Q&A with Myron Stine: Family Roots, Global Springboard
Now president of Stine Seed Company, Myron Stine has worked in the family-owned business as a district sales manager, regional sales manager, sales director, and vice president of sales and marketing. He says the last five years have brought global expansion, as well as doubling the size of their U.S. business.
What sets apart Stine Seed in the industry?
We are a different company in every way from any other seed, seed corn, or soybean seed companies out there–including the companies we are associated with on the breeding side. We started being different, and we’ve kept that position. I learned everything we are doing today from what my father started years ago. I like being different. At the end of the day, it’s made us a more cost-effective agile company bringing a tangible value to the customer.
Marking 45 years in business is a milestone, and what are some more recent milestones?
I’ll mention three that helped our brand grow.
When we got involved in LibertyLink, we took a big position with LibertyLink soybeans. Other companies said the market wasn’t a sizable market. But it turned into a big deal for us. We ended up having some dominant products in that trait platform, and then became known as the main company who did work in LibertyLink.
Our position with Liberty Link GT27 was a similar thing. No one wanted to be a big part of it. Then our products in the breeding program matured, and our products became really good.
And with Enlist E3, it was the same. Now today, we are the fourth largest soybean brand.
My father has always done a good job of keeping our options open. We know some ideas may fail, but we know some will be productive. We chose to explore options, especially if others said no.
In the seed business today, what is the key to success?
It’s our job to bring the most potential we can to the customer acre we are servicing. We need to bring the proper genetics and the proper useful management information. As a company, we have to be passionate about the right things to give the maximum performance to that acre. If you stay focused on good things that happen, and at times, we’ve not been focused, and good things didn’t happen.
The next big thing as a seed company is keeping your overhead down. Everything you do has to be something your customer would look at you in the eyes and say, “I understand why you built that building or bought the equipment to produce my corn.” If you end up doing things that don’t make sense for the customer on the overhead side, you aren’t economically viable to service your customer.
How do you think farmer seed purchase behavior has changed?
Some farmers are less loyal to a brand than they were 20 years ago. With more of a business mindset, brand loyalty and intangible things really don’t bring value to the acre and they become less important.
Tell us about your international footprint.
We are in 14 countries, and this past year we expanded into Canada. As a brand, having an international footprint is important. The more you know about the other markets helps your company bring potential value to all customers. A good example is in Latin America. Some of the breeding material in Brazil’s soybeans we could use in the U.S. to bring more genetics on the late maturity side.
Our ambitions are to make Stine brand the best soybean and corn brand in the industry everywhere.
What are your goals specific to the U.S. market?
The U.S. market is our biggest market and an important market for us. Now that we’ve expanded our footprint, we want to fine tune ourselves as a seed brand. The goal is to continually bring more value to customers. It comes down to being a better company every step of the way. In many cases, it’s about the knowledge we pickup from our agronomy department and pass that on to the farmer.
What seed technology are you most excited about?
We’ve pioneered the shorter stature corn. It was in 1996 that we started to pay attention to plant heights and taking detailed notes on them. The reality is, we don’t really care if the corn is short or tall, but we have found, as we push genetics to their highest potential and as we yield screen the brand new genetics we look at every year, the high yielding, high performing ones tend to be shorter than most of the genetics available out there. Today, our germplasm bank has shorter material than our competitors.
We have a strong belief the future of higher yields in corn will be using shorter stature genetics at higher populations with more meticulous management of inputs for those genetics.
Where do you want the company to be in five years?
I used to think we wanted to be the second largest soybean brand, and I have totally changed my tune on that. Instead of focusing on growing the brand, we’re going to focus on looking at the acre we service and how we bring the most potential for yield for that acre. If we do that correctly, our brand will grow. Right now, that’s going to be our focus: on the individual acre we are servicing and bringing the greatest potential from the product to the service to the agronomy. We want to be the best on those three areas more so than anyone else.
What’s your sales structure today in the U.S.?
Half of our sales are via our sales reps, and half are from ag retailers. We don’t think you can just pick one. We think you have to be in both areas. We have 450 reps out in the field, and we want to make those individuals even more professional. The goal is to make them the people their customer looks toward to bring the potential to the acre.
A Bit More Personal:
Myron Stine is a passionate car collector, which has focused on domestic sports cars from the 1980s and 1990s (Corvettes and Mustangs) but also includes Lamborghinis and Ferraris.
Two recent books he’s enjoyed are Matthew McConaughey’s “Greenlights” and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “Be Useful.”
About The Company
Stine Seed is headquartered near Adel, Iowa and focuses on developing and marketing corn and soybean seed.
