Playing many roles over 40 years, Bill Page talks progression in the field
Though his degree is in agriculture education, Bill Page of Insight FS says there is no instruction for potatoes other than on-farm learning, and that’s why he likes it.
A sales and specialty purchasing agent for Insight FS in Antigo, Wisconsin, Page says, “There are a lot of people who can do corn and soybeans well, there’s info and you can find it. Here, in potatoes, you have to go and do it.”
“Area growers and researchers know how to grow potatoes and have been willing to talk to us,” Page adds.
Insight FS is an agricultural cooperative serving customers in 24 locations across Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Headquartered in Jefferson, Wisconsin, Insight FS provides feed, agronomy, energy, agri-finance, seed and turf products and services, as well as grain marketing to patrons.
There are approximately 45 full-time and 27-30 seasonal employees in the Antigo location, with $30 million in sales, and 285 full-time Insight FS employees working across the state of Wisconsin.
Page, who has more than 40 years of experience in the industry, says chemistry solves many crop problems if growers are able to put the right stuff and enough of it on plants to increase uptake at or near root zone.
“When I started, you put 1,000 pounds of P205 [phosphorus pentoxide] and K20 potash in-row. Then, testing showed that if you put on half that amount of potash, you didn’t have salt toxicity to the plant. So, they took the potash half from the spring and spread it on in the fall to better hold nutrients,” he says.
“The FS system goes everywhere,” Page adds, “Maine, Montana, Florida and elsewhere.”
When asked why he’s stayed more than four decades with one company, he cites the people and job variety.
