Straight Talk with NDFB

Best of Straight Talk: Starting a business with your spouse

• Emmery Mehlhoff and Alisha Nord • Episode 4

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In this "Best of" season of Straight Talk, we step back to Season 7, episode 15 as hosts Emmery Mehlhoff and Alisha Nord travel to Wimbledon, N.D., to visit with Matt and Bethany Peterson, owners of Aligned Ag. 

Aligned Ag offers precision ag services, crop protection, soil sampling services and sells Pioneer seed to the Wimbledon and surrounding areas. 

Matt and Bethany began growing their business in 2021, and Bethany recently left her job at BASF to work full-time in the business. 

In today’s episode, we talk about: 

  • How precision ag and profitability go hand in hand 
  • Working together as husband and wife 
  • How to start a business from the ground up 

To contact Matt and Bethany at Aligned Ag, call 701-425-2100 or visit them at their location west of Wimbledon. 

Contact Emmery and Alisha, email emmery@ndfb.org

Matt and Bethany are also finishing their term on the NDFB YF&R Committee. Learn more about NDFB's YF&R program.

[Straight Talk theme]

[00:10] Emmery: Welcome to Straight Talk with NDFB. I am your host, Emmery Mehlhoff

[00:14] Alisha: And Alisha Nord. 

[00:16] Emmery: We are your Farm Bureau duo, bringing you your competitive edge. In today's episode, Alisha and I travel to Wimbledon, North Dakota, to visit with Matt and Bethany Peterson, owners of Aligned Ag. Matt is a Wimbledon native, but I can't... I'm actually not sure, Bethany, where you're originally from?

[00:33] Bethany: Yeah, I'm originally from Roseau, Minnesota.

[00:37] Emmery: Okay. How did you two meet?

[00:39] Matt: Yeah, we met at NDSU. We were both ag majors, but we actually met in Business English class, so that was kind of a different thing. And we had to review each other's resumes. So just a match made in heaven, you know.

[00:53] Emmery: That's hilarious. Yeah. When Caleb and I were going to get married, after we got engaged, like, some couples go through marital counseling and stuff, but we had... We sat down and we showed each other our balance sheets. So it's kind of the same thing.

[01:07] Bethany: I love it. Well, it's funny you say that, because kind of how it started with our small group project is with, as Matt said, looking at resumes. And so he saw that I had been farming back home, and I saw that he had a soil sampling business. And so it was just kind of funny for, like, ooh, intrigue.

[01:24] Emmery: Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so let's jump into a little bit more about your business here. So Aligned Ag, you said that you've started three years ago. Initially, Bethany, you had a job off of your business, and then now you've recently stepped back from that and you're now full time into this. So it's obviously your business has been growing and hired a few employees. Why don't you just tell us a little bit about Aligned Ag, what you do, who you are.

[01:53] Matt: We started in, like, June of '21, I think it was. We sell Pioneer seed corn, soybean seed, so a little bit of wheat seed, sell crop protection products. And then we have a lot of, a lot of services we provide to our customers that are supportive of us. And so one of those being scouting, we look at fields for our customers, help solve issues in their fields, and be proactive about 'em. And I guess that's kind of mostly on the scouting side. 

And then we also have precision ag. And so we offer a few different things in the precision ag side, but the majority is we make management zones. And then we zone soil test them. And we developed our management strategies by using, like, four different data layers. So we use satellite imagery for yield potential. We use topography to establish where hills are and depressional areas and things like that. Because obviously water will move nutrients and water will leave areas quicker than others. And then the other one that, that we do that makes us different than most places is we use what's called a Veris Cart. And a Veris Cart measures the speed of electrode conductivity. And so you pull this disc behind a pickup, it's the width of a pickup and it's got six discs in the ground and it's measuring how fast electricity moves through the soil. So the faster it moves, the finer the particle size. So it'd be more clay textured soils and the slower it moves, the bigger the particle size, so more sand. So that, that's one of the things that we kind of, that differentiates ourselves. But try to specialize in agronomy.

[03:39] Emmery: So you're layering all these maps on top of each other and then coming up with mainly like prescriptions or are you using, obviously you're doing zones. So then you're probably getting soil samples from those zones and then, using all that data, compiling it together to make prescription maps.

[03:56] Matt: Yes. So once we've made the zone map, then like you said, we zone soil, test it and then we build fertilizer. So nutrient prescriptions and then seed prescriptions and whatever else a guy would be like looking for there.

[04:11] Emmery: Well, and, and in this area, especially with how much soil variety we have, that is a huge deal for profitability. Can you go a little bit into that side of it? Like how have you seen doing all of the work of agronomy out on your field, doing the science, et cetera. How has that affected the profitability of the farmers that you've worked with?

[04:34] Matt: You know, you can look at profitability two different ways. You can look at it one way being how do I save money and then one way of how do I make money? You can do that with zone management too. How do I cut my costs as much as possible and you can utilize it for that. We've utilized it more for finding wherever the low hanging fruit is. You know, so in our area generally our major soil tests, phosphorus is our biggest low hanging fruit, when it comes to nutrient. We've built a lot of phosphorus levels when phosphorus was cheap and now that phosphorus is expensive, we've been able to cut back on it because it's, it's no longer the limiting factor. 

So for customers who are new to our program and they came into our program when phosphorus is expensive, it's much harder to address your, any of Your limiting factors, like, like you said, our area has a lot of variability. Like salt is a probably our biggest yield limiter in our area, right. And so when it comes to that, if your highest yield potential is only ever 80 bushels of corn in that area, well, we shouldn't be fertilizing it for 150. So cutting fertilizer back in those areas and then potentially putting that fertilizer elsewhere has increased yields on the fields and it also decreases cost most of the time. So profitability, knowing what acres gives you what and then actually feeding those acres correctly makes you more money at the end of the day.

[06:09] Emmery: Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, when you're flat rating everything, just going off of the average, you're really limiting your highly productive spots because you're like, oh, I'm gonna rob some nutrients over here, cause I have to flat rate everything the same. And then like you said, your salty areas or your poor is getting too much, then. Yes, for what? You know, or maybe it needs something else.

[06:31] Matt: Exactly, Yep. And that's the other thing with our area, like you said, then the variability salt, which makes the Veris Cart a good tool in our area is salt is a very good conductor of electricity. So it finds all the salt really well too, because it spikes because it's higher than it would be even if it's clay.

[06:52] Emmery: Okay, so I want to go into this Veris Cart a little bit. Can you tell? And maybe I'm just like ignorant compared to everybody listening to this podcast, but I have never heard of that before. Is that something common in the agronomy world? And can you tell us a little bit? Obviously you're using it to identify different types of soil. But how is that different than like, you know, you have your soil maps already, the types of soil, but it sounds like it's finding spots that are maybe. Yes, yeah, go go into that.

[07:22] Matt: You brought up a good point with like, you have your soil types already. So you have like, if you take a web soil survey, which is what the government did, I think it's between like the '50s and the '80s. My mom used to work at the NRCS, so I've had a lot of got some insights on that stuff. You know, she spent some time soil survey. So it's interesting because some of their mapping units up in our area could have been up to a quarter section. So take one shovel and, and say what the quarter section looks like and then they use slope and things like that to say what soil type it is. So it was never really designed for a very detailed way of management. 

A lot of more generic zone mapping and prescription companies will use it as a layer, but it's never been intended for that because it's not detailed enough to do so. So if you get down into the I states, they have more in depth soil surveys that the NRCS did, much smaller mapping units, maybe 8-acre mapping units or something like that where it's a lot tighter. I don't, I don't know what that is exactly. 

But the VeCris cart, so it's measuring speed of electricity. So if the soil is wet, you will have higher values if this because it's filling the gaps on the soil. If you have low moisture, it'll be just generally lower numbers coming out of the the cart. So what you're actually trying to get is just a pattern of the field, not necessarily values from it. You're challenging the field against itself, I guess. So you're not really saying this is Barnes soil, you're saying this part of the field is lighter than this part of the field. And so that's how we utilize a Veris Cart. And if you used it based on values, I think that's where people quit using EC to, to make zone maps in some areas is if you use the values, they're not as consistent as just the pattern it gives you. And that's, that's what we're using.

[09:29] Emmery: Let's jump a little bit into like the actual business management. Why don't you go a little bit into business ownership

[09:36] Alisha: And maybe talk about where you worked prior and then what made you decide to leave those secure jobs for this.

[09:44] Bethany: Yeah. So for me, I started out of college working with BASF and so basically with them I was an innovation specialist and really worked directly with growers on being a support role and education source of BASF products and then also assisted agronomically as well. And so I had worked with them just shy of seven years prior to coming on. Prior to that, Matthew started in 2021. So I had worked with BASF for about a year and a half of the business being started. And then Matthew, you came over from Agtegra?

[10:20] Matt: Yep. So I had worked at it. Used to be South Dakota Wheat Growers and then they merged with North Central Farmers Elevator. Agtegra is a great company. Wheat Growers was too. There were just some opportunities that arose with Pioneer. My dad and his business partner Ross Currants down in Aberdeen. They took over a Pioneer agency in Aberdeen in 2019 and so had heard all the good news about the things happening with Pioneer. Pioneer is super hungry to grow. They had gone through a bad stretch especially in North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota with some, some agronomic issues, you know, some cob drop, stock issues and things like that. So I've sold against Pioneer, you know, and done it for a while and my dad had too. 

So, it was basically when the right opportunity happened in our area, that's when we jumped on board. So it was nice to have someone with a solid stream of income. And also when you only work in one thing, so when you're totally focused on one thing, you get a little bit narrow-minded sometimes. And it, it was very refreshing when Bethany was working in, in the manufacturing side of, of the ag business. You got to see a lot of different things that she got to bring to our business that we could learn from. And BASF has been great to work with. We still work with them a lot and sell a lot of their crop protection. So.

[11:51] Bethany: Absolutely. I know I get asked a lot if I miss working at BASF and I sure do. It was great. I do miss the people there and everything. But it is something about working together with your spouse and building a business together which is super rewarding. 

You know, you guys had asked about being a couple together and how that is with business. And you know there's something about having your spouse, you trust each other and having that trust your entire way through. You know we were talking earlier today and you know when you're still working at 8, 9 pm and you, you have that person still that you can go to and still talk through different things is a big deal. 

Also with that though, Matthew is very big pictured. I am very detailed. And so we're completely opposite of each other and that has been amazing for our business because we really get to level each other out or think of different things that maybe each other of us haven't thought about previously. But with that being said, there's definitely the part of we're business partners but we're also husband and wife and where's that fine line of stuff? And so that's been something that we've been very cognizant with each other since the very beginning of this and just being very intentional with our time when we are husband and wife. 

So sometimes it'll be just okay after supper time, maybe let's just not talk about business and then we can start fresh in the morning because otherwise you just never get a break. And I'm very guilty of that, of just you know, wanting to keep bringing stuff up. And Matthew's like, you know, maybe let's write a note and we can bring it up in the morning. So that's been something that's definitely a challenge, especially as we all know the ag industry doesn't shut off, you know, and so it's something that we continue to work on for sure.

[13:36] Alisha: So when did you decide that you wanted to come over to the business and be a part of it instead of keeping your job?

[13:43] Bethany: Yeah.

[13:43] Alisha: Or did you always know you were going to come over here or was it just kind of, did it just happen that way?

[13:49] Bethany: So we always knew that eventually it was going to happen. Even when we actually first started dating in college, we had said that, you know, eventually we were going to start an agronomy business together. We didn't know when or where. 

[14:02] Alisha: This was after you looked at each others resumes and all that stuff. 

[14:05] Bethany: Were like, okay, this will work. But yeah, so it kind of just happened where the business was expanding and it was either we need to hire somebody else or it's time for me to come on. And it just felt like the perfect time to come on. We were just about to start building the process and as you guys know, building structure is a lot of work and stuff. So really just wanted to make sure that Matthew could still be customer facing, doing what he did best. And again, with me being more on the detail side, that was a perfect time for me to step in and start taking over some of those responsibilities full time.

[14:43] Alisha: How did you pick your site, location, all the planning and details? I mean, that's a really big deal because once the structure's there, I mean, you're, you're there. So what, what made you pick right here by Wimbledon?

[14:57] Matt: Yeah. So, you know, we kind of looked at the customer base we had already been working with and the customers I had worked with in my previous job, a lot of them came with us. We had a soil sampling business too. So we, we kind of just looked at the map a little bit and like, okay, what makes the most sense for us?

We do work with my dad and Ross, so Todd and Ross quite a bit on our chemical side of our business and our precision ag side of the business. They're named Aligned Ag too. So we, we try to do business together as much as we can because whenever you're together, you seem to be much stronger. I guess Wimbledon worked the best for the majority of our customers. We, we have a fair amount of business south of the interstate too, in between the interstate and like Edgley and so between Aberdeen and Wimbledon, we can service those customers pretty well just because it's right in the middle. I think that's one of the reasons Pioneer wanted it to be in this area too. So that definitely played into the situation. And then the next project was now find someone who was willing to sell some land. So luckily we had a family friend that helped us out there and was really nice to work with. And so we lucked out there.

[16:21] Alisha: As you guys are growing, I know it's fairly new, but if there's other young couples out there wanting to start their own business or companies, do you guys... What's some of your advice right off the bat that you were like, this is, you know, 100% what you need to like these are the first three steps or this is where you should not go, or these are things that we wish we would have changed. Just any advice for somebody that's wanting to start up something new.

[16:48] Matt: I think the biggest one is like find something you love to do, you know, because if you don't love to do it, you're probably not going to stay till 9 o' clock at night and doing it, you know.

[16:57] Emmery: Yeah.

[16:58] Matt: So that's probably number one, wouldn't you say?

[17:01] Bethany: Absolutely.

[17:02] Matt: And then the other one is like, you know, I don't like when people aren't all in on something because you can really tell, you know, you can feel it. And so it's like the best financial decision is probably to start with a side. Everyone says side hustle. I don't like that word. But you know, but that's what everyone kind of says, you know, so it's like start with a side hustle or whatever and then work into it that the problem you're going to have there is you're not committed to it. So it's probably not going to get the time it needs to develop stuff like that. But...

[17:40] Bethany: But it really does take baby steps. You know, as we mentioned, I worked full time for a while, made sure we could make things work on that side while Matt was full time with the business. And once we felt that we were stable in that point, then I came on, you know, so it definitely just takes time. And so being patient is a big thing. Another thing too, is just really understanding from the get go what do you want your culture to be like. And from there building your team to, you know, be that culture that you want to emulate. And so that's one thing that we really strive for with our team is just being an abundance mentality. And there's enough success and resources around for everyone to succeed. And we not only want to grow ourselves, we want our team to grow personally, professionally. We want our customers to be able to grow as well. And just really being able to, to help them have the legacy that they can have to hand down to their next generation is just really big for us.

[18:39] Emmery: Well, and that's really cool, like thinking about the side job or like the job that helps fund your lives while you build a business, it can, like Matt said, it can pull from something, but it can also compliment it, which it sounds like your job complemented it very well. And then it can help. And I can see this in you guys. You talked about your business culture could probably help you develop what you think a business should look like working in another business. You know, we talk about that a lot with succession planning on farms. There's a lot of kids that just come straight back to the farm without any other experience. But the ones that go out and get a job first are able to bring, even though they are going to eventually wind up at the farm, they're able to bring back that framework or that business mentality and then apply it. So sounds like that's what you're saying.

[19:29] Bethany: Yeah. And you know. Cause so we had farmed back in Roseau with my family and here some in North Dakota, so kind of have that background. And then with me being on the corporate manufacturing standpoint of the business, had a lot of insights with that. And then with Matt working retail, you know, we just had so many facets that we could bring to it. And with Matthew's soil sampling business prior, kind of had that starting up of a business background. And you know, it was kind of fun because when I was a rep, I actually called on Matthew and so we just really get to have some great conversations. And so yeah, absolutely. It just all kind of came together to be just the perfect glove of moving forward with starting this business together.

[20:15] Emmery: So what are some of your other objectives and goals?

[20:18] Matt: Yeah, so, you know, we've gotten to reflect on the goals thing a lot. We've done some business development stuff lately and our main one that's the easiest to explain is probably for customer base, like what is our goal for our customers? What do we want to be? You know, what's our why? You know, we want to be the easiest agronomy facility to do business with. We don't want to reason for objections. You know what I mean? That's probably the easy one to explain. And then the rest come with like some visionary stuff. But it's like, we want to work with the customers that are right for us. You know, we want to work with the customers that value the same things we do. So then you kind of get back to your core values and how it reflects that stuff. 

And it's tough to explain some of this stuff because you sit there and you think about it and you're like, yep, I got it in my head. And then it's like, now I got to put it on a piece of paper. Now this is way harder. But, you know, it's like when we sit here and think about, like, our team, we want a team that has an awesome culture that trusts each other and respects each other and, and builds off each other. We don't want this business to only run because of Matt and Bethany. We want this thing to run without Matt and Bethany, you know, because at the end of the day, it's a lot of risk for our, our employees and our customers if anything ever happened to us, if this business can't be sustainable without us. 

So our goal is to make the business sustainable without us, too. We always want to be a part of it, but we want it to be able to run without us here every day, too. As a small business owner, you know, you wear a lot of hats. At the end of the day, you're going to have to sometime figure out how to delegate some of those hats. And that's something I've had to work on a lot. I got a lot of things up here in this head, but not necessarily can communicate them as well as I maybe should write them down, you know, so delegating some things, especially that you're not good at, and then just having some processes in place.

[22:21] Emmery: And that really, I think, is the thing that makes small businesses, or businesses in general, farms, et cetera, long term successful versus ones that fail is having those systems in place, not just building something off of like, like you both said, Matt and Bethany, and your ability, but also like creating systems and processes and training and ultimately like disseminating your values and cultures and what you want this business to be. So I just want to touch briefly on your involvement with the North Dakota Farm Bureau. Can you just tell us a little bit about how you got involved with North Dakota Farm Bureau?

[23:02] Bethany: Yeah, so we really got into it. Well, Matthew has been in it since forever because his mom is really involved with it. And then Matt had introduced me to it when we were seniors in college because the Young Farmer and Rancher Conference was Fargo that year. So being at NDSU, naturally, you know, had to make our way over there. And so that really started our involvement in it. And you know, we just really have always enjoyed the Young Farmer and Rancher Conference and just being able to talk to people from all across the state, with just so many different facets and backgrounds of agriculture.

[23:35] Matt: The other nice thing is like, like you said, everyone's so different there, but we're all pretty like-minded and everyone's moving in the right or the same direction, it seems like, you know, and that's no different than when we, when we try to put a team together that's we want everyone to be moving in the same direction, otherwise you're backpedaling. And that's the fun part about when you go to that conference is it seems like everyone's going forward, you know, and that's what we want to do in life. You want to be a better person and you want to be better at your job or whatever else, and it seems like everyone's on that same page. And it's nice to have Farm Bureau on our team fighting for that because there aren't a lot of voices in there fighting for agriculture and we got to help where we can, and so that's why we try to do that.

[24:17] Emmery: Well, thank you guys for sitting down with us today and sharing your space here with us. And yeah, really appreciate you, Matt, Bethany, being part of the community, serving our farmers in the area and serving our Farm Bureau members as well.

[24:31] Bethany: Absolutely. Thank you guys for having us.

[24:33] Matt: Yeah, thank you.

[Straight Talk stinger]

[24:37] Emmery: You've been listening to Straight Talk with NDFB. To contact Matt and Bethany and Aligned Ag, call their office at 701-435-2100. To contact Alisha and I, email us a emmery@ndfb.org. You can find a Aligned Ag on Highway 9 just west of Wimbledon, North Dakota.

[Straight Talk theme]