Should Be A Good Season For Tractor Parties - Selling tractors like tupperware - Brief Article - Statistical Data Included
Author: Diesel Progress North American Edition

For the past two years, talking about farm tractors could just about get you killed, particularly if you were talking about the big machines that do most of the work in the Farm Belt. The market was so bad that no one dared say, "Hey come on over and see my new John Deere," or "How would you like to take a ride on my new Quadtrac?" It was almost like a boycott in the heartland.

Today it's a different matter. The folks that use tractors are buying them once again. They're having tractor parties, sort of like Tupperware parties, where Farmer Bob invites all of his good buddies over for a few beers and everyone stands around and shoots the breeze about how hot it is and how many acres got tilled today, etc. Then, out come the new tractors -- red ones, green ones, blue ones, white ones and just about every other color of the rainbow. What a sight!

There are demonstrations, races and other contests testing the strength and ability of the machines to outperform and look better than all the others. There are even square dances with the doggone things. Of course, there is always a salesman present to take orders should someone decide to trade in Old Yeller from 10 years ago for the latest high-tech machine with GPS, stereo, closed circuit TV or any of the other amenities available on today's high-stepping big machines.

It is worth noting that the only part of the tractor business that went sour two years ago was the big tractor sector -- the two-wheel drive and four-wheel drive brutes that cost a lot of bucks and whip through 400 acres in a half-day If you look at the numbers, small-and medium-sized machines held their own during the bad years, while big machine sales declined over 25 to 30 percent. For five straight years, sales of the 2WD machines rated over 100 hp averaging better than 20,000 units each year. In both 1999 and 2000, sales were within a soybean of 15,700 units.