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Feb. 5, 2024 by Margy Eckelkamp, The Scoop magazine With recent turnover in company leadership, a divestment in its insurance business, and a growing list of partnerships, FBN is re-focusing its business. For the first nine years of FBN, it was led by co-founder Amol Deshpande. After his exit in February of 2023, board member John Vaske took the reins as CEO, but he stepped away in November 2023. Since then, Devin Lammers has taken on the role of interim CEO. "Our mission and our vision remain the same--that hasn't changed. We want to power the prosperity of family farms," says Lammers. "The core of our business and our execution capability haven't changed. While we've had a shift in the CEO position, the company is still the company, and our day to day execution of the business is there to make good on our promise to growers." Lammers joined FBN seven years ago as head of growth, including leading the FBN Financial segment and launching Gradable, the company's sustainability platform. "The theme of the past year has been focus and increased profitability," Lammers says. "Overall, we are narrowing toward overall profitability, but we're striking a balance between growth and being profitable." The company has had recent rounds of layoffs and resizing its team. FBN did not host its annual Farmers Farmer2Farmer in 2023. "We looked at internal costs and the resources it takes and we decided to not host the event this year," he says. "But we plan to bring it back." With close to 80,000 farmer members today, the company changed its subscription model three years ago from paid to free--which doubled sign ups. "Of our members, about 16,000 farmers transact with us, which includes buying inputs, acquiring financing or enrolling in the Gradable platform," he says. In 2023, FBN completed 33,000 deliveries of farm inputs, provided $1 billion in financing, and paid $22 million in premiums from Gradable. To read the entire report click here. Tweet |
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