Grain bins at Ag Partners LLC's complex in Alton, Iowa, are shown. For this fall's busy harvest season, Ag Partners recruited 22 migrant workers to help unload grain and perform other tasks at Alton and five other locations in Northwest Iowa.
ALTON, Iowa | A $6.5 million expansion completed last summer added nearly 2 million bushels of permanent grain storage at Ag Partners' sprawling complex in Alton.
Three large grain bins were constructed, boosting the overall storage to nearly 7 million bushels.
Ag Partners CEO Troy Upah said the investment, unanimously approved by the board of directors, shows the company's "commitment to meet the ever-changing needs of our customers."
The Alton facility has the capacity to unload 50,000 bushels of grain per hour. With rail, the load-out capacity is 70,000 bushels per hour. At that rate, a 100-car unit train can be loaded in 10 hours, said Dan DeJong, Ag Partners' vice president of western operations.
With the Alton expansion completed, Ag Partners plans to close its operations in nearby Orange City, where the company has a grain elevator, former feed mill, offices, storage sheds and Cenex convenience store.
Ag Partners recently reached an agreement to sell the six-acre Orange City site to Northwestern College. The property adjoins the southwest portion of the campus, just west of the Rowenhorst Student Center.
The contract calls for Northwestern to take possession of the property on April 1.
"This property offers us the opportunity to reconsider future expansion, and it comes as we have recently developed a new campus master plan," Northwestern President Greg Christy said.
De Jong said the aging Orange City grain elevator doesn’t meet customers’ needs, with a receiving capacity per hour seven times slower than the newer elevator in Alton. In addition, he cited the safety benefits of closing the Orange City operation for Northwestern students and the improved traffic flow through campus that will result.
Ag Partners, owned jointly by Alceco, a Albert City, Iowa, farmer cooperative and Minneapolis ag giant Cargil, has more than 7,000 customers throughout its large Northwest Iowa territory. The company, which provides grain, agronomy, feed and petroleum, also has area locations in Matlock, Sheldon, Sutherland, Maurice, Merrill, Hospers, Sioux Center, Calumet, Alta, Ellsworth, Royal, Hartley, Emmetsburg and Fonda.
Plentiful rains and cool July temperatures have helped Siouxland soybean returns. Farmers hope the trend will continue. Â
Grain bins at Ag Partners LLC's complex in Alton, Iowa, are shown. For this fall's busy harvest season, Ag Partners recruited 22 migrant workers to help unload grain and perform other tasks at Alton and five other locations in Northwest Iowa.
