Why Is Pay Lagging? Maybe Too Many Mergers in the Heartland
Working in farm equipment, he added, “you get more one-on-one time with customers — they become your friends.”
Mr. Gies, 30, who began tinkering with the equipment on his family’s farm in Berlin as a child, confessed to fitting this profile.
Of the seven John Deere farm equipment dealerships within about an hour’s drive of his house, the one Mr. Gies left
and refuses to work for, Riesterer & Schnell, owns four.
Brett Faivre, whose family sold two John Deere dealerships to Riesterer & Schnell five years
ago, said Deere had structured its contracts with dealers to encourage consolidation.
Pete Hoffman, a longtime farm equipment mechanic who teaches at Southwest Wisconsin Technical College, said there was another important factor in the disparity: Many mechanics in states like Wisconsin grow up on family farms
and are keen to maintain their connection to agriculture.
But ever since he quit his job more than three years ago at a John Deere dealership — where he worked
too hard for too little pay, he said — he has struggled to find a position in the same line of work.
“The larger the dealership, the more of a discount you get on equipment.”
Ken Golden, a John Deere spokesman, said, “Dealership consolidation has occurred
as machinery has become more complex and customers have grown their businesses.”
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the typical farm-equipment mechanic made about $18 an hour nationally in 2016.
