During the Farm Progress Show in Boone, Iowa, AEI spoke with executives from farm equipment manufacturers who shared their farm equipment business outlook for the remainder of the year and going into 2027. We also asked them what, if any impact dealers can expect, from recent U.S./Canadian tariff announcements.
Three items stood out.
- Inventories are normalizing and aging fleets are signaling a sales rebound for 2026-2027
- Sales focus needs to pivot to efficiency metrics and ROI of precision ag technology
- Most manufacturers are building to demand but monitoring tariffs closely
Bill Erickson, vice president of sales at Kinze, says the good news is Kinze’s inventory in the field is getting sold.
“We’re not really competing against ourselves as we go into model year 2028 machines. But sales are relatively flat right now as expected, but with a hint of optimism. Quoting activity is through the roof. There is a lot of interest in our machines. I think this year will be flat. Next year we’ll start rising and following model year 2029, I think we’ll be in a very positive situation.”
AGCO CEO Eric Hansotia noted that farmers are looking to make purchases.
“The dealers have enough inventory, and the farmers are wanting to buy. They’re seeing these higher grain prices, and they’re starting to sell out of the bins and getting some income because it’s the biggest increase this last month is the biggest price increase they've seen since 2012. There are all sorts of new farming problems being solved on the lot and their fleets are aged. They’re about the oldest they’ve been. We’re bullish on the back part of this year and into next year. We think in this market, farmers are seeing a recovery.”
Hansotia said impacts from recent tariffs have yet to materialize for AGCO.
“We’re really hoping that it gets sorted quickly. This kind of thing just throws sand in the gears, and we’d really like to have a free flow of things. We’re hoping both sides can come together quickly. If they don’t, it will be a bit of a hindrance for our farmers primarily in Canada because we produce a lot of products in the U.S. that can shift up to Canada, sprayers and hay equipment and tractors, planters. We’re wanting to get those products to those farmers at the lowest possible cost.”
We’ll have more from our Farm Progress Show interviews in the September issue of Ag Equipment Intelligence.
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