Mind Your Farm Business — Ep. 110: Management first: Why acres don't equal excellence in farming

Mind your farm Business on RealAgriculture.com is brought to you by RBC Royal Bank. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast, brought to you by RBC Royal Bank. I'm your host, Shaun Haney of Real Agriculture. Today we're joined by someone many of you know simply as Clipper. Dean Klippenstein of MNP has worked with farm families across the country for decades, helping them sharpen management, strengthen balance sheets and make better long term decisions for their operations. In this conversation today, we're going to dig into why management results matter more than bragging rates on acres, how to fight complacency when times are good, and why having cash and even paying some tax can actually be a strategic advantage. Huh, Sounds controversial. Stay tuned for more on that. We also talk growth versus execution, the power of clear goals and bringing the next generation into true partnership sooner rather than later. Let's get on to the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast. Dean, welcome to the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast. Thanks very much for having me, Shaun. Appreciate the invite. Yeah. Well, hey, it's great to have you. I always enjoy our chats and we were, we were able to connect in in person going back to the early part of the summer. Really enjoyed that opportunity and wanted to have you as a guest here and talk about a broad number of different issues that you're seeing in the farming and ranching sector in, in the country and kind of dive into a bunch of stuff. So look, looking very forward to it. Dean, throughout your career you've seen a lot of ups and downs. You know, working in the, in the accounting sector, sometimes it feels like there's more downs than there's ups and vice versa. And right now we're kind of in a period of transition for, for sure. In your mind, what does it take to, to be a successful entrepreneur or farmer rancher in 2025? Well, I think historically it always requires un. Wavering optimism. Right. Because and if you're not in that mindset of unwavering optimism, you will, you will default and grind yourself into paralysis on the fear of the negative. And so you have to be absolutely excited and prepared to do whatever it takes to get to the next crop and, or the next calf crop or the next harvest to make sure. And so that's number one. And it cannot be successful without that. Right. It's impossible to be successful without that unending optimism. And then you need to make sure. Now obviously, hindsight makes us really, hindsight makes us geniuses. Of when we should have expanded and when we should have bought, when we should have stretched the balance sheet and when we should have hunkered down and stockpiled cash. Like when Warren Buffett, for example, when Buffett liquidated a big portion of his Microsoft stock. I don't know how much it was, but it was a lot. And he took it to a cash position because he was afraid that it was getting a little teetering. Well, then it went multiple billion dollars higher than that after he sold. But he just wanted to store his wealth in cash to be ready to attack when opportunities came in front of him. And that's the same thing with agriculture. Right. If in hindsight we would have aggressively expanded no. 4 and a 5 and 06 and then hit the, hit the 07 to 2017 rocket ship. And then. But, but at a certain point we want to, we want to dial back. If there's, if there's clouds in front of us, we want to dial back and beef up the balance sheet for, to build up a reserve or war chest of cash. Because what cash resources or low debt does for you, you can ride through what you believe is going to happen rather than have to react to a bank. That's fearful, but that's a hard ongoing mix and it's hard to know where to switch those strategies. Yeah. Because we go through downturns where, you know, I think my dad said this phrase, whereas, you know, those with the best balance sheets win. Right. And it kind of gives you not only the confidence, but it gives you the strength to be able to weather that storm. The weak balance sheet does not allow you to do that. No, but, but, and that's where, when we, when M and P benchmarks, our clients, we do not bench market based on wealth and equity. That's obviously an important consideration. But we base we benchmark based on management results and because sometimes aggressively leverage and extending the balance sheet was the best thing you could do. Right. Because you took advantage of opportunities that were in front of you. So what is working on management results mean? Like what is that, Is that quality of management? Is that just net income? What are you, what are you looking at? That. That's a really good question. It's, it's on the, on the grain sector, we benchmark based on the gross margin results, which is your crop revenue less. Your direct measurable variable expenses, fertilizer, chemical, seed, crop and hail insurance. And we've been. And that less machinery and labor costs. So you're basically your profit prior to your. I'll call It. Balance sheet cost, or land building and finance, if you've heard that term before. So. So real simple example. Shaun and Dean farm next to each other. Yep. We both produce a similar. The same crop. And we both run a pretty lean, efficient machinery line and labor pool. And we make $200 an acre before interest. And Sean's independently wealthy and owns his. His thousand acres and doesn't pay any rent on it. And Dean is a young startup farm that is paying rent on every acre. Right. Our net income. So I'm paying $150 an acre rent, and you're paying none because you own it all. That doesn't mean you're a better farmer than I was. Right. We produce the same crops. We did it with the same efficiency. And you made $200 an acre. And I made 50 because I was paying rent for mine. And so that's separating the balance sheet. Okay. Does that make sense? Be honest. If it doesn't. No, it does. That's an important clarification. And so we can never compare net income. So in that exact same example, if Shaun made $75 an acre. Cause you didn't produce as good a crop as Dean because you're. Because for whatever reason, you're not good, or you're lazy or you're tired, or you spend too much and you have too much shiny machinery. And you made $75 an acre, but you have no land rent. And Dean made 50. But he has $150 an acre land rent. Yep. That means Shaun is not executing as well for whatever reason. And so that's what I mean when I say management and then separate it from the balance sheet. Yeah. It's like an execution efficiency. Like you're. You're actually looking at the implementation of the operational strategy. Not to use a whole bunch of. It sounds like we're in an MBA class here. But essentially what you're doing. No. And it's important. And obviously geography has a big play in it. Yeah. Right. If we take. If we take a great harvest in Yorkton and then we take one of our friends in dry land, southern Alberta with no rain, or southwest Saskatchewan. We're not gonna beat up my buddy in Kincaid and say you did a bad job because you should have got 65 bushel canola like my friend in Yorkton. Yep. Because that's obviously a geographic difference. It's weather. Right. So from a. Okay. If we stick with that. Management result. Management, execution. If you look at the top like the cream of the crop of your highest benchmark group what are their characteristics? What are they doing that is different than the rest of the population? I think. And we're, we're on the starting edge of the evolution of this as we start to get the information in usable format and get this, not get this massive amount of data into a usable format. But if you summed it up with. To me, it's the constant desire for improvement. Right. And so if you always look at. And so because it's not an absolute and you have to constantly push. And so I agree with your dad. I remember. And I'm a very cautious. Like I've probably cost our clients a lot of money because we were worried about making sure the balance sheet was robust and never stretched. And in hindsight we should have stretched it right in the land price escalation. And so I'm more in your dad's camp talking about. Because I guarantee he's referencing the 80s. Yeah, absolutely. Families that were already wealthy, pretty much broke, they rode through the 80s and they didn't get any wealthier, but they just treaded water. Yep. And so that's for sure the same mindset I'm in that I liked when the balance sheet was there because we can't get bullied out. The long term strategy. But the other thing we've. We often with our really successful farms is we fight complacency. Right. You take, you take Shaun and Dean in that example. Sean's making 75 bucks an acre. He's living the great life and making lots of money. And Dean's only making 50. But Dean's executing at way higher level than Shaun. Right. And so what we find is complacency is a bit of our enemy. Right. I've rode with, I rode in my clients. A buddy of mine's combine and his derm is running 80 and the neighbor's derm is running 70. Well, the only person who's unhappy with a 70 bushel derm crop is someone who knows that 80 is possible. And so that's what the benchmarks allow us to do. And it's not. This is not about M and P. This is just about the concept. Yeah. Because. And the improvements are not. If you looked at the target Durham yield, if you looked at the target barley yield in Lethbridge 30 years ago to the target barley yield in Lethbridge today. Right. It is astronomically higher. Yeah. But the better we get, the more incremental those yield gains are. So if I compared it to. Are you a golfer, Shaun? Well, I aspire. Yeah. I'm a Terrible golfer. Well, maybe you and I are more alike than we think. But the beautiful thing about a terrible golfer is that it's easy to improve. Right. If I go to a golf coach and say I shoot 110 and I want to shoot 105, I don't have to work as hard to improve those five strokes. If you go to a golf coach and say I shoot 80 and I want to shoot 75, those are drastically harder. You have to, you have to put way more effort and they're way, you're not going to get big incremental gains. You're fine tuning. That's the same with crop production and improvement of these farm businesses because they are commodity production. And so to get a bushel yield change, you're going to do a lot of stuff on a really high level functioning farm today. Nick Saban, you know, legendary college football coach, has a great quote on complacency. Dean Complacency creates a blatant disregard for doing what is right. Success hinges on doing the work while complacency is full of indifference. Is a great quote. That is a great quote. Because. Because. And so if you look at our best farms, they're always unhappy. Right? Yeah. Right. Yes, they are. Always. Yeah. Go ahead, Shaun. Well, I was going to say Dean, so that. I think that's very true. And it's like, it's like this, there's this conflict you have. We were talking about the 80s, so you have where that hard time can really stain your appetite for risk going forward. Even when everything is saying, you know, we need, we should be going for it, but you're constantly, you're still pulling on the reins, you're scared to let go. Yeah, it's paralyzing. And then you have farms where, hey, in the last 10 years it's been pretty bloody good and you haven't seen any of those down times. You really don't understand some of the downside risk. And it's not all like how it has been. And both are very dangerous in many. Regards, but both are very dangerous. And we hear lots of people talking about the big farms and big farms getting extended and having it obviously tougher to expand today than it was 15 years ago. And I always tell them, I said, well, I don't want to judge those folks very well because I would have never had the appetite or mindset to be able to grow it as much as they did. Right. If you had a farm that grew to 30,000 acres and they started at 3, well, I would have as A cautious more in your dad's camp I would have been more pulling on the reins and slowed down at 5,000 acres. So who am I to judge that the mistakes he or she made should have stopped at 21,000 acres instead of going to 30. Right. And so so fundamentally what I think if you had to summarize it, you want to be. You want to always strive to improve and execute your strategy. Whatever your strategy is, you have to fully believe in it and you have to fully go for it and no one else can. You can have other people assist you but it has to be your own personal guidance. And I always tell people is that really that's what you need to do to empower your business partners and advisors to let them know where you're aiming. And so I'm going to give us a ridiculous absurd example is is I had a brothers clients of mine and friends of mine and they were fabulous, really profitable and and farmed 15000 acres. And I said this and they were very young and very wealthy. And I said as ridiculous as it sounds, we can't help you until you tell us where you want to go. I said so let's put, let's pick two extreme examples to illustrate them. To illustrate it I said if you want to retire by the time you're 40 and drink Mai Tai's on the beach in Mexico, that's completely possible. And what our decisions to execute to do to accomplish that will once that as our endpoint is determined, every decision that comes in front of us is simple. When put in that lens. And you take the other extreme example, you said I want to be the first publicly traded farm in Saskatchewan. Just absurd. It's example. Well if you said that's our goal then every decision come in front of us. When put under that lens the actual decision is pretty clear. Right. So so we need to focus on what our long term goals and objectives are. And no, there is no right or wrong. They're very personal. And then you need to execute always strive for perfection. So those examples I think are really good because they really solidify the thought. What comes to mind though is only like 16 or 18% of Canadian farms have a strategic plan that feels like a gap. Oh, it doesn't feel like a gap. It is a gap. It is a gap. Yeah, yeah. And so what I tell lots of people talk about these, about these like Maverick and Evan, Evan showed and Christian and Maverick and their, and their stuff. And then there's peer groups and then there's. And then there's Rob Psych and his groups and, and Terry Becker and Baxwa. Yep. And everyone says, well, are you worried about the competition? And Absolutely. That we're not in competition. We don't have enough people. Helping farms focus on the big picture and help them determine get clarity of where they want to go. Because it's a big place out there, Shaun, and they're hard decisions. Right. You, for example, you're trying to figure out where the long term strategy and the evolution of your business has changed a lot in the last five years. Oh yeah, right. And that same thing goes for every farm. And do you know how many farms there are out there, Shaun? It's a big world. There's a lot. Yeah, there's a lot. And what I hear so, and what's interesting is if, if you can get in the right peer group or the right. Or have, you know, the right business coach, the upfront cost is so minimal, so minimal based on the economic upside of making those improvements. But I find a lot of times we focus on the, I don't know, $10,000, that just seems like, that seems like a lot. Right. And hey, it may be a lot, but for a lot of farms, let's be honest, it's not. Especially when you look at repairs and maintenance or other sort of line items that you have. Investing your in yourself and your business is not a bad thing, Dean. No, no. And I find it's actually more about time. Like the main hurdle is for them that they don't put enough and we're all guilty of it. Right. We get stuck in the weeds and we get in the day to day operations and we never pull our head out of the, out of the, out of the day to day weeds and focus on strategic vision. And there's different, everyone has different perspectives. Terry looks at a problem. Terry Becker, friend of mine, looks at a different perspective than Rob Psych, than Evan Schout. And none are negative and none are bad. They're all just different. And we can only assist you, but you have to drive where you want to take your business. So Dean, I've had people on this podcast where sometimes the attitude is that growth mindset, like if you're not growing, you're dying. There's a lot of farms that I'm not interested in that and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Depending on what your goal. Everybody has their own goals. Can. Do you, do you see that as a, is a problem? If it's like, you know what, our farm is the right size, we're happy, we're ethically capitalized. I got the right amount of staff. That's not necessarily a bad thing either, is it? Well, no, it's a bit of a loaded question because I've always been a big fan. That's my personal bias of doing fabulous and only having and then just reaping the rewards and generating cash from a really well run business. Yep. And it's way more about, about operating at top of your game rather than maximizing acres. So. So absolutely we have some fabulous farms who farm 3,500 acres. There's still a big farm, do a great job, execute at the top of their game and, and focus there in their, the financial rewards from that business into either off farm investments or buying land that they're farming or whatever strategic path the farm is. But they're not about expanding. Now obviously if you could make a living on 320 acres 60 years ago, you can't probably do that today on western Canada. You're some of your intense growers in, in Central Canada and eastern Canada with. Grapes or something like that. Yeah, for, for sure. But, but on the broad acre grain farms you have to be obviously a moderate size to sustain livelihood. But we have, we have some gems that are just pouring cash out of their business and have, having the discipline to continue to operate at the top tier. I, I always describe it is a perfect comparison is if you had two McDonald's. Right. And you, and you did a great job and you managed your staff and you and you executed and you kept your location operating at a top tier level and you cash dividend and cash checks for the, for, for the 30 or 40 years you're in business, there's nothing wrong with that. And if, and if you're of the mindset to grow it from two to 20 McDonald's locations, that's fine too. But you cannot sacrifice. We are not in a high enough profit. There's virtually from, from our, from our anecdotal evidence, there's no correlation. There's no economies of scale gained on size. Right. So because if you and I own two McDonald's and we were going to grow by 18 more, we wouldn't be buying those 18 to reduce the cost on our initial two. We'd hope to replicate it. Right. Right. And so, so no, don't, don't automatically buy into that. We always have to expand to be better. We have to be better and the decision to expand is a completely separate one. But it cannot occur unless we're all, unless we're Operating in the top level. We'll get back to the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast shortly. But first, a word from our sponsor, RBC Royal Bank. This episode of the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast is brought to you by rbc. Your idea of preparing for the unsinkable. How happens here? No one knows what tomorrow will bring, but with RVC and their team of experts by your side, you can plan for the unexpected. From market risks to exploring new tech to weather challenges, they'll help you get the peace of mind you've been looking for. Visit rbc.comagriculture to learn more. Yeah, you know, Dean, I, I really think a mistake that's been made in the industry, I don't know where it started, maybe it's just human nature, but the judge of success being how many acres, how many head. All of you know, maybe those, because those are the numbers we know and they're the most obvious. But that is there. There are a lot of very, very large farms that are very successful financially. There's also some ones that can't pay bills on time. Interesting. I just. Oh, sorry I interrupted you. Go ahead, go ahead. I just was talking to our, to our, the young gentleman who's in charge of our benchmarking for the province. Yep. And our top 25 gross margin, less labor, power, machinery. So contribution margin, clients on a five year average, the top 25. There's only two farms over 10,000 acres. That's awesome. Wow. What does that tell you? Well, it, it, it's not a, it's not a negative against the farms that are bigger. But if you held a gun to my knee and said, Dean, you have to pick, there's, there's two farmers behind that glass and one's operating a 25, 000 acre farm and one's operating a seven. Whose profit would you take? Assuming the same balance sheet? Right. It's, it's statistically more likely that the 7 is operating really well because it's more manageable than the 25. It's hard to replicate that on a multiple scale and there's some great farms that are, that are doing it, but it is, it takes an elevated level of management to do that successfully. We know that. You know, on this topic, we know that consolidation is happening in the farming sector and I'm very fascinated at, on the, if you want to use the size pendulum where that consolidation happens. And what I find is a lot of people assume that like the phrase, you know, the bigger, get bigger. But I mean, I'm, I'M curious what happens with say the middle section. Do like are, do they, do they continue with like, do they also grow or do they stay the same? And I get differing opinions on that. I've heard from some people that believe that the biggest are going to get bigger and they're going to separate from a size perspective. And I hear from some that say no, like everybody moves down the chain on the average. What are your thoughts? I'm not sure I put a lot of thought into that. But as you're speaking to me, I think it's going to be because it's more about the stage in life of you and your, and your significant others or business partners and where the long term vision of your farm is, is, is probably the main driving force. And, and we've never seen a transition where wholesale farms will exit and be the size they are today. Right. We see a real fork in the road on our clients that are from an age perspective, let's say 50 to 65 and it varies depending on personality styles. But those with the next generation of business partners or kids in many cases coming up into the business versus those that don't have anyone interested in taking over the business, there's a real fork in the road in mindset. And the ones with new young folks coming into the business, they're re energized and rejuvenated because it's fun and they got someone to share the burden with and they're. And that, and that goes a long way. And the folks that don't have their kids or other business partners coming in to take over the operation, they say geez, we're working really hard and is the next million worth it? Like let's just pull the chute here and, and go off and, and enjoy the next chapter in our life. And so I think that's probably more. But, but to, to, to the, so erring to the, the concept of farms getting bigger, we are going to have wholesale takeovers of 5,000 acre farms, right. Where someone's going to say this person is getting out. They own 2,000 acres, they rent 3,000 and we're going to come in and take that whole operation over because it's simple and seamless and those are big expansions. Right. Like that's a lot of capital. A lot. Even ignoring the land ownership, that's a lot of management, a lot of capital. So for sure farms are still going to grow and grow in bigger increments and chunks than probably you and I have ever seen. That would be my thought but, but that's, that's also different in, in the big acre relative still high value. But in the ICE states and in your. In your intense corn production states and in southern Ontario, that big expansion might be 800 acres, right. Or 1,000 acres like that. And that's a lot of capital. So I'm not sure I answered you on there, buddy. But, but that's my, that's my thought. I don't think there's a right answer at this point. It's, it's. It's purely speculation. It's a conversation piece. Indeed. Dean, I've known you for quite some time, and you are very infamous in the agricultural sector for speaking your mind and telling people very much like it is. I'm curious, and I'm sure you have a list, but maybe one that's top of mind. What's something that you tell clients that they don't want to hear? The. Probably the main one is that they need to pay more taxes. And that's my goal and objective. You want them to pay more taxes? Absolutely. Absolutely. Because if you have. Because taxes mean we're making money. Shaun, right now, I'm not a baseball guy, but I know you're a baseball guy. How much did Vladdy sign for? What did they sign him up for? It was like 450 million or something like that. 450 million. So if you're Vladdy's agent and they say, well, they offered you two contracts, one is $200 million and one is $400 million, do you ever consider taking the $200 million one because it'll pay less tax? No. It's just that absurd. Okay. Like your goal, our most successful growers. Because in order to pay taxes for. This is for our north of the border friends or south of the border friends. I believe it's still cash basis accounting. But in the north of the border, the only way not to pay tax is either don't make money or store your assets in things that aren't that don't make you money. Right. So I always use defer grain. Well, so if I defer. If I sell my grain January 1st and I defer it with one of the large grain company, I'm letting them use my money for free. Right. Yep. I want to take that. Let's say I'm. Let's say I'm a large company, I pay 25% tax on my company. Yep. I don't want to defer and let them pay. Use a million dollars of mine for. For a year for free. I'd rather take that million, pay the $250,000 tax and use the $750,000 to pay down debt, buy farmland, buy Berkshire Hathaway, do whatever I felt, buy a cottage, if you buy it personally, like, do what you want with that cash to make your wealth better. Not Viterra or Bungay or Richardson. So. So, and I'm looking at the cow calf producers when I say that this year. Okay. Because they have been. There has been a long run of, of thin profitability in that industry and we've had the last two and a half or three years of remarkable success. And I'm so happy and proud of them for them for sticking it out because it's been a tough road. But. But unless they were going to expand the herd. Right. So expanding the herd, if that was their goal, then that's fine. If they don't pay tax because they're selling and buying more cows and expanding their herd and making hopefully more money. But short of that, if they don't have a desire to expand their herd, they should be paying tax, liquidating that and using that money to build up the off farm work chest, pay down debt, but again, use the money to make their family wealthier in the long run. What do you think was the enabler for. Because I hear a lot from the audience, this comment about tax, I think is a pretty accurate one across a broad swath of producers that the focus is paying. You know, I don't want to pay any tax. Not, hey, instead of I want to make the most money I can. What's. What enabled that? What started that in your mind? I don't know. I believe in cash basis accounting for tax. Interesting. If you had a welding shop and you built, you invoice the client $100,000 for a big job. Yep. You have to pay tax on that. Whether you cash, whether you got paid before the end of the year or not, you still have to pay tax on that. Whereas the farms have to pay tax. Not they don't pay tax until they get the cash in their pocket. Yep. So that somehow skewed us to saying, well, then it must be bad to have cash in my pocket and let's push off our wealth. Right. And it's exactly opposite of what we should be doing. Right. I mean, how many times have our farm clients walked into a John Deere dealership and said they want to buy, they want to pay the repair bill that they owe them, and the dealership say, no, no, no, don't pay us today, pay Us in six months from now. Right. You would never hear that. Yeah. Are there other practices or attitudes around income or money that you see in the sector that are equivalent kind of question. Well, here's a pet peeve of mine and I've been vocal on this. Like you said. I have lots of. I have just as many people who dislike hearing me as the people who like hearing me, Shaun. And one of the things is that I've always felt is that I. That separate business from inheritance. Right. So pretend, pretend you had three children and you had $10 million of farmland and you said, well, one of my children is going to farm and they're going to have three children and one of their children is going to farm. So I have three kids who have three grandkids. And so now I've got nine grandchildren. And if automatically the farming child, male, female, I don't care, one of the farm children is going to get all the farmland equity, then effectively I'm randomly picking one of my nine grandchildren and making them egregiously wealthy. Yep. And letting the other eight fight it out in the trenches and. And go get them. Good luck. Right. That's always been a terrible idea in my mind. It also brings people back to the farm for the wrong reasons too, by the way. There's a whole other subset of that. Yes. Yeah. And so I've always been a fan of separating the management, the business operations because on the other side, I've seen farms where mom and dad stay in control far beyond their years of ability of. And, and one of the children comes back and runs it for hopes and wishes and promises. Right. That's not fair either. Right. So. So I always separate the real estate and given the escalation in real estate values in. In. In my province and. And pretty much everywhere else in North America, they've increased even more. But. So I separate the real estate from the operations and I bring the operational kids who want to commit to being in that business. I bring them in ridiculously early. Right. Because they're that use and energy in piss and vinegar is way better for a farm and it's run way better than having old, rich, tired people in charge. And the earlier the better. Dean, from the aspect to. Of there being. I think there's way too much of where it's just sort of all sudden the keys are like, oh, you know, we're done. Yours. Yes. You've never met with the accountant, they've never met with the banker. They're 50 years old. Plus the agronomist. Yeah. Never met you and it's crazy. And, and we, why not take more advantage of what I, I've called before that golden age where it's, it's, it's parents and kids or whatever that that multi generational relationship is working together and passing on it really is partners. Not just as like we're the older generation, you're the younger do as we say but truly working in partnership, business partnership. Like what wealth of, of, of knowledge and skill development and education for that younger partner. And we, I don't think we do enough of it. And for the older partner it's, it's, it's a two way learning. Oh, that's a great point. Yes. Like, like. So you, let's take a real simple example. You got a 60 year old lawyer and a 20 year old lawyer. If you had a firm, if you had a long term vision for your business, you're never going to go to a person who has a 60 or 70 year old as the only lawyer because you say well what do I do when they retire in five or ten years? Yep. Right. And you never go to a law firm who had, who the only lawyer was a 20 year old who just got out of law school. Yep. But together they make a fabulous parent. She's getting ideas from him and he's getting ideas from her and they're staying up on technology and there's new ideas spinning around and collaboration. It's way better. And that's the same with farms. It's the same with yeah, that, that, that and they both feed off each other and it's better for both. Yeah. Dean, this has been so much fun. I'm gonna do this more often. Honestly. I, I really appreciate your thoughts, your insights and thanks so much for joining us here on the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast. Really appreciate it. Thanks very much buddy. I, I hope the J's go long enough that even us non baseball watching bandwagon jumpers hop on and join you for that tour. Absolutely. That's a wrap on another valuable episode of the Mind you'd Farm Business podcast. Huge thanks to Dean Klippenstein from MMP for joining us here today. Love chatting with Dean. I love the focus on execution, not just expansion and this whole idea of thinking about, you know, really about management performance. Are you operating at the highest possible level that you can? Love it. Great stuff. Also the benefit of things like peer groups. He mentioned some great options in the market. There are others. So we encourage you to check out more about that if you are interested. Now for more episodes of the mind you'd farm business podcast, head over to mindyourfarmbusiness.com Huge thanks to RBC Royal bank for supporting this series from the very beginning. We're over. We're 110 episodes deep, so this is fantastic. It's been a great success story. If you have questions feedback, you can reach out to me at shaneyrealagriculture.com is my email address. Or of course, you can always call the RealAg Feedback Line, 855-776-6147. Thanks for listening and until next time, keep on minding your farm business.