A grower deciding what to buy for 2027 is no longer having two separate conversations, one about product and one about how to pay for it. Increasingly, they are one.
That is the thread running through interviews with three financing providers heading into the 2027 season: Growers Edge, John Deere Financial and Nutrien Financial. Each describes growers locking in inputs earlier, paying on terms that run past harvest, and treating credit as part of the agronomic plan instead of a last-minute add-on. The backdrop is a farm economy where, as David O’Malley of John Deere Financial put it, “no one is sitting on a pile of cash.”
“It’s not that financing is always going to be the best choice,” said John Maman, senior director, North America, Nutrien Financial. “It’s that financing is part of a great choice that allows you to maximize your liquidity and maximize your cash flow.”
Land O’Lakes CEO Beth Ford said Tuesday that farmers are already seeking operating credit for the 2027 crop year at a pace well above last year’s. Speaking at the Economic Club of New York, she said the co-op’s financing business had roughly $100 million in reserved loans at this point last year and now has more than $1 billion. “Interest rates up. Dramatic. And this is very early,” Ford said, adding that it signals farmers “need operating loans to invest in their business.” Her read: “their stress is high.”
Financing moves into the planning conversation
For Maman, who joined Nutrien Financial in 2017, the change is about timing as much as tools. Fall is when the next season’s plan starts, he said, because growers have a yield monitor telling them how the crop performed and early programs to act on.
“I’ve often said the most valuable piece of real estate on a piece of equipment is the buddy seat,” Maman said. He wants growers to use it to sit with a trusted advisor and assess where the previous crop landed and where next year’s profit can improve.
He describes a “traditional way” and a “new way.” The traditional way splits the year into separate conversations: seed first, then crop protection around prepay season. The new way looks at everything together. The Nutrien Ag Solutions Hub is a digital platform that lets growers download every input purchase across seed, crop protection and fertilizer products, then pairs that history with financing offers relevant to the grower’s own geography, so “a grower in Iowa is not seeing a cotton financing program.” Statements, invoices, credit limit requests and paperless billing sit in the same place. “A piece of paper is outdated the second you print it,” Maman said.
Growers Edge, which sells input financing through ag retailers, sees the same early move. Michael Hoffstatter, Managing Director, Input Finance, said growers want credit lines established sooner and that applications for the 2027 season have tripled from this time last year. Growers want the credit in place, he said, so they can take advantage of preseason discounts and buy when the timing works for them. Financing also changes what they buy, he said. Because repayment is not due until February after harvest, retailers can more easily offer premium products early in the season, when asking for cash up front would give some growers pause.
Discounts and financing, together
O’Malley sees the shift in how manufacturers and retailers sell. Discounting has been part of the industry for as long as anyone can remember, he said, but ten years ago a discount was the standard offer. Today, he said, the trend is pairing the discount with an attractive low-rate financing offer, “a powerful combination” that helps a producer get the best possible price and a modern way to pay for it at the end of the season.
Manufacturers have spent the last five to ten years sponsoring 0% and low-rate programs, O’Malley said, and the complication has been keeping track of them. What qualifies and what’s available for what has been “overwhelming at times for the industry,” he said. To help, John Deere Financial created a digital site called InputFinance.com where growers can see what crop input finance offers are available to them by retailer or by manufacturer brand. The site also has a built in calculator where growers can quantify their savings. John Deere Financial just launched a new integration with AgVend, which the company calls an industry first. The integration puts those offers inside the software where retailers quote deals and plan the season with growers. It covers John Deere Financial’s Multi-Use Account in the U.S., which the company says has more than 250,000 active ag account holders.
He offered a current example. Seed and crop protection deals are strong right now, he said, and some fertilizer, too. A farmer can lock in those purchases this fall and winter, with the commitment not due until November 2027. On a $100,000 purchase carrying a 0% manufacturer offer, O’Malley said, the interest savings “is over $10,000,” which he framed as a way to lower cost per acre and improve cash flow for the coming season.
He described the offer as an alternative to cash and to a bank operating line, which he said runs 7% or more, at historic highs.
Retailers hand off the risk
The other half of the shift is on the retailer’s side of the counter. Retailers have long carried grower credit in-house or floated customers through the season, and both Growers Edge and John Deere Financial pitch their programs as a way out of that.
O’Malley called the Multi-Use Account “an account receivable replacement tool.” John Deere Financial takes 100% of the risk, he said, with no recourse to the retailer. If a retailer submits a million dollars in transactions, the company funds it back within 48 hours, or two business days. John Deere Financial then sends the statements and processes the grower’s payments. “It really gets them out of the banking business,” he said, and lets retailers focus on customer support, products and selling.
Growers Edge describes a similar setup. Hoffstatter said a retailer is paid within 48 hours of submitting a transaction and is “effectively out of the transaction.” The program, which Growers Edge says costs the retailer nothing, can also be branded for the retailer, and a retailer can choose to buy down the grower’s interest rate. Agri-Access, Growers Edge’s funding partner, underwrites the loan and assumes all risk, Hoffstatter said.
Retailers appear to be staying. Growers Edge had around 125 retailers in the 2026 program, Hoffstatter said, and 94% re-enrolled for 2027. Hoffstatter attributed the exceptions to geography, lower-than-expected grower demand or crop mixes that did not fit the program, and said the company plans to follow up with those retailers at their request.
What to watch in 2027
Growers are not spending freely. Hoffstatter said retailers describe growers as “very cautious” about what they buy and when, with diesel costs the hot topic. What has changed, he said, is that growers want credit lined up early so they have the option.
Both Growers Edge and John Deere Financial say tighter bank lending is part of the reason. Hoffstatter said banks have pulled back on operating lines and become more constrained on available credit, and O’Malley said he has heard lenders are not extending lines the way they did three-plus years ago. Neither offered data, and both stopped short of saying growers cannot get credit elsewhere. Hoffstatter described input financing as a complement to the operating line, not a replacement. “I would recommend keeping the operating line where it is,” he said.
The caution for readers is that all three sources sell financing. Their view that product and payment now belong in one conversation is consistent across the interviews, but it comes from providers. It will be worth hearing from the growers and lenders on the other side of the table about how this looks to them, including what happens when a grower cannot pay.
For Maman, the point is flexibility. “The farm financial situation is different acre to acre, door to door, farm gate to farm gate,” he said, and the tools are there to help growers plan, “beginning right now for the 2027 year.”
