Breaking Ground
Dec 07, 2020
Breaking Ground
Brian Kramer, Vice President, Operations
Innovative Ag Services Co. has recently broken ground on a new 20-acre greenfield site located in Buchanan County, Iowa. This site is located on State Highway 187 approximately 5 miles south of Lamont. It will be referred to as our Masonville location as the 911 address reflects the same.
This project was put into motion following a review of our facility assets at the Independence, Winthrop, and Manchester locations. The agronomy infrastructure at these sites needed to be updated in terms of storage and handling to meet the growing demands of our customer base. Segments of the grain facilities have aged to the point of needing capital upgrades for both speed and space. In looking at those locations, it was not hard to identify the fact that we were land-locked at the Independence and Manchester sites with no room to expand and the Winthrop location is located on less than desirable gravel road access.
Webelieve capital can be better utilized by consolidating assets at a single location versus spending it on multiple aging facilities. We plan to consolidate our agronomy assets at this location along with an initial phase of grain receiving, drying, and storage. This facility would be designed to provide increased handling capacities over our current facilities and provide room to expand. I will provide more specific details of what is being built in the next publication.
Our current estimate is for the Masonville facility to be available to operate during the fall 2021 season for both grain and agronomy. Our current grain facilities will be operational for the fall of 2021 and will be operated seasonally after. In living our purpose statement, we continue to review our operating efficiency to ensure the financial stability of our facilities for today and the future.