Wilmont Minnesota

August 1, 2008 Dear Patrons,

We are sending this letter to inform you of the exciting news we have for you regarding your cooperative. Western Consolidated Cooperative of Holloway MN and Wilmont – Adrian Cooperative of Wilmont MN are excited to announce the formation of our new agronomy LLC.  

The Wilmont – Adrian fertilizer plant in Lismore and our other agronomy assets will become part of “The Agronomy Center LLC” by West Con (Western Consolidated Coop) and Wilmont – Adrian Coop.

Why?

As you already know the agronomy business in the United States is going through a huge transformation as to where fertilizer is manufactured, generic chemistry, bio technology, cost of transportation, cost of inventory, skilled employees and services. As this has changed so has the ability of smaller agronomy plants to provide the products, having adequate inventory in the warehouse or available on short notice and providing the latest technology and necessary services that are demanded in today’s agriculture by our customers. Our goal is to provide you with quality products and services at competitive prices.

A little over a year ago the members of 5 Star Fertilizer Coop chose to split up the partnership. We realized long before the split that agronomy is a volume business and that even our 5 Star partnerships was not able to provide the necessary purchasing power necessary to meet the needs and demands of you our customers. We had been working with our 5 Star partners trying to find a solution for quite some time. When the breakup of our partnership took place our board of directors and management realized that we needed to find a long term partner that would be able to help us provide products and services to our customers in a way that will keep up with your needs. Immediately after the breakup of 5 Star we had started our search for a new relationship or partner that could help us achieve our goals For Wilmont – Adrian Cooperative we needed to find a way to improve our services and product supply concerns, offer competive pricing while maintaining necessary margins for reinvestment into your business and for retirements.

After meeting with several local managers and sometimes their directors, touring plants and locations, meeting with consultants and other industry leaders, we have found a partner in Western Consolidated Cooperative (West Con) whom truly values customer service and has the desire and ability to help us grow our business in offering product and services to you our members. As our board visited with West Con and toured their plants we realized that West Con can and does have the ability to help us to achieve our goals. We found during the meetings with West Con that they have many of the same values and goals as we do. While touring each other’s locations the board of directors from West Con and your board of directors both saw great value by working together and both boards voted unanimously to form a LLC joint venture in agronomy between the two companies.
 
So the question that you have is who is West- Con? Western Consolidated Cooperative (West Con) is an independent cooperative with their home offices in Holloway MN doing grain and agronomy business primarily in Minnesota and South Dakota. They have several locations two of which are rail terminals that have both grain and fertilizer capacity to handle 110 car shuttle trains. In the fertilizer side of their business they deal both in retail and whole sale dry and liquid fertilizer. With over 82,000 tons of dry fertilizer capacity and over 6 million gallons of liquid at the terminal warehouses, including the ability to manufacture 10- 34- 0 and other liquid fertilizer products on site, West Con has the ability to purchase, hold and deliver product when needed for their own retail outlets and also for wholesale customers. For customer service West Con has over 40 custom application units for fertilizer and chemical application, a fleet of delivery trucks, bulk seed and bulk chemical storage and can offer exceptional service when it comes to technology. On the wholesale side of their business they sell to wholesale distributors and local cooperatives. In the past we have been purchasing products from some of these wholesale companies and even from West Con directly that were delivered to us from West Con’s terminals. The ability to deliver products and services from West Con are impressive to say the least and almost needs to be seen to appreciate. They are truly a Cooperative that says what they are going to do and does what they say.

What about other Cooperatives that are closer to us, why not work with them? Well we did visit with many neighbors and it did not take long to decide that our needs would be better served by a partnership with West Con. We intend to have a couple of bus tours arranged in the near future so that we can invite you to see for yourself why we are so excited about this partnership.

Wilmont – Adrian Cooperative

Board of Directors and Management

www.west-con.com