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Small tractors continue leading strong equipment market

A large farm equipment dealership is seeing ag tractor sales remain strong. Cody Hatcher, Small Ag Sales Manager for Sloan Implement tells Brownfield they’re seeing the most growth in the under-40 horsepower market and especially the under-25 horsepower market. “Typically, we’ve got, you know, more sales in that February-March time frame and I think we may be seeing those a little bit earlier just because people know kind of where the inventory levels are. They’re not quite where they should be, so they’re, you know, purchasing units a little bit earlier than they typically would have in a normal year.”

And Hatcher says the low inventories on new equipment, especially larger equipment are forcing farmers to plan farther ahead. “We’re struggling to get equipment right now. We’ve had to have a couple of tough conversations with some of our customers, and it has been, you know, we need you to go ahead and commit to a unit right now. You know, we’re looking even into 2023 right now. If you want a tractor spring of next year, you know, we to go ahead and start thinking about it.”

Hatcher says despite the inventory challenges, 2022 might top 2021 sales records.  He says right now, the used equipment market is very hot and many well-maintained machines are selling for more now than when they were new a few years ago.

Sloan Implement is a John Deere dealership with 22 locations in Illinois and southern Wisconsin.

The Association of Equipment Manufacturers latest report says January sales for tractors under 40 horsepower is up about 2% from 2021 at more than 10-thousand units.  More than 15-hundred tractors with more than 100 horsepower sold last month, but that’s almost an 11% increase over last year.