By Per Peterson
CHS Marshall’s General Manager Kent Mulder shared a story at the company’s annual meeting Saturday night that has stuck with him and reminds him of the importance of the cooperative system in agriculture.
Mulder’s message to a packed banquet hall at The Caboose was highlighted by his visit last summer to a farmer who had decided to cash in on the equity he had earned through CHS over the years.
“Standing in the kitchen with his family — and I’ll never forget this for the rest of my life — it was the farmer, his wife, their son and his wife and there was two grandchildren there,” he said. “As I handed the check to the producer, he looked at it — and this was a significant check mind you, very large — and he took it and shows it to his grandson who was about 9 or 10 years old and he says, ‘had I done business with the other person in town, I never would’ve seen this; you need to remember the value of the cooperative system.’ It was quite a moment.”
For more on this article, see this week’s Headlight-Herald.