect with DPH Website | LinkedIn | CropLife Article
Peter Martin is an Advisory Partner at Pinion and Matt Powell is a Global Innovation Leader at Pinion, CEO of Robot Accounts, and Co-Founder of AgWorld.
Pinion, formerly named KCoe Isom, is a ‘U.S. Top 100’ accounting firm and global leader in food and agriculture consulting. With roots dating back to 1932, the firm has expanded upon traditional accounting services to deliver increased value and growth for clients through comprehensive policy-to-plate strategies, and specialized advisory in the areas of sustainability, government affairs, farm programs, land management, financial management, succession planning, and business strategy.
Robot Accounts provides AI powered automated accounting and financial data standardization, workflow and integration.
Connect with Pinion Website | LinkedIn
This month, the Modern Acre Co-op got together to discuss all things AI in agriculture. It was a roundtable discussion that was wide-ranging and including a number of different use-cases for how people are thinking about and leveraging AI in their businesses.
Participants: Chris Bunio of Theory Mesh, Chase Dwelle, Kenny Lee of Aigen, Erik Wolfe of Sound Agriculture, Jim Cupples of All the Farms, Dustin Brunn of Dunn Dairy, and Ria Xi of CropSafe
Connect with the Co-op Details | Apply
Dr. Michael Gilbert is the founder and Chairman of the Board of Semios, the leading precision farming loT platform for tree fruits, nuts, and grapes. Michael is a natural product synthetic chemist with a PhD from University of British Columbia and a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Vienna. He has 25 years of experience in agtech and biotech R&D and production. In 2009, Michael founded Semios to meet the growing demand for data-driven sustainable and traceable food production.
Michael joins us to share his story of founding the company and how the have strategically scaled through acquisitions, distribution, technology, and business model. Tune in!
Connect with Semios Website | Twitter
Kit Barron is the Head of Data Science & Analytics at Farmer's Business Network, an independent agricultural tech and commerce platform and farmer-to-farmer network that helps its members make confident decisions to ensure the economic viability of their farms and work toward a sustainable future. FBN is an advocate for family farmers and ranchers, and does whatever it takes to help farmers become more prosperous - whether it's through data science-driven agronomic insights about their fields, providing farm inputs through its e-commerce store, helping farmers sell their crop more intelligently and independently, or providing them with health or crop insurance. FBN arms farmers with the tools they need to make the best decisions for their business, their families and the planet.
Kit joins the pod to provide some updates on FBN and share more about their recent launch of Norm, their AI agronomy advisor. Tune in!
Connect with FBN Website | Norm
Jacob Muise is the Founder and CEO of Maui Nui Venison. Their venison comes from Axis deer, a non-native species to Hawaiʻi. Numerous and free-roaming, these deer are truly wild until the moment they humanely harvest them using 100% stress-free methods. Because their deer are wild instead of being raised for food, they enjoy a natural varied diet, which means their meat is higher in nutrients and noticeably more delicious.
Connect with Maui Nui Venison Website | Nutrient Density Study
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "We didn't produce this much only to produce this much: A framework for understanding yield in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Connect with Ariel Topsoil Newsletter | LinkedIn
Carson Britz is the Sr. Manager of Sustainable Ag at Nutrien Ag Solutions. Nutrien Ag Solutions is a subsidiary of Nutrien Ltd., a leading global agricultural solutions provider. The company was formed in 2018 as a result of a merger between Agrium Inc. and Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan Inc. Nutrien Ag Solutions is primarily focused on providing agricultural inputs and services to farmers, helping them achieve higher crop yields and better farm productivity.
Nutrien Ag Solutions operates a vast retail network, offering a wide range of products and services. With a strong presence in North America, Australia, and South America, Nutrien Ag Solutions is committed to providing innovative and sustainable solutions that help farmers meet the increasing global demand for food while minimizing the environmental impact of agricultural practices.
Connect with Nutrien Website | LinkedIn
Paul Pittman is the founder and executive chairman of Farmland Partners, a publicly traded real estate investment trust (REIT) that purchases, leases, and manages high-quality farmland throughout North America.
Paul grew up in a farm family and has been buying and operating farms since the mid-1990s. Many of his farmland assets in Illinois, Nebraska, and Colorado were contributed to Farmland Partners Inc. at the time of its initial public offering in 2014. Paul has served as the company’s Chairman since that time, and he remains one of its largest shareholders. He was the company’s CEO until February 2023.
Before devoting full attention to his farming and farmland ownership businesses, Paul was the CFO of Jazz Technologies, a publicly traded semiconductor foundry. Prior, he started TheJobsite.com, which merged into HomeSphere, an enterprise software company where Paul served as President. Paul has worked as an investment banker in London, New York, and San Francisco, specializing in mergers and acquisitions with Merrill Lynch, Wasserstein Perella & Co, and ThinkEquity. He began his career as an attorney with Sullivan & Cromwell.
Connect with Farmland Partners Website | LinkedIn
Jessie Deelo founded Deelo Consulting Services to design strategies for agricultural systems change. Building off her career as a farmer, Extension specialist and industry consultant, she integrates expertise in regenerative agriculture, corporate impact programs, food systems and strategy. Through analysis of landscape, markets, cultures and stakeholders, Jessie develops markets for place-based regenerative agriculture. In commodity markets, she executes strategic solutions for climate-smart sourcing and low-carbon ingredient supply chains.
Jessie has sector expertise in North American dairy, grains and oilseeds, and organic and regenerative agriculture. She also has experiential knowledge of small- to mid-scale organic horticultural production. Her graduate school training in International Agricultural Development from the University of California-Davis shapes her approach to supply chain sustainability for global markets.
Connect with Jessie Website
Niall Haughey is the Founder of Graze and writer of the Agri Fintech Newsletter covering the category globally.
Niall specialized in Financial Services at Deloitte before founding an SME Payments business and performing advisory work for clients including Royal Bank of Scotland, Investec, UBS, Centrica and others. Since 2015, Niall has focused on fintech product design and development for the Food and Agriculture sector in sub-Saharan Africa, including developing Input Finance, Warehouse Receipt Finance for grains and Pay-As-You-Go Asset Finance structures.
With Graze, Niall wants to utilize his combined expertise of conventional Financial Services and cutting edge Agri Fintech to design modern financial services for global food systems.
Connect with Niall Website | Newsletter
Bailey Stockdale is the founder & CEO of Leaf, food and agriculture’s data infrastructure company. Bailey has worked with food and agriculture technology since 2014 as a software developer, entrepreneur, and EIR at SP Ventures’ AgTech fund. Bailey is passionate about empowering developers that are solving farming, health, and sustainability challenges through food and agriculture technology. With Leaf, he contributes to broadening industry access and building the tools that food and agriculture technology needs to scale. Leaf provides farm data infrastructure similar to Plaid in finance, Twilio in communications, or Stipe in payments.
Connect with Leaf Website | Twitter
Craig Rupp is the CEO and Founder of Sabanto, a Farming-as-a-Service company that provides total turn-key agriculture services using our supervised autonomous equipment platform.
Connect with Sabanto Website | Twitter
This month, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Crops grow where cash flows: A framework for understanding the business of farming."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Connect with Ariel Topsoil Newsletter | LinkedIn
Grant Jones is the Co-Founder and Chief Agricultural Officer at Mt. Joy, a fast casual restaurant on a mission to accelerate global adoption of regenerative agricultural practices.
Connect with Mt. Joy Website | Instagram
Tune in this week to hear Tim and Tyler's takeaways from attending the 2023 World AgriTech Innovation Summit in SF. They hit on the state of farmers, biological innovation, the retail/advisor ecosystem, M&A and consolidation, and more!
Michael Macolino is the Managing Director for the APAC region at SVG Ventures THRIVE, as well as a serial entrepreneur and business advisor. He launched his first company at 21, which started a 15 year journey to launch four other businesses across a range of industries. His long term support of entrepreneurship and mentoring was recognised in 2020, as a winner in the InDaily 40 under 40 awards.
Michael’s curiosity for solving problems using technology led him to Agriculture and the food system, where he now leverages his skills, experience and network to help AgriFood Tech startups commercialise and scale their innovations to redesign the food system. Prior to joining SVG Ventures Thrive Michael led AgriFood Tech at BDO Australia for 4 years, where he was an advisor to several Investors, Start-ups, Agribusinesses and Government Departments.
Michael is deeply engaged in the development of the AgriFood tech eco-system, working with various startup events and programs, as well as being the co-organiser of the South Australian AgriTech Meetup Group. Michael’s thinking on redesigning the food system was featured in his TEDx talk, in which he detailed the potential of emerging technologies in agriculture to build a more sustainable and resilient food system.
Connect with Michael Website | LinkedIn | SVG Ventures Thrive
Stuart Woolf is President and CEO of Woolf Farming & Processing. Woolf Farming & Processing is a family owned operation whose primary business is the production and processing of agricultural commodities. He was involved with the establishment of two related entities: Harris Woolf California Almonds and Los Gatos Tomato Products. Harris Woolf is a processor and handler of raw almonds. Los Gatos manufactures bulk tomato paste for industrial users.
Connect with Woolf Farming & Processing Website
Elizabeth Fastiggi is the Head of Worldwide Agriculture at AWS. She partners with customers on transformative initiatives that align digital innovation with their business vision and is motivated by the opportunity to create solutions that create a healthier, transparent, and more inclusive food system. Prior to AWS, Elizabeth led Market Development at Indigo Agriculture and Business Development at Farmers Business Network. Previously, Elizabeth was a private equity investor with GE Capital and Ziff Brothers Investments, structuring investments in the energy and agriculture sectors. Elizabeth began her career at the Environmental Defense Fund, developing partnerships with market leading corporations to improve environmental and financial performance.
Connect with Elizabeth AWS Agriculture Solutions | LinkedIn
In this new monthly series, Tim and Tyler talk with Ariel about her latest Topsoil edition - "Turns out, Seasons are a Thing in Agriculture: a framework for understanding seasonal activities in agriculture."
Ariel Patton is the creator of Topsoil, a newsletter bringing you monthly frameworks to help make sense of agriculture, at just the right depth. Ariel has focused her career on driving digital transformation of agriculture to help farmers manage their businesses more profitably and sustainably at Monsanto, Granular, Corteva and currently, Mineral.
Connect with Ariel Topsoil Newsletter | LinkedIn
Aaron Hutchinson is the President and Co-Founder of CropTrak. CropTrak brings decades of experience as the leading cloud technology solution to document, share, and analyze an entire supply chain in real-time from source through production. By digitally enabling and connecting their entire supply chain management process, customers can more seamlessly weave together the story of their product, contract, and certification – resulting in significant efficiency gains internally and improved supplier relationships. Started more than a decade ago by a team of entrepreneurial farm kids and data security experts with a background in 3D military GIS software, they set forth to help create the most efficient, effective and transparent supply chain.
Connect with CropTrak Website | LinkedIn
Tim's LinkedIn post on our experience with organic farming went viral. We dig into our experience and thoughts on organic before providing some updates on The Modern Acre Co-op membership community!
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Cole Jones is the CEO and Founder of Local Line. Local Line helps farmers, food hubs, and farmers' markets access new customers and digitize their businesses. Their e-commerce, CRM, inventory and logistics modules enable food producers of all kinds to control their own brand and grow their business on their terms.
Connect with Local Line Website | LinkedIn
Ian Harley is CEO and co-founder of Traction Ag, Inc, a cloud-based farm accounting and management software company focused on helping farmers become more profitable and efficient. Ian has more than 25 years of experience in sales and management of AgTech companies, delivering accounting, operations and agronomy software. Prior to Traction Ag, Ian held roles at Granular, Trimble and Farm Works Software. Traction Ag is the only farm management solution uniquely built for the cloud, integrating actual accounting numbers with field operations, resulting in real-time financial analysis for timely, informed decision-making. Traction Ag delivers the most extensive suite of farm-specific accounting capabilities in a cloud application and allows users to automatically and easily maintain inventory balances for crops and supplies, tracks costs of production and field-level profitability; providing crucial insights and saving valuable time. The company is majority employee and farmer-owned business and leverages integrations with Climate FieldView and John Deere Operations Center to automate and ease the collection of field activities.
Guillermo Valenzuela is the VP of Sales and Marketing at WiseConn, an agtech company that has developed a technology to measure and control water and other fluids in such diverse areas such as agriculture, mining and hydrology. The WiseConn platform consists of a wireless hardware installed on the field and software that is accessible through the Internet, allowing users to view their process and make informed decisions.
Connect with WiseConn Website | LinkedIn
Trey Hill is the owner and manager of Harborview Farms in Rock Hall, Maryland. A fourth generation grain farmer, he and his family sustainably produce corn, wheat, and soybeans for the Mid-Atlantic region. A graduate of Purdue University with a degree in Farm Management and Economics, Trey has been committed throughout his career to innovative agriculture sustainability.
At Harborview Farms, he and his team are breaking new ground with innovative and creative farming techniques — combining the wisdom of traditional practices with forward thinking, environmentally conscious solutions that are shaping the future of the agricultural industry. Trey talks about his operation, his focus on technology and sustainability, carbon markets, and much more!
Connect with Trey LinkedIn | Harborview Farms
Founders Gabe Sibley and Curtis Garner are the CEO and COO, respectively, of Verdant Robotics. After coming on the show last year, Gabe and Curtis join this week to give an update on Verdant, including raising their Series A, progress on commercialization, and dealing with a changing economic landscape.
Connect with Verdant Robotics Website | LinkedIn
Chris Kerston is the Co-CEO of Land to Market, the world’s first outcomes-based verified regenerative sourcing solution. They support brands and producers who are leading the way in giving the land a voice and working to improve soil health, water, biodiversity and ecosystem function. Chris ranched full time for over 10 years before joining the Savory Institute. With a longstanding passion for regenerative agricultural and better food distribution systems, Chris has dedicated his life to helping connect ranchers with consumers in ways that create synergistic value for both sides.
Connect with Land to Market Website | LinkedIn
BIG ANNOUNCEMENT - Tim is joining Nuss Farms full time in 2023 to further support the farm's growth and regenerative transition. We talk through what this means for Tim and the farm, while also covering our 2023 predictions in ag.
Email Tim to connect at tim@nussfarms.com
Erik Westblom is the Co-Founder and CEO of Provision, and agtech startup that makes cloud software to streamline food safety and QA. Clients can build simple digital templates that expedite recordkeeping, with automatic schedules, rules, and alerts that increase compliance. All food safety and quality data is centralized in one hub with automatic history and customizable reporting. This makes it faster to complete audits, and easier to analyze processes.
Connect with Provision Website | LinkedIn
Shannon Boselli and Clara Cecil are the Head of Sales and Business Development and the Head of Customer Success, respectively, at Proof. Proof aims to lead the next evolution of business intelligence through verified ESG & Impact Data. They believe that all future decisions, whether it be business decisions, investment decisions, or broad consumer behavior, will be influenced by their effect on people and the planet. This can only be achieved through real-time access to verified impact data. Therefore, Proof is building the digital infrastructure that will drive that transformation in the market. Founded in 2019, Proof brought together a global team of experts in impact measurement, impact investing, and technology solutions to deliver an end-to-end solution that changes the way investors will make investment decisions for good.
Connect with Proof Website | LinkedIn
Lauren Manning is a Senior Associate at the Croatan Institute, an independent, nonprofit research and action institute whose mission is to build social equity and ecological resilience by leveraging finance to create pathways to a just economy.
Lauren is an attorney, law professor, and farmer with a dedicated passion for all things farming. Before joining Croatan Institute, Lauren was a venture capital investor with food and ag-focused VC firm AgFunder where she focused on deal flow and due diligence. Lauren began with AgFunder in 2015 as part of AgFunderNews media and research team reporting on issues involving finance, agriculture, climate change, and more. Lauren owns a small farm in Northwest Arkansas where she raises cattle, sheep, and goats. She is a partner with Ozark Pasture Beef, a direct-to-consumer grass-finished and pasture-based livestock partnership selling beef and lamb.
Connect with the Croatan Institute Website | LinkedIn
Brandon Welch is the Co-Founder and CEO of Mad Capital. Beginning in 2019, he formulated the idea for the Perennial Fund and has led all efforts from whitepaper creation to financial modeling, fundraising, portfolio management to building the team. In 2021, he led the close of $10M into the Perennial Fund I from 42 investors in 7 countries. He previously managed the Colorado Carbon Fund, a revolving nonprofit fund focused on driving capital into carbon removal projects in CO.
Connect with Mad Cap Website | LinkedIn
Natalie Collins is the Interim President of the California Association of Winegrape Growers (CAWG), who exists to protect and promote the interests of California winegrape growers by providing members a unified voice, effective advocacy and strong leadership. CAWG promotes the winegrowing industry’s long-term success by advancing the adoption of sound public policies, and fostering awareness and understanding of winegrape growers’ contributions to the economy, environment and California communities.
Connect with CAWG Website | LinkedIn
Troy Carter is the CEO and Co-founder of Earthshot Labs, a startup building the technology and expert guidance to develop and finance nature based carbon projects globally. Their mission is to restore nature at the planetary scale. Seizing the unprecedented opportunity of the carbon market, Earthshot is building the technology and operational capacity to scale carbon credits globally in alignment with regenerative principles.
LandOS is a tech enabled platform that guides land stewards step-by-step guidance through the carbon development process. Biome uses the smartphone’s augmented reality capabilities, whether based on IR or LiDAR, combined with the camera in order to create a three dimensional map of all the trees surrounding the user.
Connect with Earshot Labs Website | LinkedIn
Celebrating 250 episodes with a fresh Acre Insights episode. Thanks for listening over the past five years!
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Igino Cafiero is the Co-founder and CEO of Bear Flag Robotics, which was acquired by Deere & Co in August 2021 and is now run as an independent subsidiary. Bear Flag Robotics is developing autonomous farming technology. Growers can orchestrate a fleet of autonomous equipment directly from their smartphone or tablet, allowing them to realize productivity gains and reduce their operational expenses.
Connect with Bear Flag Robotics Website | LinkedIn
Rob Hranac is the CEO of Pattern Ag, an agtech startup developing a recommendation and product discovery platform centered around a deep understanding of soil. They are leveraging advances in genomics, robotics, and high-resolution agronomic data to build this knowledge, in service of improving farm profitability.
Rob joins the podcast to talk about his path to Pattern, their investors and long term vision, and how scaling the company has gone over the past few years. Tune in to learn more!
Connect with Pattern Ag Website | Twitter
THRIVE Global Impact Summit, November 17, 2022 in San Jose, CA Website Use Code PRTNR25 for 25% off
Bill Stoddart and Chris Zuehlsdorff are the CEO and COO, respectively, of Iroquois Valley Farmland REIT, which is an organic farmland finance company that provides farmer-friendly leases and mortgages to the next generation of organic farmers. Since their founding in 2007, they have directed $85 million in investments in organic agriculture. Their goal is to make organic agriculture the norm, not the exception in America to benefit the health of the soil and of future generations.
Connect with Iroquois Valley Website | LinkedIn
This week Tim and Tyler share their takeaways from the Regenerative Food Systems Investment Forum that took place in Denver last week! Tune in if you’re ready for some hot takes on investing in regenerative agriculture.
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Oscar Baracaldo is the CEO and Co-Founder of Farmfolio, an agtech platform that has come together to fulfill a single mission ― To Evolve Agribusiness Ownership. This simple and compelling mission has guided the company to create some of the most meaningful operations in the country of Colombia, for Farmfolio, and for farm owners across the globe. Farmfolio currently exceeds $70M of assets under management and has created high-ranking fully integrated solutions from LATAM into international markets including the US and Europe.
Connect with Farmfolio Website | LinkedIn
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Connie Bowen is the founding General Partner of Farmhand Ventures, a venture studio building the future of work in specialty crop agriculture. She’s also a Venture Partner with Republic, where she collaborates across the startup ecosystem to support founders and their ideas. She is passionate about distributing knowledge and inspiring inclusive, impactful innovation in global food and ag systems.
Connect with Connie LinkedIn | Website
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Alexander Reichert is the co-founder and CEO of AgVend, a digital commerce platform in the agriculture industry. AgVend's tools constructively power the omnichannel experiences for ag retailers, distributors, and manufacturers. Alexander joins us the podcast to talk about founding AgVend, evolving the business model, disruption vs. innovation, and much more. Tune in!
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This week on Acre Insights: What Kim Kardashian's PE fund means for content creation, USDA's "climate-smart" grants that don't actually go to farmers, Patagonia's founder gives away profits, and California's heat wave.
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Eduardo Novillo Astrada is the CEO & Co-Founder of Agrotoken. Agrotoken is a blockchain company that was the first to create stable coins backed by Agro-Commodities. By creating stable coins enabled by blockchain and smart contracts, they create new, unique and improved financial products that will satisfy financial needs in superior
ways.
Connect with Eduardo LinkedIn | Website
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David Leon is an impact-oriented executive whose experience spans early stage venture building in funds, tech, non-profits, and consumer brands. He’s a co-founder and Partner at Biome Capital (a regenerative ag real asset fund) and a co-founder and Executive Director at Farmer’s Footprint (a non-profit accelerating the universal adoption of regenerative agriculture).
Previously he was Principal at Odocava (a growth-centric strategy & ops consulting firm), CEO at Saint Inky’s (a personal care CPG brand), and co-founder of Yogijii (a payments and scheduling platform in health and wellness). David serves as a board member at Kindhumans Foundation and Project Biome Australia. He lives on the island of Lana’i with his partner, Arielle.
Connect with David Farmer’s Footprint | Biome Capital
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Nathan Faleide is an independent agtech consultant with an extensive background in remote sensing. Nathan recently started an agtech newsletter with his takes on the industry. He joins the podcast to dig into some of the realties of agtech and share some hot takes. Tune in!
Connect with Nathan LinkedIn | Easy Observations
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Nathan Faleide is an independent agtech consultant with an extensive background in remote sensing. Nathan recently started an agtech newsletter with his takes on the industry. He joins the podcast to dig into some of the realties of agtech and share some hot takes. Tune in!
Connect with Nathan LinkedIn | Easy Observations
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Natasha Dhayagude is the CEO and Co-founder of Chinova Bioworks, who has developed a revolutionary clean-label preservation technology extracted from white button mushrooms for use in food and beverage applications. This clean-label ingredient is broad-spectrum and can be customized to target individual producers spoilage microbial issues. Chinova recently launched 3 products - Chiber Beverage, Chiber Dairy and Chiber Plant-based dairy. Chiber is certified Vegan, Kosher, Halal and is Organic Compliant. Chinova aims to provide consumers with natural, transparent ingredients they want and provides producers with effective, clean-labels they need.
Connect with Chinova Bioworks Website | LinkedIn
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On this edition of Acre Insights, Tyler provides an overview of his experience doing a road trip in the Rivian electric truck. Tim and Tyler than debate and pitch their competing SXSW panels covering regenerative ag. Lastly, they provide a mid-season update on what's happening on Nuss Farms.
Vote here!
Tim's SXSW Panel: https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/128223
Tyler's SXSW Panel: https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/127786
After voting, email us (tyler@themodernacre.co) or tag/DM us on social to be entered to win a Co-op pass!
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Anthony Corsaro is the Director of Business Development for Regenerative Food Systems Investment (RFSI). Anthony connects with stakeholders across food & ag to create meaningful connections that catalyze the regenerative transformation of our food system. Anthony is committed to building food supply chains that incentivize the production and consumption of healthy, nutrient-dense foods.
Anthony was a third-generation family contributor and executive at Indianapolis Fruit Company before joining Questor Corp. Anthony oversaw the sales & marketing team that provided fresh produce products and services to over 2,500 retail customers across 20 states. Anthony’s professional background in food distribution and personal health journey led him to his commitment of building regenerative food systems. Anthony is an active investor in multiple regenerative food ventures, and he is an entrepreneur in the space as well.
Anthony holds a B.S. in Business from the Kelley School at Indiana University, where he was a varsity athlete as a tight end on the football team.\
Connect with RFSI Website | LinkedIn
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Claire Smith is the founder and CEO of Teffola, a CPG company that exists to create bold, fresh, and innovative granola for the health-aware consumer. They do this by creating whole-food plant-based snacks sourcing at least one ingredient per product from their 7th generation family farm.
Connect with Teffola Website | LinkedIn
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Jeff Nobbs is the co-founder and CEO of Zero Acre Farms, a food company replacing destructive vegetable oils with healthier, more sustainable oils and fats made by fermentation.
With over 15 years of experience in the health and nutrition space, Jeff has co-founded several startups to offer better quality ingredients and nutrition-forward food to people and communities, including the fast casual restaurant chain Kitava. In 2020, after seeing a drastic decrease in accessibility to fresh food, Jeff co-founded HelpKitchen to connect food-insecure individuals with partner restaurants for a free meal via SMS. Jeff also served as the chief operating officer for Perfect Keto and General Manager of Rakuten, which acquired his first company Extrabux.
Jeff writes about health, nutrition, and sustainability at jeffnobbs.com and @jeffnobbs.
Connect with Zero Acre Farms Website | LinkedIn
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On this edition of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler share their latest thoughts on regenerative vs. organic, including Tim's recap of attending the Organic Produce Summit. They also provide an update on The Modern Acre Co-op and what to expect as part of the membership.
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Mike Hemman is a veteran of the global agriculture and manufacturing industries, previously working at Corteva Agriscience (including DuPont and Dow) and Pioneer Seeds. In addition, he has extensive lobbying experience in the irrigation industry and holds a bachelor's degree from California State University in Fresno in Plant Science.
Mike heads the U.S. division of Netafim, the pioneering company that invented drip irrigation more than 50 years ago. Netafim USA's entry into the U.S. marketplace 40 years ago transformed the face of U.S. agriculture by increasing farmers' adoption of sustainable practices, especially in California's Central Valley.
Under Mike's leadership, Netafim continues to be at the forefront of transforming U.S. agriculture by increasing farmers' ability to optimize their water use, increase their crop yield, and reduce lower labor costs by adopting precision irrigation technology.
Specifically, Netafim is helping farms transition into the new era of digital farming by offering modernizing irrigation solutions such as NetBeat which monitors, analyzes, and automates irrigation systems from practically anywhere.
Connect with Netafim Website | LinkedIn
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Kristy Lewis is the founder and CEO of Quinn Snacks, a CPG company reimagining classic snacks by bringing real ingredients and transparency back to the snacks you love. Kristy joins the podcast to tell us about the founding story, Quinn's focus on their farmer-partners, their approach to regenerative ag, how they have scaled, and much, much more. Tune in!
Connect with Quinn Snacks Website | Instagram
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Han Chen is the Co-Founder and CEO of ZeaKal, a plant traits innovator that helps crops capture more carbon and sunlight, leading to healthier, nutrient-rich food and feed. ZeaKal is committed to building a more equitable and resilient agricultural system on a smaller environmental footprint. Their plant traits dramatically improve the yield and composition of staple crops, resulting in carbon capture for better nutrition, as well as higher incomes, lower costs, and efficiencies along the ag supply chain.
Han brings with him over fifteen years of management and venture experience. He has been a pioneer in changing how agricultural trait technologies are commercialized, focusing on innovative public-private partnerships between industry, venture, and research. To date, Han has started and successfully raised financing for three startups, totaling over twenty million in capital.
Han is also the co-founder and Managing Director of Kapyon Ventures, a technology incubation firm behind the pre-venture development of ZeaKal. Prior to founding ZeaKal and Kapyon, Han was the Investment Manager for Finistere Partners, a San Diego based life science venture capital firm. He was responsible for seeding the deal flow of a nine million dollar strategic investment fund that resulted in the formation of several startups, generation of millions in research funding and also several technology licensing opportunities.
Han graduated magna cum laude from Amherst College and has a master’s degree in international business from the University of California, San Diego. He is also a CFA Charterholder.
Connect with ZeaKal Website | LinkedIn
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Pete Oberle is a Managing Partner at Trailhead Capital, a mission-driven investment firm creating outstanding financial, societal, and ecological returns by backing entrepreneurs who are building the regenerative future of food and agriculture.
Pete has 23 years of finance and investing experience. Since 2014, he has been an angel investor in the agricultural, food, renewable energy, environmental and human health spaces. Pete joins us to share more about his background and starting Trailhead Capital. We go deep on his approach to investing in regenerative ag in the current economic climate.
Connect with Trailhead Capital Website | LinkedIn
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Nicole Atchison is the CEO of PURIS Foods, a family-owned company founded in 1985 in Oskaloosa, Iowa. Built with intention over 30 years, PURIS’ plant-based food system benefits every link in the chain of production: flavorful and nutritious choices for people, profitable opportunities for growers, flexible ingredients for food makers, and practices that nourish soil, the environment, and life on earth. Nicole is the daughter of the founders of the company.
Nicole Atchison is responsible for leading innovation and business development across PURIS’ portfolio of companies including ingredient technologies, processing technologies, seed genetic strategies, product development and go-to-market strategies, insights, and support for plant-based brands. PURIS develops and supports continued innovation in a spectrum of pure, plant-based foods and ingredients from U.S.-based organic and non-GMO sources. She is the CEO of PURIS Holdings and the CEO of AcreMade, a consumer facing plant-based egg company and latest innovation from the broader PURIS team.
Connect with PURIS Foods Website | LinkedIn
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Adrián Ferrero is the Co-Founder and CEO of Biome Makers, one of the foremost global AgTech leaders setting the standard in soil health with BeCrop® technology. Built on industry-leading AgTech expertise and driven by data and science, Biome Makers connectsoil biology to agricultural decision-making to optimize farming practices and reverse the degradation of arable soils. With labs across the globe, customers on 4 continents, and 1M+ acres of land impacted, Biome Makers revitalizes soil functionality and agricultural sustainability worldwide.
With recognition from the Spanish Government, Illumina Accelerator, and MIT Technology Review —Adrián is a self-described entrepreneur on a mission to improve the world. He holds a Master of Science in Economics from the University of Salamanca and a Master of Environmental Management from the Turku School of Economics and Business Administration.
Growing up in an agricultural region of Spain inspired Adrián to co-found, together with Alberto Acedo, Biome Makers Inc., and create its patented BeCrop® technology. From there, Biome Makers has received many awards worldwide (AgSum in Japan, agripreneur 2019 in Greece, WINnovation in US, or Best innovative startup by AgFunder) and attracted over $24M from investors. Prior to Biome Makers, Adrián has founded three start-ups and worked as an innovation consultant for more than nine years.
Connect with Biome Makers Website | Twitter
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Pablo Borquez is the founder and CEO of ProducePay, an AgTech startup committed to building a better supply chain for fresh produce, one that places trust at the center of every transaction. It is the fastest-growing provider of capital, market insights, and trade protection for the fresh produce industry. Through its products Marketplace, Pre-Season Financing, Quick-Pay+ and Daily Market Report, ProducePay has the mission of strengthening relationships between growers, shippers, retailers, and consumers of fresh produce in the United States and Latin America.
With over 20 years' experience in the Ag Industry, Pablo Borquez founded ProducePay to make fresh produce accessible to all. Born into a 4th generation farming family from Mexico, Pablo grew up around the family farm “Campos Borquez”. Pablo’s experience throughout his life helped him launch ProducePay in 2014; with the mission to build a better supply chain for fresh produce, one that places trust at the center of every transaction and strengthens relationships between growers, shippers, retailers, and consumers of fresh produce.
Connect with ProducePay Website | LinkedIn
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David Nothmann is the COO of Unfold. Unfold is accelerating the “seed to table” capabilities of vertical farming with an integrated offering of superior seeds, digital services, and agronomic insight. Based in Davis, California, Unfold’s mission is to create a world where the freshest, most nutritious, and most delicious produce is available to every person on the planet.
David is a visionary leader and team builder with more than two decades of executive-level B2B and B2C experience in agriculture and food production, with a passion for sustainability and bringing products to market. Prior to his role at Unfold, David served in C-Suite and leadership roles at Terramera, Valent LLC (a Sumitomo Chemical subsidiary), Battelle and ArborGen. David started his career at Monsanto and currently serves as Chairman of Board for startup 3Bar Biologics as well as on the Advisory Board of AgroSpheres.
Connect with Unfold Website | LinkedIn
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Matthieu Kohlmeyer is the Founder and CEO of La Tourangelle, a family owned & operated producer of artisan oils & other natural food. Steeped in the oil making tradition of France’s Loire Valley, and with production facilities both in France & California, La Tourangelle is on a mission to make good food. Good for the table, community & planet.
Connect with La Tourangelle Website | LinkedIn
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Michael Guirguis is the co-founder and CEO of Seso Labor, a labor marketplace for agriculture that addresses the labor problem by connecting U.S farms with qualified seasonal workers via America’s agricultural guest worker program (H-2A). Michael joins us to dive into his background in labor policy, founded and scaling the company, and some meaningful insights into the complex nature of agricultural labor. Must listen!
Connect with Seso Labor Website | LinkedIn
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Ethan Steinberg is the Co-Founder and CEO of Propagate Ventures, an agtech startup that helps farmers & landowners make regenerative agriculture work for them by balancing short-term income with long-term returns. Their platform makes it easy to access the operational know-how, implementation tools, financing and off-take agreements needed to reduce business risks while integrating fruit, nut and timber trees with animal or crop farming systems. By helping farmers focus on permanent crops in regenerative agriculture, a practice known as agroforestry, farmers become more resilient and investors earn great returns while building the next generation of regenerative farms.
Ethan joins the podcast to share more about Propagates approach to regenerative agriculture, how they have scaled the business, and how he's thinking about the ag industry. Tune in!
Connect with Propagate Ventures Website | Overyield
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eAgronom was founded in Estonia in 2016 by son of a farmer and entrepreneur Robin Saluoks, computer scientists Stenver Jerkku and business veteran Kristjan Luha. eAgronom is an AgTech startup transforming the voluntary carbon offset market and accelerating the transition to net-zero farming. eAgronom’s farm management software, AI and remote sensing technologies help grain farmers make better and more profitable decisions by providing real-time crop monitoring from fields, automated reporting, crop and yield plans, farm activity schedules and more.
Robins joins us to share more about his journey founding and scaling the company, the pivots they have made over time, and the importance of carbon accounting in Europe. Don't miss this episode!
Connect with eAgronom Website | LinkedIn
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Fourth generation California farmer, Aubrey Bettencourt is the President & CEO of the Almond Alliance of California, the trade association for the almond industry and community, representing and advocating for the 7,600 American almond farms growing 90% of the world almonds. Aubrey also has an incredible background in public policy and natural resources.
Aubrey joins us and shares the state of the ag industry, specifically looking at California almonds. We get into the various headwinds facing the industry and how she is focused on finding innovate solutions. Tune in!
Connect with the Almond Alliance Website
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On this edition of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler share more about web3 applications and what use cases exist in agriculture. They also discuss the recent Pairwise news that they are launching a consumer brand. Lastly, they provide an update from Nuss farms, including offseason cover crops and spring planting. Tune in!
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Dr. Michael Gilbert is the CEO and founder of Semios, the leading precision farming loT platform for tree fruits, nuts, and grapes. Michael is a natural product synthetic chemist with a PhD from University of British Columbia and a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Vienna. He has 25 years of experience in agtech and biotech R&D and production. In 2009, Michael founded Semios to meet the growing demand for data-driven sustainable and traceable food production.
Michael joins us to share his story of founding the company and how the have strategically scaled through acquisitions, distribution, technology, and business model. Tune in!
Connect with Semios Website | Twitter
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Trey Hill is the owner and manager of Harborview Farms in Rock Hall, Maryland. A fourth generation grain farmer, he and his family sustainably produce corn, wheat, and soybeans for the Mid-Atlantic region. A graduate of Purdue University with a degree in Farm Management and Economics, Trey has been committed throughout his career to innovative agriculture sustainability.
At Harborview Farms, he and his team are breaking new ground with innovative and creative farming techniques — combining the wisdom of traditional practices with forward thinking, environmentally conscious solutions that are shaping the future of the agricultural industry. Trey talks about his operation, his focus on technology and sustainability, carbon markets, and much more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/217
The day is here! We are announcing the next iteration of The Modern Acre and the web3 project we have been teasing. Introducing The Modern Acre Co-op!
On this edition of Acre Insights, we are providing all the details of the project including the TOP 10 reasons to join the co-op. Tune in and sign up for the presale list!
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Gabe Sibley and Curtis Garner are the co-founders of Verdant Robotics. Verdant has raised $21.5 million to develop the industry’s first multi-action, autonomous farm-robot capable of millimeter-accurate spraying, laser weeding, and AI-based digital crop modeling. Together with farming partners, Verdant uses these tools to deliver better outcomes: larger produce, greater yields and significant savings.
Gabe, CEO, and Curtis, COO, join us to share more about what they have been working on behind the scenes for the past few years, including releasing their offering as a service to farmers. We get into current crisis in Ukraine and the trends happening within agriculture. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/215
Jamie Ager is a fourth-generation farmer at Hickory Nut Gap Farm. In partnership with his wife,
Amy, they built Hickory Nut Gap into a well-established regional brand and created a
destination that welcomes visitors to learn about regenerative agriculture. The farm currently
raises organic cattle, pasture raised hogs and poultry, as well as a variety of fruits and
vegetables. In addition to the farming production, the Agers built and oversee the on-farm
store and butcher shop.
Jamie discusses the story of Hickory Nut Gap and how the are focused on scaling regeneratively raised meat. We discuss labeling, meat processing and supply chain, building a brand, and much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/214
Dr. Michael Miille is the CEO of Joyn Bio, a biotech company engineering microbes to provide growers with a new class of sustainable agricultural solutions. A joint venture by Bayer and Ginkgo Bioworks, Joyn is working to reduce farmers’ needs for synthetic chemicals while boosting yield and improving crop performance. Joyn’s solutions leverage synthetic biology, giving the company the resources to scale climate-smart agriculture solutions using innovative technologies at a faster rate than traditional agricultural solutions. Before Joyn Bio, Dr. Miille was Head of Biologics within Bayer’s Crop Science division, and previously spent 8 years with AgraQuest, Inc. as CEO and as President & COO.
Connect with Joyn Bio Website | LinkedIn
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Over the past 11 years, Paul Lightfoot has been known as the founder and CEO of BrightFarms, a company selling branded produce at retail with a disruptive supply chain model that is better for the environment. His mission is to reverse climate change by changing the food system, which he’s doing by mentoring food entrepreneurs and by writing and speaking about Negative Foods (food brands with supply chains that are carbon neutral or negative).
Paul joins us to talk about his latest ventures focused on regenerative agriculture. We get into a lot - consumer demand, certifications, processing and supply chain, nutrient density, the beef industry, and much more. This is a must listen for anyone interested in regenerative ag!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/212
Barney Debnam is the Director, Agribusiness Industry Solutions, at Microsoft. Barney joins the podcast to provide insight into Microsoft's focus and involvement in agriculture, his background and current role with Microsoft, and the state of ag technology adoption. This episode has great insight into how the tech industry is approaching ag. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/211
Tom Shapland is the co-founder and CEO of Tule Technologies, an agtech company that combines agronomic expertise with cutting-edge artificial intelligence to provide growers with irrigation decision support. Tule's UC Davis research-based sensor technology measures the Actual Evapotranspiration (ETa) of a field. Tule’s latest offering, Tule Vision, enables grape growers to take midday Leaf Water Potential readings using a smartphone camera.
Tom joins us to share his journey founding and scaling the company, including the technology, perspectives on computer vision, capital raising, sales, and more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/210
Jordan Rubin is the co-founder and CEO of Ancient Nutrition, a supplement company with its mission to restore our health, strength and vitality by providing history's healthiest whole food nutrients to the modern world. One of America’s most-recognized and respected natural health experts, Jordan is the *New York Times* bestselling author of *The Maker’s Diet*, and 26 additional titles, including his latest work *Essential Fasting.*
Jordan joins us to share his journey in health and nutrition and what led him to start Ancient Nutrition. We dive deep into Ancient Nutrition's focus on regenerative agriculture with their R.A.N.C.H. Project. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/209
Vishnu Jayaprakash is the co-founder and CEO of AgZen, a startup based in Boston, Massachusetts on a mission to help farmers save money and prevent the over-spraying of agrochemicals. Their patented sprayer retrofits and additives, developed at MIT, allow farmers to spray 50% less pesticides while maintaining crop health and yield.
Vishnu shares more about his backstory and the origin story of AgZen. We talk a lot about the technology the use as well as the overall strategy for the company. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/208
Dax Hansen is the owner of Oatman Flats Ranch and founder of Oatman Farms is a world-renowned FinTech lawyer, and a visionary farmer who is leveraging his blockchain expertise to bring transparency to the food supply chain. Dax’s focus in on creating sustainable and profitable business family-farm models that other farmers can replicate.
Dax joins us to share his background in law and technology, journey back to agriculture, using bitcoin to save the farm and transition it to regenerative agriculture, and building a consumer food brand. This is an incredibly fun, jam-packed episode you can't miss!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/207
Helena Lumme is the President and Co-Founder of Hälsa Foods, a CPG company that produces oat milk products, focusing on clean ingredients, clean processing, and clean labels. Helena joins to share more about her journey founding the company and optimizing their marketing and supply chain.
Helena is joined by Eric Ziehm, who is a farmer-partner of Hälsa. He has converted his dairy operation to produce oats. He shares his perspective of making this change and being open to alternative paths for farmers. We hope you enjoy this episode with a founder and a farmer!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/206
Listen on Apple Podcasts or Everywhere Else
On this installment of Acre Insights, Tim and Tyler give a sneak peak of the project they are working on for The Modern Acre based on Web3. They also share their bold predictions for this year, plus they provide an update on Nuss Farms.
Connect with The Modern Acre Website | Instagram | Twitter
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Lew Moorman is the Co-Founder of Soilworks, a Public Benefit Company on a mission to accelerate the Regenerative Food Movement by helping launch scalable, repeatable businesses that fuel the Regenerative economy. Lew's background is in the tech industry and he shares his story about why he decided to jump into the ag industry and start investing there. Tune in to learn what's he's up to with Soilworks, PastureMap, and Wholesome Meats!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/204
Mike Woelk is the CEO and founder of Corigin, a startup that aims to help farmers improve yields and margins with organic solutions produced from farm waste. Mike joins the podcast to tell us more about the company and technology, along with his perspective on scaling regenerative agriculture.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/203
Ashwin Madgavkar is the CEO and founder of Ceres Imaging, an agtech startup that is creating irrigation management solutions that help farmers improve profitability. Their high-resolution aerial imagery and expert support help their customers detect issues quickly, measure potential ROI, and take action with confidence.
Ashwin joins the podcast to share his journey in founding and scaling Ceres. We dive into the business, the aerial imaging technology and competitive landscape, and more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/202
Charlie Anderson is the CEO and Founder of Burro, a robotics startup looking to solve the labor problem facing farmers by making robots like Wall-E a reality. To do this, they are starting first with a collaborative robotic platform called Burro, that helps people work more productively today, while building the base for more expansive autonomy where it is needed most. Charlie joins us to talk about his background in agriculture and what led him to found and scale the company. He share insights into the industry and lessons learned along his journey.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/201
Episode 200! For this milestone, we had to do something special. This week we sit down with our dad, Dave Nuss, to learn more about the history and evolution of Nuss Farms. We dive into his journey as well as his perspective on the changes within California ag over the years and our interest in and transition to regenerative agriculture.
Thanks for your support to get us to this point! We hope you enjoy this special episode.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/200
Sarah Sha is the Director of Strategy and Isha Joshi is the Director of Product Development for KitchenTown, a scale-up facility in San Mateo, CA that gives food startups access to a commercial kitchen, product innovation lab, direct to consumer warehouse, brand partnerships program, and thriving community of makers. Sara and Isha join the podcast to share more about their backgrounds and the evolution of KitchenTown as a key hub for CPG innovation. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/199
Greg Shewmaker is the co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer of TeakOrigin, a food data company that collects actionable data to help consumers make better food decisions. Greg joins us to talk about his background in ecommerce, founding and developing the business at TeakOrigin, and the role nutrient density will play in the food system. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/198
On this installment of Acre Insights, Tim interviews Tyler on a variety of topics, including his thoughts on Web3 and NFT's, college entrepreneurial pursuits, his career from Apple to Rivian, and finally more on Nuss Farms. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/198
Craig Hurlbert is the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Local Bounty, a premier controlled environment agriculture company redefining conversion efficiency and ESG standards for indoor ag. Craig joins the podcast to share more about his background in the energy sector and private equity and what ultimately led him to found Local Bounti. We discuss the challenges of CEA and how he and the team are taking a unique approach to a difficult business to scale profitably.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/196
Interested in direct-to-consumer business? We are re-airing one of our most popular episodes to-date featuring the Farmer’s Dog.
Brett Podolsky joins The Modern Acre podcast to talk about how he helped create The Farmer’s Dog, a dog food company focused on using real, fresh food and delivering customized servings to their customers. Brett shares the vision behind the company and why using real food is so important to the brand. While the company is not directly involved in a agriculture at the farm level, there is SO much insight from building a direct-to-consumer business, cutting out middlemen, focus on high quality food, marketing, and more! Let us know what you think!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/195
Scott Uknes and Eric Ward are the co-founders and co-CEO's of AgBiome, a biotechnology company that is focused on discovering, developing, and commercializing innovative biological and trait products for crop protection. Scott and Eric join the podcast to talk about their journey starting the company together and how they have successfully scaled and launched their first product, Howler. They also share how they make being "co-CEO's" work leading their team. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/194
Another edition of Acre Insights! Tyler provides a quick update on Rivian, then Tim and Tyler discuss the latest at Nuss Farms and their journey developing a product to go direct-to-consumer. Plus, they discuss a recent article and study about the US importing tomatoes from Mexico. Tune in for some insights!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/193
Jennifer Barney is the founder of Barney Butter Almond Butter and previously led Innovation for a $700mm CPG category leader. She is an advisor and mentor to startup CPG brands and ag leaders entering the value added space. Jennifer joins us to share more about her journey founding, scaling, and exiting a CPG brand. She also dives into the current landscape of ag and CPG and her current work at 3rd & Broadway. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/192
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Kristy Lewis is the founder and CEO of Quinn Snacks, a CPG company reimagining classic snacks by bringing real ingredients and transparency back to the snacks you love. Kristy joins the podcast to tell us about the founding story, Quinn's focus on their farmer-partners, their approach to regenerative ag, how they have scaled, and much, much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/191
Praveen Penmetsa is the co-founder and CEO of Monarch Tractor, an agtech company developing an electric, driver-optional compact tractor. Praveen has nearly two decades of hands-on experience in translating creative visions into products for startups to Fortune 50 companies alike. He co-currently serves as founder and CEO of Motivo Engineering, a product-engineering firm with clients in the Mobility, Energy, AgTech, and Aerospace sectors.
Praveen joins us to talk through the founding story, product development, market dynamics within agriculture, and much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/190
John Mey is the Director of Product at Carbon Robotics, an agtech startup pioneering the next revolution in agriculture through the deployment of innovative technology and hardware. Carbon Robotics’ first product, the Autonomous Weeder, is purpose built to tackle one of the industry’s biggest problems: weed control.
John joins us to share more about the company, his role as head of product, and how they intend to scale with their recent round of funding. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/189
Zach Sheely joins us to talk about how his interest in technology started on his family farm and evolved to his current position as President of Agworld. Agworld is one of the leading farm management companies, recently acquired by Semios, helping farmers take control of their business and operate more efficiently. Zach walks us through how he joined Agworld and helped them grow over time. This is a jam-packed episode you can't afford to miss!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/188
Rob Hranac is the CEO of Pattern Ag, an agtech startup developing a recommendation and product discovery platform centered around a deep understanding of soil. They are leveraging advances in genomics, robotics, and high-resolution agronomic data to build this knowledge, in service of improving farm profitability.
Rob joins the podcast to talk about his path to Pattern, their investors and long term vision, and how scaling the company has gone over the past few years. Tune in to learn more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/187
Listen on Apple Podcasts or Everywhere Else
Kim Bui is the Global Head of FreshCloud Infrastructure and Analytics at AgroFresh, an agtech innovator and global leader with a mission to prevent food loss/waste and conserve the planet’s resources by providing a range of science-based solutions, data-driven digital technologies and high-touch customer services. AgroFresh supports growers, packers and retailers with solutions across the food supply chain to enhance the quality and extend the shelf life of fresh produce.
Kim joins the podcast to talk about how his team is responsible for implementing the digital layer within AgroFresh in the food supply chain. We dive deep into how technology is impacting and driving the produce industry.
Connect with AgroFresh Website | Twitter
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Matt Crisp is the CEO and Co-Founder of Benson Hill, a food technology company founded in 2012 with a mission to deliver food made better from the beginning. Through our CropOS® technology platform, which combines data science, plant science and food science, we are leveraging the natural genetic diversity of plants to deliver seed innovation that enables healthier, better tasting, more sustainable and more affordable food and ingredient options.
Matt joins us to talk about the plant based food movement, how we has grown and scaled the business, and shares insight into their decision to go public via SPAC. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/185
This week we talk to two agtech founders - Jake Joraanstad, the CEO and co-founder of Bushel, and Jesse Vollmar, the CEO and co-founder of FarmLogs - about the recent news of Bushel acquiring Farmlogs. Bushel is an independently owned software company and leading provider of software technology solutions for growers, grain buyers, ag retailers, protein producers and food companies. FarmLogs is an agtech startup that provides farm management software designed to help run a more efficient, more profitable farm.
Jake and Jesse talk through the recent news, their businesses, and how they plan to integrate and grow together. They also offer some spicy takes during our quick takes segment. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/184
John Kempf is an entrepreneur, speaker, podcast host and teacher. He is passionate about the potential of well managed agriculture ecosystems to reverse ecological degradation. In addition to being a grower, John is the founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture, Crop Health Labs, Ozadia, and the Regenerative Agriculture Academy. He hosts the Regenerative Agriculture Podcast, where he interviews top growers and scientists about the principles and practice of implementing regenerative agriculture on a large scale.
John joins us to dive deep into what regenerative means and what is does not mean. We address what is overhyped, what is undervalued, and if regenerative agriculture will cure climate change. We also discuss John's background and entrepreneurial endeavors, including his company, podcast, and new book! Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/183
Julie Kunen is the Director of Sustainability at Oatly, the world's original and largest oat drink company. Julie's background is in creating and delivering sustainability programs and motivating stakeholders to deliver results. She joins us to dig deep on what sustainability means at Oatly and how they are driving towards continued improvement.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/182
Another edition of Acre Insights! This week we are talking about the drought crisis on the West Coast and the impact on farmers there, the shutting down of Abundant Robotics and what that means for agtech startups, and finally we discuss some challenges we are seeing in the co-packing space, specifically for farmers trying to develop a brand. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/181
Bob Powell is the founder and CEO of Brightmark, a global leader in waste solutions that takes a holistic approach to tackling the planet’s most pressing environmental challenges with imagination and optimism for the future. Brightmark enables programs specifically tailored to environmental needs in order to build scalable project solutions that have a positive impact on the world and communities in which they live and work.
Bob joins us to talk about how and why he founded the company and how Brightmark is working closely with the ag community, specifically dairy farms, to solve these environmental challenges. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/180
Adam Litle is the CEO of Sound Agriculture, a plant development company that helps producers grow more efficiently and enhance food taste, nutrition and sustainability. Adam was formerly part of the founding management team at Granular, a farm management software platform startup that was acquired by Dupont for $300M in 2017.
Adam joins us to share lessons from his time at Granular, where he supported multiple functions and company growth. We learn more about Sound Ag and their efforts to transform agriculture through sustainability. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/179
Paul Gambill is the CEO and Co-Founder of Nori, a carbon removal marketplace on a mission to reverse climate change by removing enough carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to lower the overall concentration of CO2 below 300 parts per million. Paul joins us to talk about how they are leveraging blockchain technology to build the business and develop their own cryptocurrency. We also get in to how the business has scaled, the verification and permanence problems of regenerative agriculture, and much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/178
Rhonda Bassett-Spiers is the President and CEO of iTradeNetwork, the leader in perishables supply chain management for 20 years with a powerful network of over 8,000 food and beverage trading partners. Its end-to-end supply chain software suite simplifies the complexities that occur at all waypoints of the food and perishables supply chain. Rhonda has 25+ years of Silicon Valley technology company experience in financial services and supply chain solutions. She joins us to talk through how she has scaled the company and how they have evolved the business through COVID as partners are more concerned than ever with supply chain resiliency. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/177
Alexander Reichert is the co-founder and CEO of AgVend, a digital commerce platform in the agriculture industry. AgVend's tools constructively power the omnichannel experiences for ag retailers, distributors, and manufacturers. Alexander joins us the podcast to talk about founding AgVend, evolving the business model, disruption vs. innovation, and much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/176
Jason Kosareff is a Farmland Asset Manager at FarmTogether and joins us this week to dive deep on farmland operations. Jason has an extensive background in farming and agriculture, including in retail, working as a PCA, farm management, and asset manager for investment groups. We discuss more about management, evolving ag trends, row crops vs. permanent crops, and much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/175
We are finally back with another edition of Acre Insights. This episode we discuss if regenerative agriculture is losing it's buzz as well as some of the negative press it has received. Plus, we cover cryptocurrency in ag, Bowery's latest funding round (and some concerns with indoor farming), and the latest happenings with Nuss Farms. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/174
Jeff Dunn is the Chairman and CEO of Bolthouse Farms, a farm and consumer brand focused on carrot production and healthy beverages. Jeff was the CEO of Bolthouse for 6 years before helping sell the business to Campbell's Soup Company in 2012. In a twist of events, Campbell's sold the company back to Jeff last year.
Jeff joins us to dive deep into that journey and to share more about what makes Bolthouse special and innovative. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/173
Michael Bosworth is the CEO of Next Generation Foods which was established in 2006 to market and distribute locally grown foods in Northern California. Next Generation Foods' seeks to shorten the supply chain, increase traceability and transparency of the local food system and promote foods grown by local family farms.
Michael joins us to share more about his story as a farmer turned founder, including why he started NGF, processing and distribution, creating a retail brand, and much more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/172
Michael Guirguis is the co-founder and CEO of Seso Labor, a labor marketplace for agriculture that addresses the labor problem by connecting U.S farms with qualified seasonal workers via America’s agricultural guest worker program (H-2A). Michael joins us to dive into his background in labor policy, founded and scaling the company, and some meaningful insights into the complex nature of agricultural labor. Must listen!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/171
Stacy Kimmel, PhD, is the Vice President of R&D at AeroFarms, an indoor farming company and Certified B Corporation that uses the latest breakthroughs in vertical farming, artificial intelligence and plant biology to grow and distribute fresh produce locally and globally.
Stacy joins us to give an update on AeroFarms, including their recent announcement of going public via SPAC, company and product rebrand, and construction of their newest indoor farm. Tune in for an insightful update into one of the most innovative companies in the indoor farming space!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/170
Israel Talpaz is the co-founder and CEO of See Tree, an agtech startup that uses the power of machine-learning algorithms to get smarter, and offer farmers the most precise window into the strength of their tree crops. Israel joins the podcast to talk about how he founded the company and how they are scaling both geographically and in crop type. Tune in to learn more about their approach, technology, and more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/169
Vonnie Estes is the Vice President of Technology of the Produce Marketing Association. Vonnie joins us for the second time to give some updates and insights into some hot topics within agriculture. We talk through the recent merger of PMA and United Fresh, the latest in carbon markets, agtech exits including SPAC's, indoor farming, and seeing a Rivian in the wild! This episode has it all.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/168
Jayce Hafner (CEO) and Sami Tellatin (COO) are the co-founders of FarmRaise, a digital platform that equips producers with financial resources to build vital farming communities that are profitable, equitable, and ecologically resilient. Their simplified farm funding app applies farmers for major USDA cost-share programs in less than 20 minutes. They also track local and state funding programs as they open throughout the year and provide 1:1 support to help farms unlock more capital.
Jayce and Sami join the podcast for a wide-ranging conversation. We cover how they founded and have grown the business, the challenges of farm financing, regenerative hot takes, and much more. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/167
Josiah Terrell-Perica is the Director of Farmland Investing at FarmTogether, a technology-enabled farmland investment platform that provides accredited investors with direct access to farmland as an asset class.
Josiah joins us for the second time on the podcast to dive deep on some of FarmTogether's recent deals, what Josiah looks for in farmland, and sustainable water management and principles. He provides an overview of both climate and market related factors to consider in farmland investing. A ton of good stuff in this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/166
Loren Booth is the President of Booth Ranches, a premium citrus grower located in the San Joaquin Valley of California. Their Navel oranges, Valencia oranges, Cara-Caras, Minneolas and W. Murcotts are distributed worldwide.
Loren joins us to talk about the origin story of the farm and how she joined and has developed the business over time, including focusing on bringing more of the farming operations and business in-house. We also discuss their focus on sustainability and technology. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/165
Dan Miller is the founder and CEO of Steward, a private lender providing regenerative farmers, ranchers, fishermen, and producers the capital they need to expand and sustain their businesses. And through our innovative online platform, qualified lenders have the opportunity to join in our mission and help fund the growth of regenerative agriculture by purchasing loan participations.
Dan joins us to talk about how he started and is growing the business. We go deep on regenerative ag, transition finance, and investing in value-add processing and direct marketing. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/164
Cousin Brad (Brad Squires) joins us again on the podcast to give an update on his farm, Heirloom Acres Farms, and orchard, Orangevale Fruit Co. We talk through how the farm business has involved, the focus on community building, regenerative practices, and much more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/163
Haven Baker is the Chief Business Officer and Co-Founder of Pairwise, an agtech company that has developed the world’s most sophisticated genome editing platform. Haven is the former Senior Vice President / General Manager of Simplot Plant Sciences, where he led the team that launched the innovative, non-browning Innate® potato. He holds a PhD in chemistry from Northeastern University, an MBA from Harvard University, and a BS in biomedical engineering from Yale University.
Haven joins the show to teach us all about CRISPR technology and how he and the team at Pairwise have leveraged in to build the business. We also talk about how they think about GMO vs. non-GMO and much more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/162
Tyler reveals the details behind his mini Twitter fight about farmers being paid for carbon credits. Tune in to hear Tyler and Tim talk through their thoughts on the evolving carbon market and companies, certifications, and marketplaces focused on regenerative agriculture.
Tim and Tyler also talk through their perspectives and insights into partnerships, including things to think about when considering partners.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/161
Michael Ott is the founder and CEO of Rantizo, an agtech startup that addresses both the field needs of farmers and the business needs of custom applicators with the platform’s combination of autonomous hardware and user-friendly software. Rantizo leverages both drone and aerial imagery technology to provide solutions to growers.
Michael joins us to talk about his background in investing and what led him to jump into entrepreneurship and start Rantizo. He shares how he has grown and scaled the business and the insights he has learned along the way. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/160
Sonia Lo is the CEO of Sensei Ag, a market-changing agtech company transforming health by using data to redesign how food is grown. Sensei Ag was founded by Larry Ellison and Dr. David Agus. Sensei Ag helps growers make informed decisions that set new standards for food safety, quality and taste. Through the use of data and technology, they create innovative, agile growing systems that dramatically improve farm production.
Sonia shares her unique background and story that led her to become CEO of Sensei Ag. She talks through the business model and approach to scaling a digital distributed agriculture system. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/159
We are switching it up this week! Tyler interviews Tim for an in-depth conversation about Tim's background, childhood misconduct, early career in the produce industry, transition to agtech, founding The Modern Acre, and his evolving involvement with Nuss Farms. If you like Tim, you should listen to this episode because it will make him feel good about himself.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/158
Steven Dodge is the CEO and Co-Founder of Acuity Agriculture, a technology company that builds smart, wireless sensor networks for farms. Equipped with our real-time soil data, farms can optimize irrigation schedules, lower supply costs, and save hundreds of dollars per acre.
Steven joins the podcast to talk about his background in agriculture and farming, the origin of Acuity Agriculture, and how he and the team have been scaling the business over the past few years without taking on outside funding. Tune in to hear his awesome story!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/157
Mark Johnson is the CEO of GrainBridge, a joint venture between ADM and Cargill with the goal of helping farmers make better grain marketing decisions. Mark joins the podcast to talk about his background in tech, the history and story of GrainBridge, and how they are innovating and scaling the business today. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/156
Damien Hajduk, Ph.D., is the CTO and COO of Crop Enhancement, a San Jose-based startup that works at the intersection of materials science and biology to bring new and effective solutions to agriculture that help growers protect their crops and the environment, while meeting the global need for sustainably produced foods.
Damien joins us to talk about his impressive background that ultimately led him to Crop Enhancement. We discuss the origin story and how they have approached going to market with their sustainable crop solutions. Tune in to learn more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/155
Kenny Fahey is the Executive Director of Leading Harvest, a newly formed nonprofit organization at the vanguard of advancing sustainable agriculture, providing assurance programs comprised of standards, audit procedures, training and education, and reporting and claim offerings that are optimized for flexibility, scalability, and impact.
Kenny shares more about his background and how Leading Harvest was founded. Additionally, we discuss their recent announcement with FarmTogether, who is enrolling 100% of their farmland in Leading Harvest's Sustainable Farmland Management Standard. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/154
Tim and Tyler are on the other side of this episode! They share more about Nuss Farms' transition to regenerative ag on the PMA Takes on Tech Podcast, hosted by Vonnie Estes. Tune in to hear their latest thoughts on their farm and where regenerative ag is going.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/153
Tim and Tyler are back with the final episode of The Modern Acre podcast of 2020. We talk through our biggest takeaways and lessons learned from this year, including our thoughts on the ag industry, our farm, and personal takeaways. Tune in and have a great new year! Thanks for listening!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/152
Greg Shewmaker is the co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer of Teak Origin, a food data company that collects actionable data to help consumers make better food decisions. Greg joins us to talk about his background in ecommerce, founding and developing the business at Teak Origin, and the role nutrient density will play in the food system. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/151
Alison Woitunski DiFiore is the Director of Small Farm Initiatives at FruitStand, which is a division of Apeel Sciences. FruitStand is an online platform that enables farmers to sell directly to customers with an emphasis on exotic fruit and unique crop varieties. Alison joins us to share about how her journey in farming ultimately led her to lead the team at FruitStand. She shares lessons learned along the way and how they are scaling the business.
We also discuss Nuss Farms' partnership with FruitStand this year. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/150
Get 20% off the Nuss Farms Squash Box!
Gabe Brown is one of the pioneers of the current soil health movement which focuses on the regeneration of our resources. Gabe, along with his wife Shelly, and son Paul, own and operate Brown's Ranch, a diversified 5,000 acre farm and ranch near Bismarck, North Dakota. He is a partner, along with Ray Archuleta, Shane New, and Dr. Allen Williams, in Understanding Ag LLC. He is also an instructor for Soil Health Academy, which focuses on teaching others the power and importance of healthy functioning ecosystems.
In this episode you will hear more about Gabe's journey to discovering regenerative agriculture, how context is key to a successful transition, and why regenerative ag is reaching a tipping point. We we're honored to have Gabe on the show and you won't want to miss it!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/149
Jody Levy is the Co-Founder and Creative Director of WTRMLN WTR, the pioneer in deliciously hydrating, super healthy watermelon water. Jody joins us to share the story of founding and scaling the business, covering areas of branding, supply chain, and sales.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/148
Kit Barron is the Head of Automation and Artificial Intelligence at FarmTogether, a technology-enabled farmland investment platform that provides accredited investors with direct access to farmland as an asset class. Kit has over 10 years of experience leveraging technology to shape the future of food and agriculture. Kit joins FarmTogether after six years at the Climate Corporation, where he helped build the world's leading AgTech platform, most recently as Director of Product, New Features.
Kit joins us for a wide-ranging conversation covering his time at Climate Corp, his role at FarmTogether, and the role automation, agtech, and AI has in agriculture. Don't miss this one!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/147
Lew Moorman is the Co-Founder of Soilworks, a Public Benefit Company on a mission to accelerate the Regenerative Food Movement by helping launch scalable, repeatable businesses that fuel the Regenerative economy. Lew's background is in the tech industry and he shares his story about why he decided to jump into the ag industry and start investing there. Tune in to learn what's he's up to with Soilworks, PastureMap, and Wholesome Meats!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/146
Bakur Kvezereli is the founder and CEO of Ztractor, a startup that develops Autonomous Electric Tractors (AETs) to increase farming efficiency, productivity, safety on the field while reducing production cost and environmental footprint. Ztractor has 3 models under development BearCub 24, Mars 45, and Superpolit 125. The first model BeraCub 24 is available for online pre-orders.
Prior to entrepreneurship Bakur was Senior Investment Officer at $1.5 Billion Sovereign Wealth Fund, focusing on investments in Ag Tech. Between 2008-2011 he was the delegate to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Bakur joins us to talk about what led him to start Ztractor, the challenges of growth, the timing of the industry, and where they are going from here. Tune in!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/145
David Nothmann is the Chief Revenue Officer of Terramera, a cleantech leader focused on fusing AI, science and nature to create revolutionary technologies that transform how we grow food and solve other world-scale challenges. David joins the podcast to share more about his journey in the ag industry, including starting at Monsanto, investing in agtech, and his current role with Terramera. This episode was full of ag insights!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/144
Mike Machado is a California farmer, veteran, and former State Senator. He continues to own and operate his family's walnut farm in Linden, California. Mike joins us to share more about his decades-long journey in agriculture, lessons along the way, passing it to the next-generation, and continuing to innovate along the way. Mike also shares his perspective on leveraging environmental easements through California Farmland Trust as a way to protect his farmland from development.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/143
Buy our squash box here!!!
Tim and Tyler are back and feeling fiery. Tune in to learn why we think there should be more action and less complaining about how much farmers make for every dollar spent and why we're trying to do something about it with our new squash boxes. We also share our thoughts on the Driscoll's and Plenty partnership and what that indicates moving forward. Lastly, Tyler explains a hot take on Halloween decorations.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/142
Arama Kukutai is a co-founder and partner at Finistere Ventures, one of the pioneering venture firms dedicated to agritech, founded in 2006. Arama has been an investor, company founder and entrepreneur in the Agribusiness sector for over 20 years. Arama joins us to talk all things agtech investing, covering what he's paying close attention to right now and if the investment space is oversaturated. Don't miss this interview with an expert in agtech!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/141
Josiah Terrell-Perica is the Director of Farmland Investing at FarmTogether, a technology-enabled farmland investment platform that provides accredited investors with direct access to farmland as an asset class. Josiah joins us to dive deep into sourcing farmland for the platform and what he looks for, including land and financial criteria, operators, and crops. We also dig into farmland as an investment and the adoption of technology on the farm. Josiah also shares his thoughts on some really interesting crops that have high-demand potential.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/140
Uri Rosenweig is the Head of Product at Trellis, a leading provider of Food System Intelligence, using AI to optimize the way millions of acres of land are transformed into consumable food. Uri brings over a decade’s experience as an agricultural innovator and expert in farm management systems and optimization. He earned his BA in economics, sociology, and political science at Bar Ilan University.
Uri joins us to talk about how data and AI can transform the food supply chain and how he and the team at Trellis is scaling this technology.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/139
Nathan Gilliland is the CEO of Bellwether Coffee, a venture-backed, high-growth tech company working to positively transform the coffee industry through their flagship product, a coffee roaster. Nathan joins us to discuss how their roaster is shifting the traditional supply chain model by bringing the coffee roasting closer to the consumer, literally in the coffee shop! He also shares his background, more about the business, and what's next for Bellwether!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/138
John Kempf is an entrepreneur, speaker, podcast host and teacher. He is passionate about the potential of well managed agriculture ecosystems to reverse ecological degradation.
John joins us to dive deep into what regenerative means and what is does not mean. We address what is overhyped, what is undervalued, and if regenerative agriculture will cure climate change. We also discuss John's background and entrepreneurial endeavors, including his company, podcast, and new book!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/137
Nate Storey is the co-founder and CSO at Plenty, a vertical farming startup on a mission to bring the freshest, cleanest, most craveable produce to people everywhere. Nate joins us to talk all things vertical farming, including the latest developments in the industry, traditional vs. indoor ag, nutrient density, and more! He also shares the founding story of Plenty and the latest in the company's high-profile journey, including their retail partnership with Albertsons.
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/136
Sequoia Price-Lazarus is the founder and CEO of Lazarus Naturals, a leading CBD manufacturer. Sequoia joins the podcast to talk all things CBD. We cover how the company started, regulatory hurdles, a saturated market, farming operations, branding, and more!
Show Notes: https://themodernacre.com/135
We made it to 100 episodes! Thank YOU for listening and following The Modern Acre. Your support means everything to us.
On this episode, we are debuting a new podcast format called Acre Insights, where we will share more of our thoughts and perspectives on the industry. We hope you enjoy and would love to hear what you think!
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John Raines (@jmrainesfarm) is the Chief Commercial Officer for The Climate Corporation, the digital farming arm of Bayer. In this role, John serves on Climate's leadership team and is responsible for global sales, marketing, account management and customer service & support. John has been involved in production agriculture throughout his life.
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Richard Owen is the Vice President of Global Membership and Engagement with the Produce Marketing Association. Richard joins us for a discussion around the latest in global trade policy affecting the ag industry. Richard's extensive background and role with PMA makes him the perfect guest to give us an incredibly useful overview of the highlights of 2019.
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Seana Day is a Partner at Better Food Ventures, a venture capital fund looking to identify and develop companies that can improve the performance of the food and agriculture industries through the application of information and communications technology.
Seana shares more about the firm and her take on the industry and how it's evolved. You won't want to miss this!
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Derek Axten is the owner of Axten Farms based in Saskatchewean, Canada. He joins us to discuss how his farm transitioned to regenerative practices, including what's worked and challenges they've faced along the way. This is the perfect conclusion to our mini-series on regenerative agriculture. Tune in!
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Jill Clapperton is the principal scientist, owner, and founder of Rhizoterra, an international company that creates information and knowledge pertaining to soil health, so we can all make informed decisions based on science. Jill is also a well-known international lecturer and advocate for practices that promote soil health.
Rhizoterra is partnering with Grounded Growth to provide nutrient-density testing as a way to execute an outcome-based approach to verifying regenerative ag. Tune in to learn more!
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Sara Harper is the founder of Grounded Growth, a membership-based company that provides the resources needed for food companies and farmers to research, develop and build regenerative supply chains together.
Sara was previously on the podcast (episode HERE) to discuss her backgrounded the origin of Grounded Growth. On this episode, she joins us to discuss the latest trends in regenerative agriculture and updates on her membership community. Tune in!
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Cousin Brad (Brad Squires) comes back on the podcast to update us on his suburban family 10-acre farm that he started a few years ago (check out his first episode here). Brad shares some key business insights on what's worked on the farm, including their go-to-market approach for flowers. Brad also discusses some new ventures, Orangevale Fruit Co. and a plan for a retail store called The Local Acre. Tune in!
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Chiles Wilson is the founder and general manager of Branch to Box, a business-to-business ecommerce business that provides fresh fruit and snack delivery to company offices. This is Chiles' second time on the podcast, because his first appearance was so good! This time we dig in deeper to how he is focused on scaling the business. Tune in!
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Dave Kohl is the founder of Joolies, a California based farm and CPG brand producing Medjool date products. Dave and his family founded the original date farm two decades ago and recently launched Joolies. He shares more about the company's origin and how they strategically built the brand and product messaging.
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John Bourne is the VP of Marketing at Ceres Imaging, a venture-backed company delivering solutions for irrigation and nutrient management, pest and disease prevention, and more. Tune in to learn how John and the Ceres team recently launched an updated product portfolio and corresponding rebrand to further scale and grow the business.
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Julie Escobar is the co-founder of Global Women Fresh, a community focused on connecting, inspiring, and empowering women in the fresh produce industry. She has over 20 years experience in the fresh produce industry, achieving growth in domestic and international sales and marketing operations.
Julie shares more about her background and the origin story of GWF. She shares details about how they have grown the organization and insight into the produce industry. Tune in!
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Paul Schrimpf is an award-winning journalist who has covered the agriculture market since 1998. He is Group Editor of the Agribusiness Group at Meister Media Worldwide, with full editorial responsibility for CropLife®, CropLife IRON, and PrecisionAg® Professional.
Paul shares his story of joining Meister and his perspective on the ever-changing agriculture industry, sharing insights you won't want to miss throughout the episode. Tune in!
Connect with Meister Website | VISION Conference
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This is the last episode in a 4-part series sponsored by PMA!
John Hartnett is the founder and CEO of SVG Ventures and the THRIVE accelerator. SVG Ventures-THRIVE is a leading agri-food innovation ecosystem, comprised of top agriculture, food & technology corporations, universities and investors. With a community of over 2,000 startups from 82 countries, the THRIVE platform invests, accelerates and creates unparalleled access for entrepreneurs to scale globally.
Tune in to hear John share his story about founding the company and getting into the ag sector, plus his thoughts on the current state of the industry. You won't want to miss this episode!
Connect with PMA Website | Fresh Summit
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This is the third episode in a 4-part series sponsored by PMA!
Tommie Van Zyl is the CEO of ZZ2, a South African produce grower, packer, and shipper. Tommie has helped develop and scale the business, which supports both the South African and global markets. He dives into the operation, supply chain, and their outlook for 2020. Tune in!
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This is the second episode in a 4-part series sponsored by PMA!
Alicia Calhoun is the Vice President of Talent Portfolio at the Center for Growing Talent by PMA. She joins the podcast to give us her perspective on building and sustaining talent within the industry as well as the importance of creating a positive culture. Whether you have a few employees on a farm or hundreds in the corporate world, you won't want to miss the insights on this episode!
Connect with PMA Website | Fresh Summit | Center for Growing Talent
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This is the first episode in a 4-part series sponsored by PMA!
Bob Whitaker is the Chief Science & Technology Officer of the Produce Marketing Association. Bob has has a incredibly successful career, starting in the biotechnology plant space. He then spent time in the processing side of the produce industry before joining PMA over 10 years ago. In his role Bob has responsibility for food safety, technology, and issues leadership for the produce supply chain, from field to fork.
Bob announced his retirement a few months ago and will be officially leaving after this year's Fresh Summit. He shares a ton of insight into the industry, including an emphasis on food safety and role of technology within agriculture. Tune in!
Connect with PMA Website | Fresh Summit | Essentials of Food Safety
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Chris Paterson is the North America Lead for Xarvio, the digital farming arm of BASF. Chris has been involved with agronomy and agribusiness across North America for 25 years, and for the past ten years has been directly involved with the development of new business applications and value streams around the Digitization of Farming, Agribusiness, and AgriFood. He shares more about his career, and insights into how agriculture has evolved over time with some key insights into where the industry is going.
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Paul Greive is founder of Primal Pastures, a pastured livestock farm that delivers high-quality, fresh meat direct to consumer. Paul shares his amazing story of founding the company to feed his family healthy, real food and how it grew to become a successful company. He talks about their focus on growing regeneratively, the role of social media, and how he has launched a wholesale company called Pasture Bird. Tune in!
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Gail Becker is the founder and CEO of Caulipower. Gail left an incredibly successful career in PR and marketing to launch a food company focused on making comfort foods with healthier ingredients. Caulipower came on the food scene with their incredibly popular cauliflower pizza crust. Gail shares her compelling story of starting and growing the company and you won't want to miss it. Tune in!
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Ryan Jacobsen is the CEO and Executive Director of the Fresno County Farm Bureau. He is also the host of the television show, Valley's Gold, which provides a behind-the-scenes look of the California agricultural industry. We talk with Ryan about the current state of the ag industry, how we has managed and grown the Farm Bureau, and the importance of using your voice in agriculture.
Connect with Fresno County Farm Bureau Website | Twitter | Valley's Gold
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This is the fourth and final episode in a 4-part series sponsored by AgFunder!
David Farquhar is the CEO of Intelligent Growth Solutions, a technology company that provides vertical farming systems for 3rd party indoor farms. IGS has been a leading innovator in the vertical farming space. David has an impressive background of scaling technology companies and shares the story and technology of IGS and what he has implemented since taking over as CEO. This is a must-listen episode!
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This is the third episode in a 4-part series sponsored by AgFunder!
Abi Ramanan is the founder and CEO of ImpactVision, which uses machine learning and hyperspectral imaging to detect the quality and composition of food products to a degree that has not been possible before. This will enable food supply chains to reduce waste, maximize yield, and improve quality. Tune in to learn more about how the company was founded and developed over time, it's partnership with AgFunder, and more about hyperspectral technology.
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This is the second episode in a 4-part series sponsored by AgFunder!
Sofia Elizondo is the co-founder and COO at Brightseed. She has an impressive background in CPG, pharmaceutical, and technology companies. Sofia co-founded Brightseed focusing on improving the nutrition in our food. The team has developed a computational search engine, Forager, which can identify plant compounds that can be instrumental in returning nutrition to food. We learn more about the company, their partnership with AgFunder, and where they are in the product development. Tune in!
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This is the first episode in a 4-part series sponsored by AgFunder!
Michael Dean is the founding partner of AgFunder, which is a venture capital firm whose mission is to invest in technology that will rapidly transform our food and agriculture system. AgFunder has built it's investing platform on top of it's best-in-class news publications, which has become the go-to hub for the latest on food and agri-tech investment.
Michael is an entrepreneur and investor with a background in agriculture, finance and law. On this episode, we discuss how Michael and his co-founder, Rob, started AgFunder and their approach to growing the business. Michael also shares his perspective on the industry, including the M&A activity, which you won't want to miss!
Connect with AgFunder Fund | News | Episode 30 | Twitter
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Nick Halla is the Senior Vice President, International at Impossible Foods and was also the company's first employee. Nick has grown within the company as it has scaled into restaurants, food service, and now retail. Impossible Foods is a plant-based meat company that is committed to products that look, feel, and taste like animal meat, but with less environmental impact. Tune in to learn about this innovative area of alternative agriculture!
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Nike Neal is the founder and CEO of DecisionNext. DecisionNext helps companies improve their market performance through machine learning and prescriptive analytics. Mike talks with us about founding the company and how it has scaled over time, including the focus on agricultural commodities. Tune in and learn more!
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Finally The Modern Acre podcast discusses hemp and CBD! The introduction of the new Farm Bill opened the floodgates to a new business opportunity. This week we talk with the founder of Nikkal Farms, Paul Clift, who talks all things hemp and CBD. He farms 7 acres of industrial hemp and is currently focusing on launching a retail line of CBD products. Learn more about his approach to this fast-paced industry on this episode!
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2018 Forbes Ag Tech Episode
We had the pleasure of participating in the 5th annual Forbes AgTech Summit this year in Salinas, California. To learn more about what we learned at the show, sign up for Acre Insights.
Aerobotics focuses on early pest and disease detection enabled by drone imagery and artificial intelligence. We talked with Aerobotics Chief Commerical Officer, Andrew Burdock, who is working to scale up their U.S. operation. Andrew talks more about the origins of the company, how they were successful in South Africa, and how they are approaching entering a new market. This episode is jam packed, don't miss it!
Connect with Aerobotics Website | #Trees&Tech | YouTube
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Molly Toot is the Director of Sustainability at Land O'Lakes SUSTAIN. Land O'Lakes SUSTAIN is a leading conservation solutions provider, advancing and connecting stewardship efforts throughout the food system with scale – from farmers to ag retailers to partners like food companies. Molly talks about her background in the industry and how SUSTAIN originated as a merger with Land O'Lakes and United Suppliers. We get into all things sustainability and learn more about how SUSTAIN is pushing the industry forward.
Connect with Land O'Lakes SUSTAIN Website | Twitter | Molly's Twitter
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Interested in direct-to-consumer business? We are re-airing one of our most popular episodes to-date featuring the Farmer's Dog.
Brett Podolskyjoins The Modern Acre podcast to talk about how he helped create The Farmer's Dog, a dog food company focused on using real, fresh food and delivering customized servings to their customers. Brett shares the vision behind the company and why using real food is so important to the brand. While the company is not directly involved in a agriculture at the farm level, there is SO much insight from building a direct-to-consumer business, cutting out middlemen, focus on high quality food, marketing, and more! Let us know what you think!
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Want to learn more about our plans for The Modern Acre? For the first time, we sit on the other side of the mic and join The Farm Traveler Podcast for an interview! The host, Trevor Williams, asks us about how The Modern Acre started and what our vision for it is. We also discuss our take on the industry. We really appreciated the opportunity to be on The Farm Traveler Podcast and share a little more with the community!
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This week we are talking regenerative agriculture with Sara Harper, founder and CEO of Grounded Growth. Sara discusses her career on Capitol Hill working to implement policy change within agriculture and how that led her to the private sector to continue the effort. Grounded Growth is a network that enables, supports and grows business-enhancing relationships between food companies and farmers who are expanding regenerative agriculture. Tune in to learn more about this popular topic and how Sara has scaled her business!
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Zach Sheely joins us to talk about how his interest in technology started on his family farm and evolved to his current position as President of Agworld. Agworld is one of the leading farm management companies, helping farmers take control of their business and operate more efficiently. Zach walks us through how he joined Agworld and helped them grow over time. This is a jam-packed episode you can't afford to miss!
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We're happy to continue to partner with the International Agri-Center, which is set to hold the 53rd World Ag Expo February 11-13, 2020.
Listen to Jennifer's episode HERE
Fieldin was recently awarded the AgFunder Innovation Award for Farm Tech category for its smart harvesting and spraying technology! We had the great opportunity to sit down with Neil Knaak to learn more about Fieldin. Neil shares more about the exciting technology that Fieldin has developed, how the team has grown the business, and what priorities are for the next year. You won't want to miss this episode with one of the hottest agtech startups around!
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Gary Loh is the Executive Chairman of First Alverstone Capital, a private equity group focusing primarily in Asian oriented opportunities. He also serves as the Executive Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of SunMoon Food Company. Gary led the turnaround of SunMoon Food after taking control of the business in 2007 and implementing a new business model. Recently, Gary founded a tech startup, DiMuto, focused on global trade that leverages blockchain technology to instill transparency in the food chain.
On this episode, we get in to Gary's background with SunMoon and how he led the turnaround. Gary discusses his new venture, DiMuto, and how he has begun building the business in Asia and the US. Gary is a wealth of knowledge and experience and you won't want to miss this one!
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David Jones came back to the family dairy and led the adoption and integration of robotic technology to help address the increasing labor challenges in the US. Learn more about his thoughts on robotics and the farm's transition. David is an advocate for technology and the dairy industry and recently started a position at DeLaval, who provides integrated, automated equipment solutions for dairies. Don't miss this episode!
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Tune in to hear about ag entrepreneurship! Danny Royer started his career working for several successful farms, focusing on improving operation's efficiencies using technology. He recently ventured out on his own to start his own consulting firm that works with both farmers and ag tech companies. We discuss the vision for the business, what his first steps have been, and how he is thinking differently about marketing.
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Tillable is an online ag marketplace focused on changing the way farmland is rented, making it easier than ever for landowners and farmers to grow. We talk this week with the Founder and CEO of Tillable, Corbett Kullwho has an impressive background in technology and ag startups. Tune in to learn how he has navigated building a marketplace for farmers and landowners, as well as his take on the ag industry!
Connect with Tillable Website | Twitter
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Join our Closed Facebook Group HERE
Tune in this week to hear how Christine Moseley has grown her startup, Full Harvest, to fix one of the biggest problems in agriculture: food waste. Full Harvest is the first B2B marketplace for imperfect and surplus produce. Christine shares the details behind how the company started, the challenges she's faced, and what the company is focused on the rest of the year. Don't miss this episode!
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We had the great pleasure of interviewing a fellow podcaster and standout farm-marketer, Tim Young. Tim has an incredible story, from having a successful career in corporate America to leaving it all to start a farm while focusing on his family. As it turns out, Tim was rather successful farming and has since transitioned to build an online academy that helps farmers build and grow their small farm and direct-to-consumer products, not to mention a great podcast. We talk through Tim's career and he shares a ton of valuable insight along the way. You don't want to miss this one!
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Watch our Cheddar TV Segment HERE
Tune in this week to hear from one of the premier thought leaders in the agriculture industry, Vonnie Estes. Vonnie holds the position of Vice President of Technology at the Produce Marketing Association and has an impressive background in science and technology as it relates to agriculture.
Vonnie dives into a recent AgFunder article she wrote sharing 5 things she saw at the recent Agri-Tech Innovation Summit in San Francisco as well as sharing more about her role at PMA. You won't want to miss this episode!
Connect with Vonnie LinkedIn | AgFunder Article | PMA Website
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Henry Gordon-Smithis the Founder and Managing Director of Agritecture, an urban agriculture consulting company. Agritecture was started by Henry as a blog resource for all things urban agriculture news, business, and design. He shares about how he started his career in hydroponics and grew his blog into a successful consulting business.
Henry gives his take on the current state of the industry, from industrial-scale, localized vertical farms to shipping container indoor farms. There is so much value in this episode whether you are interested in urban agriculture or you want to learn how to develop your network and influence to start a business. Don't miss this one!
Connect with Agritecture Website | Instagram | Twitter | Podcast
Connect with Teens for Food Justice HERE
TMA Spotlight | Hingtgen Farms Instagram
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You won't want to miss this episode talking with Doug Brunner, a California farmer and businessman who left his family's dairy operation to start and scale his own farm. Doug has a passion for agriculture and shares his experience of navigating farming in 2019. He also talks about a new venture called The Ag Center 59, which is one-stop-shop of ag businesses, servicing farms across California. Tune in!
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This week on the podcast we welcome Tara Vander Dussen, better known online as the New Mexico Milkmaid. Tara started her blog to share her story about being in the dairy industry and what she has learned along the way. She shares her vision for her brand, how it started, and how she's moving it forward, including how to monetize the brand. Tune in to learn more how to leverage your influence online!
Books: Good to Great, Building a Story Brand, How to Win Friends and Influence People
Podcasts: Stuff You Should Know, The End of the World, How I Built This
App: Instagram
Influencer: Five Marys Farm
Connect with New Mexico Milkmaid Website | Instagram | Facebook
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Tune in to hear the story of how Kyle McMahon built his company, TractorZoom, which is revolutionizing how farmers are finding farm equipment auctions.
Connect with TractorZoom Website | Instagram | Twitter
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Porter Road is revolutionizing the way poultry is processed and how it's sent to you. Founder James Peisker shares the story of how he and co-founder, Chris Carter, started a meat catering service which evolved over time to a storefront in Nashville and now an online business. Porter Road partners with farmers to provide the highest quality and standard meat and are taking on the large poultry industry in the process. Tune in and learn the whole story!
Connect with Porter Road Website | Instagram | Facebook
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In this popular episode, we re-air the story of the beverage business, SAP!, with co-founders Chas Smith and Nikita Salmon. SAP! offers sparkling water that's flavored with maple and birch sap, straight from Chas and Nikita's home state of Vermont.
We discuss their upbringing in Vermont and how the maple industry has evolved. They share how they started the ag business and have scaled it through supply chain optimization, local and regional sales distribution, and marketing through social media. We could not stop asking questions and digging into how they've grown their business from nothing. Tune in!
Connect with SAP! Website | Instagram
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Brennan Turner is the CEO and co-founder of FarmLead, North America's largest grain marketplace. He joins us for a wide-ranging conversation that you won't want to miss. Learn how he left Wall Street to come back home to build and scale the startup aimed at transforming how grain marketing is done. Tune in!
Connect with Farm Lead Website | Twitter | Breakfast Brief
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Pivot Bio is one of the hottest new startups out there today, but they are no flash in the pan. Pivot Bio has developed a first-of-its-kind, nitrogen-producing microbe that is changing the way nitrogen is applied to corn. This means less fertilizer work for farmers and a more reliable and consistent method for delivering plant nutrition. Tune in to hear from Sarah Bloch and learn more about the technology and how the startup began and has scaled over time.
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ENTER THE GIVEAWAY HERE
We made it! We could not be more thrilled to reach this milestone and can't thank YOU enough for tuning in. For this episode, Tim and Tyler talk through the top takeaways from a year of the podcast.
1) Ag businesses that are successful focus on the farmer first and provide clear value to them
Check out the episodes HERE
2) Social media wins - not for the sake of social media, but for connecting with real people (customers, partners, etc.)
Check out the episodes HERE
3) Direct-to-consumer strategy is increasingly achievable and effective due to internet/social with a plethora of simple, low-cost e-commerce tools
Check out the episodes HERE
4) Time, effort, and resources should be spent on understanding the market and what people are buying NOT on philosophical opinions of organic vs. conventional (vs. non-GMO, etc.)
Check out the episodes HERE
5) Non-traditional agriculture (vertical, indoor, urban, hydroponics, aquaculture) have their place and have good upsides. They are a SUPPLEMENT not a REPLACEMENT in ag innovation
Check out the episodes HERE
6) The biggest challenge/opportunity in agriculture is the labor shortage. The idea/company that can effectively solve pieces of this problem will win
Check out the episodes HERE
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We're so excited to partner with the International Agri-Center, which is set to hold the 52nd World Ag Expo February 12-14, 2019. The largest annual agricultural exposition of its kind, World Ag Expo boasts more than 1,500 exhibitors displaying cutting-edge agricultural technology and equipment on 2.6 million square feet of exhibit space. In 2018, 106,700 people came from 49 states and 63 countries to attend the 51st World Ag Expo.
We sit down and talk with Jennifer Fawkes who is in charge of Marketing for the event. She provides background on the Ag Expo and how they have involved over time. We discuss the challenges and opportunities planning and executing an event like this requires.
We will be attending the Expo in February and hope to see you there! Be on the lookout next week for our giveaway which will include 4 tickets to the event!
Coupon Code: ModAcre
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Whether you're interested in building an ag business or want to know more about advancements made in agronomic testing, this episode is FIRE. This interview was the perfect way to kick off 2019. We interview the President and Co-Founder of Trace Genomics, a technology startup changing how agronomic testing is done through testing the soil's DNA and getting that information in the hands of farmers. So much good stuff in this one, tune in!
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We loved this episode. You won’t want to miss how Bryton Shang and Aquabyte are disrupting a very specific niche of agriculture, aquaculture. Tune in to learn about what Aquabyte is up to, how they are building and going to market with their product, and more about the industry of aquaculture. Most importantly, you will learn about how they are using cutting end technology to build a promising business in agriculture.
Connect with Aquabite Website | Twitter | Careers
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We had a little break and are so excited to release a brand new episode! This week we sit down with Eamon Flood of Granular, a popular suite of farm management software. We discuss Eamon's background and what makes Granular unique and beneficial for the farmer. He also shares how Granular has scaled over time and how they plan to double-down on UI in 2019. Tune in!
Connect with Granular Website | Twitter
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This is a must-listen episode with HarvestPort CEO, Brian Dawson. Not only do we dive deep on Brian's latest venture with HarvestPort, but we also talk about the agtech industry landscape as a whole. Brian shares how HarvestPort originated and how it has continued to innovate through a hybrid marketing approach, while continuing to listen to its customers to evolve over time. Soak up all the insight you can from Brian in this episode- tune in!
Connect with HarvestPort Website | Instagram
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Re-airing one of our most popular episodes, Episode 4 with Jesse Vollmar. Tim and Tyler also share some details of a recent wine project from Gary Vee. Tune in!
On this episode we have a hugely valuable conversation with Jesse Vollmar, Founder and CEO of the farm management technology company, FarmLogs. Jesse discusses his passion for technology and software development, and how he brought that passion back to the agriculture community. We talk through the difference between maximizing yields and maximizing profits, as well as what lessons he has learned as a CEO. Jesse touches on the importance of net neutrality and how technology will continue to impact agriculture.
FarmLogs is a platform of easy-to-use tools and software that enables farmers to more effectively leverage data on the farm. There are over 50,000 farms covering over 80M acres that use FarmLogs, allowing thousands of farmers to run more efficient and profitable businesses. That's a LOT of modern acres.
Check out FarmLogs HERE
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We are re-airing one of our most popular episodes ever! Well worth a second listen as there's so much good stuff packed in this one.
In this episode, we talk to Jay Hill, who grew his family's 10 acre hobby farm into a 17,000 acre farming operation today. Jay talks about his journey from a 16-year-old who knew he wanted to build the farm to how he has scaled the farm to multiple locations with a diverse crop portfolio. Jay has successfully leveraged social media to not only build brand awareness, but also to drive sales to his business. This is a must-listen! So much good info.
Connect with Jay Twitter | Instagram | Podcast
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We've all been waiting for it... (right?!) It only took 42 episodes for us to finally discuss blockchain! We couldn't have had a better guest on to discuss the application of blockchain technology in food and ag. Raja Ramachandran is the CEO and co-founder of ripe.io, which is transforming the food and ag industry by bringing transparency and solutions to the supply chain through blockchain and the internet of things. Raja shares more about what blockchain is, how ripe.io fits in, and where the industry is going. You won't want to miss this episode!
Connect with Ripe.io Website | Twitter
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Shay Myers is the owner and general manager of Owyhee Produce, a Oregon-based, multi-generational, vertically-integrated farm. Shay exemplifies what The Modern Acre is all about. We talk about how he and the team at Owyhee are innovating their business through value-add operations, technology, and marketing. Shay talks about his influence on LinkedIn and how that has opened doors for him and the farm business. We loved talking with Shay and hope you'll listen in!
Connect with Owyhee Website | LinkedIn
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Bowery Farming is rethinking farming and we had the great pleasure to talk with the person who is helping bring the future to life there. Henry Sztul is the Head of R&D and BoweryOS. We discuss Bowery's vision and mission for the future of agriculture, focused on bringing fresh and local produce to cities around the world. Bowery leverages advanced technology to scale up their operations. Henry had plenty of great insight to share that you won't want to miss, especially if you are interested in the world of indoor/vertical farming!
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Sarah Nolet knows the AgTech space and works with both startups, corporates, and farmers in the industry to help create and build the future of food and agriculture. We dive into her company, AgThentic, which provides leading consulting services to the industry. Sarah shares how the company was originated and how it has evolved and grown to now include a venture capital arm. Not only does she share about building her business, but Sarah also has so much good insight on the industry as a whole. Tune in!
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Anna Haldewang's class project in college has turned into her full time job with the help of some viral media coverage highlighting her unique idea. Tune in to learn more about Plan Bee, Anna's company that is developing a drone that mimics the work of a bee by pollinating plants. Anna is very passionate about the issues affecting bees and it was great learning more about the business as it's entering the next phase of development. Drones, labor, entrepreneurship- this episode packs a punch!
Connect with Plan Bee Website | LinkedIn
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We had the great honor to interview the co-founder and CEO of Square Roots, Tobias Peggs. Tobias has an incredibly successful career as the CEO of multiple companies, acquired by Adobe and Walmart, not to mention a background in Artificial Intelligence. Tobias shares the story of how Square Roots started with co-founder Kimbal Musk. Square Roots is a platform and program that empowers and trains urban farmers to grow leafy greens in modified storage container units. Tobias goes in to detail how they approach urban/indoor farming and have evolved their go to market strategy. Don't miss this!
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We have finally made it around to one of our favorite topics -- beer! We had the great pleasure to talk to an industry veteran, Ron Silberstein, who has founded one of the first organic breweries and, most recently, the first craft malting house on the west coast. Admiral Maltings utilizes a traditional, low-volume method to malt grain and barely from local farmers. Ron shares more about the whole malting process and how to create a premium product from a traditionally commodity market.
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Our first repeat guest on the show is Chris Laudando. Chris was a part of the Forbes AgTech Summit episode (listen here) and after talking to him, we knew we had to get him back on the show for a full episode. Chris has so much insight to offer in the food and ag tech space with his work at Motive Engineering, which is an engineering services firm that accelerates product development for their clients. Chris joined Motivo as part of an acquisition of a company he started focused on creative and innovative solutions in the food and ag sectors. This is a must-listen, tune in!
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This episode showcases the best of startup innovation in food and ag! We had the pleasure of talking with Nina Meijers, who is a Senior Associate and Platform Manager of FoodBytes! by Rabobank. FoodBytes! was launched within Rabobank as an initiative to engage with the startup community, focusing on food and ag. Nina has extensive background in sustainable food and ag tech and discusses how the program started and how it has experienced incredible growth over the past few years. This episode has so much good stuff, whether you're interested in how to build a brand, grow a platform, or just interested in how Rabobank is approaching the startup world. Too good not to listen!
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We had the great pleasure of interviewing a fellow podcaster and standout farm-marketer, Tim Young. Tim has an incredible story, from having a successful career in corporate America to leaving it all to start a farm while focusing on his family. As it turns out, Tim was rather successful farming and has since transitioned to build an online academy that helps farmers build and grow their small farm and direct-to-consumer products, not to mention a great podcast. We talk through Tim's career and he shares a ton of valuable insight along the way. You don't want to miss this one!
Connect with Small Farm Nation Website | Twitter
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We loved talking with Alexandra "Rae" Danell, who started Harvest Joy Design to share the unique story of farms through photography. With a passion for agriculture and marketing, Rae decided to start a business outside of her day job. We discuss how her previous experience led her back to the world of agriculture and how she started and approaches her business. She provides a ton of amazing insight for anyone looking to improve their social media marketing. Tune in!
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We loved getting to talk to Igino Cafiero, who is the co-founder and CEO of Bear Flag Robotics. Bear Flag is a startup focused on tackling the challenge of automating farms to reduce cost, increase output, and make farms safer. Igino shares more about the origins of Bear Flag, how they approach autonomy, and how to run a company that's so dynamic. The future of farming is closer than you think, tune in!
Connect with Bear Flag Robotics Website | Twitter
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On our 30th episode (!!!) we had the great privilege to talk with Rob Reclerc, who is the Co-Founder and CEO of AgFunder. AgFunder is the leading online investment platform, focused on AgriFood Tech investments. We talk about how the business started, how it's evolved, and how it's focused on media and news to grow their online presence. Rob had so much insight to share about the state of the industry, not to mention how to start a thriving ag business. Tune in!
Connect with AgFunder Website | Twitter
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This week we talk with Harry Ferdon of SWIIM System, which was recently ranked as one of the Top 25 Most Innovative AgTech Startups by Forbes for the second straight year! The water challenge facing farmers across America and globally has come up many times on the podcast. We were thrilled to dive into SWIIM System's business model and learn about the value they provide farmers and how they have evolved over time. Harry discusses their focus on technology, their customers, and the industry. We hope you enjoy!
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Brett Podolsky joins The Modern Acre to talk about how he helped create the Farmer's Dog, a dog food company focused on using real, fresh food and delivering customized servings to their customers. Brett shares the vision behind the company and why using real food is so important to the brand. While the company is not directly involved in a agriculture at the farm level, there is SO much insight from building a direct-to-consumer business, cutting out middlemen, focus on high quality food, marketing, and more! Let us know what you think!
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What a great, jam-packed episode! We chat with Curtis Garner of Bowles Farming Company, an innovative 6th-generation family owned and operated farm in California. Curtis dives deep into the vision, operations, and challenges at Bowles. We discuss everything from conventional vs. organic and labor challenges to agtech and sustainability. If you are involved in agriculture, there is something in this episode for you or your money back (good thing we don't charge for this amazing content). Tune in!
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This week we talk with Adam and Jean O'Neal of PepperHarrow Farm. PepperHarrow Farm is a 20-acre boutique flower farm in Iowa that Adam and Jenn have scaled over time without increasing acreage. They have done this by leveraging multiple revenue streams and optimizing their business strategy. We talk everything from farmers markets to growing an authentic social media. SO much good value in this episode, tune in!
Connect with PepperHarrow Farm Website | Instagram
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Check out the Forbes AgTech Summit HERE
Indianapolis Summit in September HERE
We had the opportunity to do live interviews with 3 speakers from the Forbes AgTech Summit in Salinas last week! We wanted to extract as much value from these guests in our short time, so we asked them these two questions:
- What do you think is the biggest challenge facing the agriculture industry today?
- What technology or idea do you find most compelling in agriculture right now?
The three guests cover a great range of topics and ideas:
Dan Harburg, Venture Associate at Anterra Capital
Kyle Bridgeforth, Partner and Accounts Manager at Bridgeforth Farms
Chris Laudando, Head of Strategic Partnerships at Motivo
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We loved the chance to talk to Noushin Ketabi about starting Vega Coffee by focusing on empowering growers at the farm level in Nicaragua. What makes Vega unique is cutting out the middle men in the coffee supply chain. Noushin talks about the origins of Vega, scaling the business, optimizing the supply chain and logistics, and organic growth. If you're interested in companies that are narrowing the gap between the farm and the consumer, this episode is for you!
Connect with Vega Website | Instagram
Coupon Code THEMODERNACRE at checkout for your 1st shipment free!!
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Check out the Forbes AgTech Summit HERE
Tune in to hear the story of how Chiles Wilson started Branch to Box, a fruit delivery service that provides companies with fresh produce and snacks on a recurring, subscription basis. This episode has it all, as we talk through starting a company solo, early challenges, how to pivot, and how to grass-roots market your business. Chiles also shares how he is now scaling the business with grower-partners and is able to penetrate additional markets. Learn more about this fast-growing sector of produce delivery and let us know what you think!
Connect with Branch to Box Website | Instagram
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Check out the Forbes AgTech Summit HERE
Farming.... In the ocean. Roger Bason, CEO of 3D Ocean Farm, shares his wealth of knowledge on the ocean farming industry. We dive into his background, what aquaculture is, and his latest venture in the space, 3D Ocean Farm, which is being funded through an impact investing platform called Rabble. Roger take us inside an ocean farming operation, from setup and planting to harvesting and value-add processing. "Kelp is the new kale!"
Connect with 3D Ocean Farm (Rabble) Website | Instagram
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FarmHer was founded by Marji Guyler-Alaniz to shine a light on women in agriculture through photography. It has since grown into a massive online community and media business with a presence online, on TV, and at events. Marji and FarmHer's communications manager, Lexi Marek, talk about how the business was formed and how it has evolved and grown over time.
We discuss everything from events to merchandise to how to best connect with your audience. This episode has so much value if you're interested in started a business around your passion. Tune in!
Connect with FarmHer Website | Instagram| Twitter| Spotify
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Small Robot Company's name is simple, but their vision is vast. Founders Ben Scott-Robinson and Sam Watson Jones talk about how their UK startup was formed and how they plan to execute their vision. The company is developing a three-robot autonomous system unlike anything seen in the tractor space. Ben and Sam share how they plan to go-to-market as "farming as a service" and how they work with farmers to communicate their value proposition. Tune in and let us know what you think!
Connect with Small Robot Company Website | Twitter| Indigogo
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This is a must-listen episode with HarvestPort CEO, Brian Dawson. Not only do we dive deep on Brian's latest venture with HarvestPort, but we also talk about the agtech industry landscape as a whole. Brian shares how HarvestPort originated and how it has continued to innovate through a hybrid marketing approach, while continuing to listen to its customers to evolve over time. Soak up all the insight you can from Brian in this episode- tune in!
Connect with HarvestPort Website | Instagram
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Henry Gordon-Smith is the Founder and Managing Director of Agritecture, an urban agriculture consulting company. Agritecture was started by Henry as a blog resource for all things urban agriculture news, business, and design. He shares about how he started his career in hydroponics and grew his blog into a successful consulting business.
Henry gives his take on the current state of the industry, from industrial-scale, localized vertical farms to shipping container indoor farms. There is so much value in this episode whether you are interested in urban agriculture or you want to learn how to develop your network and influence to start a business. Don't miss this one!
Connect with Agritecture Website | Instagram | Twitter
Connect with Teens for Food Justice HERE
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Join our Closed Facebook Group HERE
California Olive Ranch is the premier olive oil producer in America. We had the great opportunity to talk with Logan Jennings, the production operations manager at CA Olive Ranch, to discuss his journey with the company over the past several years. Logan entered the company as an entry-level employee and has gained responsibility while learning much of the full business operation. He now oversees the entire mill operation.
Logan talks about the olive oil industry, CA Olive Ranch's focus on the customer, and why it's important to consolidate your product portfolio to maximize operational efficiency. Logan has a wealth of knowledge and he shared a ton of information that's too good not to miss! Tune in and let us know what you think!
Connect with CA Olive Ranch Website | Twitter| Instagram
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In this episode, we talk with Michael Mazourek, who is one of the founders and head breeder at Row 7 Seeds. Row 7 is completely rethinking seed development. Where most seed companies are focused on maximizing quality and yield, Row 7 is focused on maximizing different attributes: taste and flavor. Row 7 is developing seeds for new breeds of vegetables by working directly with chefs.
Michael talks about his background in seed science and how his passion for the field ultimately led him to Row 7. We cover Row 7's innovative approach, working with growers and chefs directly, and how Row 7 is focused on building their brand online through their website and social media. Tons of good takeaways in this episode, tune in!
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If you are just getting into farming or need some inspiration for thinking creatively in agriculture, this is the episode for you. Brad Squires joins us to talk about how he transitioned out of the tech industry, where he helped build an incredibly successful B2B software company, to how he is now jumping into agriculture. Although Brad is just starting out, he shares valuable insight into how he plans to maximize a relatively small farm into an Ag Experience, focusing on community involvement and agritourism. We discuss several go-to-market strategies that he is thinking through and much more. Tune in!
Connect with Brad LinkedIn
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If you’ve wanted to learn more about hydroponics and how the technology can fit into your business, this is the episode for you. We talk with Joe Swartz, Vice President of Sales with American Hydroponics, or AmHydro. He has over 30 years of hydroponics experience, originally converting his own farm to maximize the business.
Joe shares important insight into what hydroponics is and what it isn’t, how it compares to organic methods, and how to discern up and coming technology. We get into how AmHydro has innovated by building a solution oriented business and focusing on the success of their customers. Tune in to learn more about building a business around the proven method that can diversify farms: hydroponics!
Connect with AmHydro Website | Instagram
Connect with Joe Twitter
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In this episode, we talk to Jay Hill, who grew his family's 10 acre hobby farm into a 17,000 acre farming operation today. Jay talks about his journey from a 16-year-old who knew he wanted to build the farm to how he has scaled the farm to multiple locations with a diverse crop portfolio. Jay has successfully leveraged social media to not only build brand awareness, but also to drive sales to his business. This is a must-listen! So much good info.
Connect with Jay Twitter | Instagram
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Trent Meyer is the Executive Vice President of DOT Technology, which is reimagining the future of farming through autonomous technology. Trent shares the story of how he unknowingly ended up working for the top-secret project under the vision and leadership of DOT's founder, Norbert Beaujot. Trent discusses DOT's innovative business model that acts as base infrastructure technology to broader autonomous applications and how the team at DOT has been strategic about their marketing approach.
We discuss how autonomous technology can disrupt agriculture, while leveraging increasingly available and competitively priced technology. Trent is focused on how DOT is providing value to farmers and how the "next big thing" in agriculture may not be where people expect it to come from. We are really excited for our first episode focused on the equipment aspect of agriculture - autonomous equipment no less!
Connect with DOT Website | Instagram
Donate to Saskatchewan Special Olympics HERE
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In this episode, we talk with Casey Cox, a 6th-generation farmer from Georgia (yes, 6th!). Casey decided to come back to the family peanut, sweet corn, and timber farm after going away to college and discusses the challenges she’s faced as well as her early successes.
Casey is incredibly involved in water conservation efforts and shares how she is pushing for innovation, both in the policy sector and investing in technology to improve irrigation. We also dive into her appearance on the Netflix series “Rotten” where she discussed her perspective on the peanut industry. Tune in to find out how it went!
Connect with Casey Website | Instagram
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Charles Baron, VP of Product and Co-founder of Farmers Business Network, talks with us about the values of the company that has disrupted the ag industry with price transparency. FBN is a company based around a network of farmers that leverages data to provide valuable insight and market intelligence back to the farmers. In our words, Farmers Business Network is "robinhood" for the ag industry.
Charles talks about how and why he and his co-founders were inspired to build this business based around technology and the challenges they faced right from the start. He talks about how they had to boot strap the business to build traction and how they really focused on listening to their customers to innovate their product. FBN is a true Modern Acre case study, tune in!
Connect with Farmers Business Network Website | Twitter | YouTube
Connect with The Modern Acre Website | Instagram | Twitter
Jack Zech, a fourth-generation farmer, talks about coming back to his family farm after several years moving up the ladder of a large clothing company. We discuss what he learned through managing retail stores and overall strategy for Uniclo and what motivated him to leave corporate America to return to his family's farm in the California delta.
Jack shares how he is adjusting to the change and how he has started in filling whatever gaps the farm needs. In addition to helping with the farming operation, Jack is starting a distillery business as a sister-company of the family farm. We dive into some of the early wins and challenges he has faced with building this business. Enjoy!
Connect with Jack Email
Connect with The Modern Acre Website | Instagram | Twitter
Margaux Alvarez, a 5x CrossFit Games athlete, shares how she has built a successful wine business around her personal brand. We cover everything from how she grows her own grapes to the winemaking process to all of the regulatory challenges of the alcohol industry.
She has scaled her business by leveraging her personal brand as a CrossFit athlete and coach, focusing on direct-to-consumer sales and marketing. She connects with others by being honest about her story, while engaging well in her community. This is a great episode that everyone can learn from, no matter the sector of agriculture.
Connect with Margaux Instagram | YouTube
Connect with Vine Yard Wine | CrossFit
Connect with The Modern Acre Website | Instagram | Twitter
In this episode, we dive into the beverage business, SAP!, with co-founders Chas Smith and Nikita Salmon. SAP! offers sparkling water that's flavored with maple and birch sap, straight from Chas and Nikita's home state of Vermont.
We discuss their upbringing in Vermont and how the maple industry has evolved. They share how they started the ag business and have scaled it through supply chain optimization, local and regional sales distribution, and marketing through social media. We could not stop asking questions and digging into how they've grown their business from nothing. Tune in!
Connect with SAP! Website | Instagram
Launch Giveaway: Scope the details HERE
In episode 6, we talk with Alli Cecchini, Executive Director of First Generation Farmers, a non-profit organization dedicated to the education and training of the next-generation of organic farmers. Alli grew up on her family's asparagus farm and eventually came back and convinced her parents to let her use a half an acre for community farming.
That half acre turned into a massive community and education program, including school field trips and agritourism. Alli has since created the Urban Edge Sustainable Farming Program, a program which provides organic farmer training to first generation farmers passionate about agriculture. Alli shares her journey, what she’s learned, and why she is passionate about creating change.
Connect with FGF Website | Instagram | Facebook
Launch Giveaway: Scope the details HERE
In this episode, we talk about the importance of education in inspiring the next-generation of farmers and ag entrepreneurs with the president of the California FFA, Luke O’Leary.
Luke talks about his experience with FFA in high school, the transition to college in Texas, then back to California for a year spent traveling around the state inspiring and educated the next generation. We discuss the importance of educating others about the importance and breadth of agriculture, as well as the role FFA plays.
Connect with Luke HERE
Connect with the California FFA HERE
Launch Giveaway: Scope the details HERE
On episode 4, we have a hugely valuable conversation with Jesse Vollmar, Co-founder and CEO of the farm management technology company, FarmLogs. Jesse discusses his passion for technology and software development, and how he brought that passion back to the agriculture community. We talk through the difference between maximizing yields and maximizing profits, as well as what lessons he has learned as a CEO. Jesse touches on the importance of net neutrality and how technology will continue to impact agriculture.
FarmLogs is a platform of easy-to-use tools and software that enables farmers to more effectively leverage data on the farm. There are over 50,000 farms covering over 80M acres that use FarmLogs, allowing thousands of farmers to run more efficient and profitable businesses. That's a LOT of modern acres.
Check out FarmLogs HERE
Connect with Jesse HERE
Launch Giveaway: Scope the details HERE
On this episode, we talk with Austin Maness, COO of Harvest Returns, a crowdfunding platform for ag investing. Austin talks about learning about agriculture and farming from his grandparents, his extensive military service, and helping start an innovative ag business.
Harvest Returns provides farmers with more flexible financing options that a traditional loan, while also providing an alternative, passive investment for investors. Austin provides some examples of ag businesses they have worked with and talks about how the industry is trending and adopting technology.
This is a good one, tune in!
Check out Harvest Returns HERE
Connect with Austin HERE
Launch Giveaway: Scope the details HERE
“A flamethrower is at stake here people.”
On this episode, we interview John Stenderup, Strategic Sales Executive for C.H. Robinson. We discuss what growing up on a farm was like, studying international ag business at Cal Poly, and transitioning to supply chain management, logistics, and global trade for fresh produce. We also get into what his recent Mount Everest climb was like. Needless to say, it’s a jam packed show!
John talks about learning about hard work doing odd jobs on the farm and how that established a foundation for him later in life. We discuss the disruption of technology in agriculture in the past 10 years and how that will continue to change the industry at a faster pace. John highlights the importance of relationships, networking, and partnering with academia to push innovation.
Connect with John HERE
Read the Cal Poly article HERE
Launch Giveaway: Scope the details HERE
We made it! Episode 1 of The Modern Acre. On the first episode of the podcast, we share more of the vision of The Modern Acre and who we are. We’ll let our voiceover guy take it from here…
“The Modern Acre - Agriculture for the Next-Generation Farm & Business
The Modern Acre is a community of students, farmers, professionals, and entrepreneurs passionate about building their ag businesses through modern day innovation and technology. If you’re in the ag industry and looking for strategies for your business and inspiration from industry leaders and disruptors, you’re in the right place.
Stay tuned and join the community of ag innovators at themodernacre.co”
Thanks, voiceover guy. But seriously, we are really excited about starting this podcast and hope it will provide a ton of value to you!
You can connect with Tim and Tyler HERE