Lately, it seems that when you walk into a farm equipment dealer, you're faced with an assortment of product brands that sound like the dessert menu of a gourmet restaurant: Tonutti, Kubota, Moreau, Sovema, Claas, Sitrex - to name a few. Wasn't it just yesterday when you could visit your local dealer and see names you knew how to pronounce? Old stand-bys like International Harvester, John Deere, Case and New Holland. What happened?

While farmers continue to use fences to mark out their territory, farm equipment manufacturers have all but torn theirs down. Where once North American manufacturers ruled the continent, today these companies have become one of many competitors on the showroom floor. Pat Collins, executive vice president of the Farm Equipment Wholesalers Association (FEWA) estimated that approximately 75% of FEWA's wholesaler members import from non-North American companies. Why? One reason is the need to expand their product offering.

Many wholesalers choose to import farm equipment and machinery from overseas in order to give their customers more choice. Rob Snyder, president of Eastern Farm Machinery Limited knows the benefit

But isn't it difficult dealing with manufacturers a half a world away? Joe Strain, sales and marketing manager of S. & T. Manufacturing, Inc., doesn't think so. "When you work with an overseas manufacturer that has a North American presence," he stated, "there's always somebody available to help. These companies will usually stock components, replacement parts and even whole goods in some cases." As for the fluctuations in currency, Strain commented, "Most exporters sell everything in US dollars now. So you don't have to worry about the exchange rates." In addition to the currency being easy to work with, North American acceptance of the metric system has made foreign-made products simpler to maintain and fix.

Another reason for the growing numbers of foreign-made products making their way onto the shores of North America is innovation. The invention of the finger wheel rake is one such example. "At first, the Italians offered a product in whole that couldn't be sourced anywhere else," explained L.R. Sights, president of Southwest Distributing Company. And now, even though several companies offer finger wheel rakes for sale, Italian manufacturers continue to dominate the market. The reason? "(Because they are) quality-minded companies with good products at a competitive price," responded Sights.

"Sometimes it's better to do business with a foreign company because they know they have to be better," Paul Janczak with Brevini USA added. "They stand behind their warranty, especially in extenuating circumstances because they're building a reputation." Plus, with the advent of personal computers and the internet, communicating to foreign manufacturers has become much simpler. "With e-mail, we can do things we couldn't do 10 years ago," explained Janczak. "Now you can get drawings, metric conversions, dual English, Cad, Word processing that wasn't available in the past."

Okay, you say, but buying farm equipment with a foreign name just ain't American. On the surface, that may sound logical. Yet the truth of the matter is, today, many American-based farm equipment manufacturers have also crossed the pond to import European-made parts and components to sell here. In fact, some companies have even gone as far as to import whole goods in order to provide North American dealers and farmers the breadth of products they demand.

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Approximate Word count = 1906
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)