Why Grain Marketing Is More Psychology Than Analysis with Susan Stroud

Susan Stroud [00:00:00] Let's say you sold corn today and it was $5 and it was a fantastic sale. And if the market would go up 10 cents tomorrow, you would look at it as you just lost 10 cents. Now you didn't lose 10 cents. You know, you made that sale. And let's say you were clearing 50 cents a bushel. But a producer would still look at it as, I lost something because I essentially left it on the table. Marketing grain is a head game, and a lot of farmers, it's more about managing your emotions than anything. I am Caleb Denzy, a precision ag specialist living in Aurora, South Dakota, and you are listening to the Vance Crow podcast.

Vance Crowe [00:00:43] Welcome back to the podcast. I'm glad you're here. Today we sit down with Susan Stroud, who is the author of the No Bull Ag Newsletter. This is a very popular, and I would say rapidly growing newsletter that is brought to some sort of fame because there is no bull in it. It's about trying to analyze all of the information out there and distilling it into something that people can take action on that are in the ag commodity world. Susan came at a recommendation of my buddies from the Farm for Profit podcast, and anytime they suggest somebody, I always sit down with them. And Susan was definitely a delight. She's somebody that digs into the details, has done stuff like take a plane flight all the way up and down the distance of the Mississippi so that that way she could learn about where all these commodities are going and how it all works. So we're gonna get to that interview in just a moment, but if you've been thinking about doing a Legacy Interviews for your loved ones, the holidays are a perfect time to give this as a gift. A legacy interview is where I sit down with an individual or couple to record their life stories so that future generations have an opportunity to know their family history. We'll talk about their childhood, their career, marriage, parenting, and the wisdom that they've learned along the way. You can do this as a half day or a full day. We can put it on a video or even transcribe it into a book, whatever it takes to make your family memories lasting and create an heirloom that can be passed down for generations. If you're interested in having us sit down with your loved ones or buying this as a gift for Christmas, go to Legacy Interviews dot com to find out more.

Vance Crowe [00:02:21] All right, without further ado, let's go to the interview with Susan Stroud. Susan Stroud, welcome to the podcast.

Susan Stroud [00:02:31] Thank you.

Vance Crowe [00:02:32] So who reads the Noble Newsletter?

Susan Stroud [00:02:35] Initially, I guess I thought the, the target audience or the primary audience would be producers, but I think it's more, it's so many different types of people from the ag industry and now hedge funds too.

Vance Crowe [00:02:54] And what are hedge funds looking to gain from your,

Susan Stroud [00:02:58] So all funds have analysts and researchers that you know, that are always gathering information. So I think that it's just a matter of, maybe I put things in a slightly different perspective or it's, it's a little different from kind of your traditional updates.

Vance Crowe [00:03:17] Yeah, it's funny because there's no end to the amount of things that you can read for free. So anytime somebody is paying to read something, there's like some kind of value there and maybe it's a time elapsed value or something. What value do people get from yours?

Susan Stroud [00:03:33] For starters, the most difficult thing is the fact that I'm in a really saturated market, so you can get free info. It doesn't matter if it's something that maybe a grain company provides or the internet, Twitter, just lots of free things out there and you know, someone told me a long time ago, whatever you do, just don't be vanilla. And so I've tried to make sure that I've held true to that with my own writing and my updates, but it's been a really long, slow process trying to build, you know, build something that is, is has people see enough value in it that it's worth paying, even though it's really not a very expensive thing?

Vance Crowe [00:04:18] Well, anything, anytime somebody's gonna pay even a penny, it's the activation energy of like, ah, am I really gonna do this? Do I trust this person?

Susan Stroud [00:04:26] Yeah, I think that's why a lot of people pay monthly because they have the option of paying annually or by month. And I think a lot of people do monthly because they're either afraid that they're not going to get much value out of it, or because it is a market, you know, it's a commodity based wire. So if maybe they don't like the stance that I have on corn or my feelings towards soybeans or the, you know, particular market, then maybe they can bail after, you know, after a month or two.

Vance Crowe [00:05:00] And so tell me, like is in the articles you're saying, Hey, I think you ought to make a buy, buy, buy or what?

Susan Stroud [00:05:07] No, it's very, it's very rare that I would say anything that would be remotely close to an official trade recommendation. But I will, when I feel like it's an opportunity for, because even though the audience is very broad, it's still, for the most part when, when I feel strongly about this is an opportunity for the producer, that's, that's generally kind of how I'm writing it, who it's directed to, just to help them. And it's not about picking a market top or anything like that, it's just, it's more about risk management and making sound business decisions. My background was about 15 years in cash grain merchandising. So I worked for a DM and then Consolidated Grain and Barge. And so for all those years I talked to producers and you know, you, if you talk to one, you've talked to them all, you start to learn their mannerisms and unfortunately the ways that they approach approach risk management, which is not too much management. So you know, like

Vance Crowe [00:06:15] What, what do you mean this is abstract?

Susan Stroud [00:06:20] So let's say that, let's say you sold corn today and it was $5 and it was a fantastic sale, and if the market would go up 10 cents tomorrow, you would look at it as you just lost 10 cents. Now you didn't lose 10 cents. Maybe it was, you know, you made that sale and let's say you were clearing 50 cents a bushel. But a producer would still look at it as, I lost something because I essentially left it on the table. Or it's just a marketing grain is a head game. And a lot of farmers, it's more about managing your emotions than anything

Vance Crowe [00:07:04] Really. So tell me more about managing your emotions. I don't think most people associate farmers with like, you know, emotional.

Susan Stroud [00:07:12] I think it's because you're, you know, they're putting like all of this effort and care into growing a crop and raising all these bushels. And then, you know, on the agronomy side, the equipment side of it, all this stuff, they put so much into it. But on the marketing side, that's generally where they feel miserably, but it's because they have this weird emotional connection to the bushels.

Vance Crowe [00:07:40] And how would you, how do you advise or get somebody out of that emotional state?

Susan Stroud [00:07:45] That's probably why I ended up with the name Noble for my wires that I write. And you know, it just, you can't beat around the bush with a producer. You have to like lay it out there. And right now it's kind of a hard thing to talk about seasonally because if you're in fall and harvest and market prices are kind of on the slide, but if we are in the summer months where we're seeing heat or dry weather, you know, that emotionally gets a farmer upset because his crop looks threatened in the field, say the market's rallying and then you get more emotions there. It's like this big build, that's where we see people make horrible decisions because generally they don't make a decision, you know, and row crop production. It, it presents all sorts of different challenges and it's not just about, you have to get the crop in the ground, but then you have to hope and pray that you get the right, you know, right weather at the right time to produce a crop. And then all along the way you're trying to figure out, okay, where do I need to start? Where do I need to be selling bushels at, you know, calendar year 23 and then the growing season for 23. It's presented all sorts of challenges because coming off of a couple years of these incredible highs followed by, you know, we were kind of lulled to sleep with corn in the $6 area for new crop and, and when you're looking at $7 of the year prior, it makes it really difficult to make decisions.

Susan Stroud [00:09:34] And then we've had just a really erratic growing season that's presented all sorts of challenges from everything with too much water in places to not enough water and everything in between, and then a really horrible finishing weather. And so it's just all of those things make it very difficult for a producer to make decisions. And now, especially because the market's fallen a dollar from where we were, you know, a handful of months ago,

Vance Crowe [00:10:07] If you say, let's say you're, you're, you've got a thousand acres, right? And you're going through this ups and downs of the market and how much is a producer supposed to watch what's going on in the world? Like, is a war in Ukraine gonna impact the grain prices or weather in Nebraska gonna impact my prices that I'm gonna take for corn in Iowa? Like how much do they need to know?

Susan Stroud [00:10:30] I think the problem is, is that most of them, they tend to try to take in too much information. And a lot of the problem too is that if, if you are watching, let's just say you're watching a, like an ag news type program and if they're talking about it, then it's probably already priced in. So that's a lot of the thing is getting a producer to the point or anyone else that's a market participant to the point where you're realizing if we're discussing it now, it's probably already priced in. We price things really, really early, like in a summer rally, you know, we're watching sure if it's abnormally warm today, if it's 105 out and it's really dry, that's one thing, but we've probably already priced it two weeks ago because we're looking at forecast not for what today's weather is, but we're looking two weeks out, three weeks out and the market is moving based on how those forecasts are changing. So what's here? And now it's already long gone in the market size and we have to be more and more forward thinking, otherwise the market just runs you over.

Vance Crowe [00:11:46] I mean, I would think that it could run you over, even if you're, like you said, like you gotta find

Susan Stroud [00:11:50] It will run you over anyway.

Vance Crowe [00:11:52] Yeah.

Susan Stroud [00:11:52] But that's the important thing is making sure that you understand that the market can run you over. And then that's why, that's kind of where I feel like I try to come in and it's not that I don't know where the market's going. You might have a better chance at guessing where the market's going then I do. And even though this is what I do when I have access to all sorts of information. But I think one of the most important things is just being able to recognize opportunity plus putting things in a different perspective. So those are probably my two kind of go-to points. Especially when we are in a situation like summer months where we're seeing these, you know, big moves, big price action. And I don't know if we rally the market $1, I don't know if we're gonna go another dollar higher maybe, but it's my job to say, we just moved this, like here's an opportunity you need to take advantage of it

Vance Crowe [00:12:52] Instead of waiting and then like somebody that keeps putting down hands on on the roulette table and it builds up. You can have it all wiped out.

Susan Stroud [00:12:59] Yeah. I always know when, when a producer says, oh well you just wait until like, ooh, yeah, here's, here's your sign.

Vance Crowe [00:13:08] And so you used to work for a DM, you said you were a cash buyer.

Susan Stroud [00:13:12] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:13:13] So what does that mean?

Susan Stroud [00:13:14] I've worked at two different large river facilities in St. Louis. So both of them big elevators on the river. So farmers are delivering bushels in and trucks and we would be loading those bushels out on barges.

Vance Crowe [00:13:31] And so you're actually making the purchases to decide what price you're willing to pay? Or how does

Susan Stroud [00:13:35] Yeah, so elevators always have a posted bid. So they always have a basis that they're paying basis, meaning they're either paying above or x amount below whatever the particular Chicago Board of Trade Futures price is.

Vance Crowe [00:13:52] And so your job there, when you're doing this, do you have decision making authority? Like what is your role there?

Susan Stroud [00:13:58] Yeah, it, I mean it just kind of would depend on the situation, but you know, when the St. Louis market is a very, it's stiff competition. It's one of those areas that a lot of people, when you think of kind of the mecca of grain movement in the United States, you definitely don't think of St. Louis, but it has, because of its location on the Mississippi, it's as far north as you get before you're in the lock and dam system. So it has a freight advantage, a barge freight advantage, it's cheaper. You also have, oh, I don't remember what it is now, 16 elevators or something like that in town, 16 different places that are buying bushels. So with that it's, it's really competitive. So in some other markets where you only have one or two places buying, they have big fat margins because there's not as much competition. But in St. Louis, you have a huge amount of competition. So, and it's one of those things that's kind of, it feeds off of it itself too. So in the industry, kind of, there's kind of a saying about it, you can't have a facility, an exporting facility at the Gulf unless you have a facility to help you originate in St. Louis,

Vance Crowe [00:15:20] You had said that when we were talking before the show that you actually just recently did like a tour of the Mississippi, like got a good view of it.

Susan Stroud [00:15:28] Yeah, so with my background working for River facilities, it's always on my radar when there are issues with the river because it, when you have a problem on the river, then it, it can affect the larger system. And so we've, this is a second year in a row, we've dealt with extreme low water conditions. Last year I missed it, water, water came up before I was able to take a plane ride. So this year I wanted to make sure I took advantage of it. So I took a few hour plane ride, a small plane. We started out south of St. Louis. We went all the way down to the Boot heel of Missouri to the Confluence with the Ohio. We went back up the Ohio just a little bit through Mound City because there's still some barges that are grounded there that were left from last year that ended up grounded. So there were some pictures floating around where it kind of looked like the Sahara Desert with these random barges sprinkled and that's actually the Ohio River. So yeah. And then my, my main goal, I wanted to find a dredging boat, the Hurley, which is out of the Memphis Core District. And we did, we made it down to around Tipton, Tennessee. So real foot lake, like south of New Madrid, that area where we were able to see where this dredge boat had been working. So, and

Vance Crowe [00:16:57] Why'd you wanna see that?

Susan Stroud [00:16:59] So low water creates a lot of, a lot of issues. One of those is that you've got, the channel is narrow and you'll get shoing and things where the, the channel isn't wide enough for boats and tows barge toes to pass. So they bring in these dredge boats where it will take like the sand and sediment and stuff from the center or what should be the channel and it will pump it back and it'll throw it back over toward the shore. So I just never, you don't see dredge boats a lot. And so I just went on a mission to find this boat. So.

Vance Crowe [00:17:37] And how did going on this trip change the way you thought about things?

Susan Stroud [00:17:42] I mean, I knew that they were low, but working on the river for a long time, you know, you learn what normal looks like and then obviously what, what really low water is like. And so it's just, it's just really wild when you see something like the Mississippi that should be normally very wide and always has a, a significant current, even like in times of high water especially, you can see swells. I mean it's just a really, yeah,

Vance Crowe [00:18:16] The Mississippi moves fast.

Susan Stroud [00:18:17] Massive. Yeah. But right now it, it almost looks like, it almost looks like a lake. It's too still, it's just, it's very bizarre because the so low. But it just, I was really excited to be able to, to capture, I think I took 300 pictures in this two hour window. But it's, that's the kind of thing that, it's a kind of thing that really interests me. 'cause it's not, you know, it's not every day. And so that's, I wanted to do it for myself, but then I know that these things that really interest me, generally my audience is really interested in too. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:18:58] And having a front row seat where you can be like, I saw this thing makes the ability to write about it so much different.

Susan Stroud [00:19:05] Yeah. Well, and it helps with my, my background too. I can talk river things a little more in depth than most people. So, you know, being able to talk about the significance of the fact that all of these like rock dykes are exposed and that this is normally exposed to the point that there's grass growing on them. But, you know, these are normally the things that are helping keep the channel intact. And so yeah, it's just a, it's a pretty wild, pretty wild thing. I,

Vance Crowe [00:19:39] The Mississippi River is kind of a, an American superpower that we don't, people don't realize, right? Like how much easier and cheaper it is to move freight down a river than it is even on a train. It's just like, the volumes are unbelievable. The

Susan Stroud [00:19:54] Inland waterway system is the most efficient transportation mechanism in the world. And so it's really what has pushed American agriculture to, to the greatness I guess that we've seen. I hate to say that, you know, that it's not quite like that now, but things are, domestic policies and things like that are changing grain flows here in the United States. But in

Vance Crowe [00:20:21] What way?

Susan Stroud [00:20:23] So we've, you know, first we had the renewable fuel standard back, oh, I hate to throw a year out. Oh, eight ish, something like that. Is

Vance Crowe [00:20:34] This when we started getting ethanol?

Susan Stroud [00:20:36] Yes. So, you know, so when you have, and I don't wanna say that domestic policies are a bad thing because when you, now for me, as we're coming off this conversation where I've spent so much time at river facilities where we're loading barges and barges, go down the river for export, you know, so that's been my, was my lifeblood for a long time. And so it's been a really interesting and kind of difficult transition for me to watch other countries somewhat turn into exporting powerhouses like Brazil.

Vance Crowe [00:21:13] Oh. Because by creating the fuel standard, then there's more domestic demand, which means the price of selling it goes up, which makes you less competitive with Brazil.

Susan Stroud [00:21:24] Yeah. So, you know, corn has, we have plenty of other competitors. Brazil is now a massive competitor, but one of the biggest, you know, one of the biggest reasons there or that we've, we've seen a big shift the past, I guess over the course of the past 12 months is because China approved Brazilian corn for import back in the summer of 22. And so then the end of 22, they started shipping corn to China. And so that's been, that's been a big change and adjustment for us here in the us. But yes, back to your original question or comment. Yeah, we see this, this shift in policy where suddenly we're using, you know, five plus billion bushels of corn here domestically each year for ethanol, which is, that's great. Now we're seeing it, it's kind of like ethanol 2.0 with soybeans, soybean oil specifically for renewable diesel here in the us.

Vance Crowe [00:22:28] Did you think that's gonna grow?

Susan Stroud [00:22:30] Yeah, it, it is growing in a huge way.

Vance Crowe [00:22:34] Why

Susan Stroud [00:22:34] Again, policy, low carbon fuel standard, Arnold Schwartzenegger.

Vance Crowe [00:22:40] And so this is imagining that people are gonna be, or more semis and, and delivery trucks will be using soy diesel.

Susan Stroud [00:22:48] Yes. But see they're two distinctively different types of soybean oil or biomass based diesel is the,

Vance Crowe [00:22:58] I don't know anything at all about this.

Susan Stroud [00:23:00] So, okay, so we have traditional fame, fatty fatty acid, methyl ester biodiesel. So it's been around for a while. It's the old, like, you know, we have a max blend I believe of 20% it gels when it gets cold out, that kind of thing. But now we have renewable diesel, which is chemically identical to petroleum-based diesel. It can be blended up to 100%. It's a drop in fuel so you can use it with existing infrastructure. So there are all sorts of advantages to it. And with California's low carbon fuel standard, that is what's, what started kind of this revolution of sorts.

Vance Crowe [00:23:47] So without a mandate that you have to have, you know, for carbon, is the price anywhere competitive with regular diesel fuel?

Susan Stroud [00:23:56] Oh no, there are tremendous tax incentives, that kind of thing. But you know, and the interesting thing about the little carbon fuel standard, while it's, it's like there's that Jimmy Carter quote, it's something about whatever happens in California has a tendency to spread. I think it's something like that. So, you know, we've seen it with a lot of different things. California is the, if it was a country fifth largest, and actually it might be getting ready to overtake, I think it's maybe set up to go to number four now. I, I can't remember. But either way. So massive economy. And so the changes, you know, the decisions that they make, the legislation, the legislation that they put into action in California, it has a tendency to go elsewhere. So we've seen it spread up the West coast. Canada has a low carbon fuel policy of sorts now we're seeing on the East coast, I think Minnesota's in the middle of something and then Illinois. So

Vance Crowe [00:24:59] Very interesting. And then that, so in your newsletter, as you're writing about things like fuel standards, how competent are you in the subjects that you're writing about? Because each one of these things is its own huge domain.

Susan Stroud [00:25:13] I just try to make sure that I'm not writing incorrect things. So

Vance Crowe [00:25:18] Did you start out as a writer?

Susan Stroud [00:25:21] No, actually the way, when I worked at a DM, we used to do a market recap kind of thing that I remember. I ended up calling it the inside scoop because it was just a goal to try to, to help, to help producers understand a little bit more about why the changes, why, why did Basis suddenly drop 20 cents most of the time it's because of a barge freight thing or something like that. So it kind of started out as like, oh, let's do something that's educational that benefits the producer that makes my life easier because I want them to understand. So, you know, I'm not getting chewed on all the time when there are these big changes that happen. When I went to Consolidated Grain and Barge, I kept up that same like once a week email, but I directed it at my own producer customers. It eventually grew to where I had more CGB and CG B's parent company zow more employees on the distribution list than my own customers. They eventually rolled it out to be a company-wide all customer once a week email, it was called Straight Talk with Susan. But I got out of the elevator business and got more in the brokerage kind of stuff about three years ago. And I kept riding once a week. And then about a year ago when low water was becoming a major issue, I thought, okay, well if I'm going to turn this into something that is a revenue generator, I better do it now because this is kind of my time to shine since I can talk about the river.

Susan Stroud [00:27:04] And it was a really big deal last year because we saw freight go to these absurd levels and you know, it was kind of a shock to the system. This year it's a muted, we're still in a bad situation, but everyone's a lot more prepared for it this year, so it's not nearly as exciting. But to answer your question, since I just got way, way off

Vance Crowe [00:27:26] Track No, you were while you were writing.

Susan Stroud [00:27:29] Yeah, so I guess I always, I'm just, I, you know, learned something new every day's, like my mantra and I just, I, that's what I enjoy the most.

Vance Crowe [00:27:42] So it's funny because you had specifically said like how long it took to build up to this, because I was definitely in the camp of like, oh, this is like a overnight success because I'd never heard of you, and then all of a sudden I heard of you and then I saw you everywhere. So it seemed like an overnight success.

Susan Stroud [00:27:59] Oh goodness. It's, it's a, a crowded pool of commentaries is the best way to describe it. And yeah, it's been long and painful and I think consistency, consistency is key and I'm clearly passionate about it. So

Vance Crowe [00:28:22] What's been painful about it?

Susan Stroud [00:28:25] Not making any money for a long time with countless hours. And I mean, I'm a one man show and I am very scrappy, so I don't, you know, I'm not, I'm not utilizing a lot of other, a lot of other groups are probably either paying for information, they have a graphics department, they have a team of re you know, like it's me hanging out my little office at home trying my best. But you know, I'm a I'm a very visual person and I think at the end of the day, most people are visual learners. We all like pictures. It doesn't matter if you're a truck driver or a CEO, everybody likes, you know, likes something that helps tell the story and kind of bring it to life.

Vance Crowe [00:29:13] Oh yeah, when I worked in corporate America, I used to, and one of the great things about Monsanto was there were dry erase boards everywhere. And anytime there was a disagreement, I would just be like, all right, let's draw it. And as soon as you draw it, all of a sudden you find out like one, the person, like people's arguments are often have big gaps in 'em because they, they didn't have to draw it out. And the very act of having to draw some kind of a diagram or some kind of a picture makes people think through their problems. And it also changes the way that people are oriented around a problem. So in a newsletter, I would imagine that's the same thing.

Susan Stroud [00:29:48] Yeah. Plus I, I don't know anyone that likes to just scroll through paragraph after paragraph, you know, you don't wanna, which I, I'm kind of guilty of it too. I have to be, I have to be careful sometimes because I'll go down, you know, I'll go, go down a rabbit hole and I'll realize that I just typed out six paragraphs and, and I'm like, wait, I need visuals to go with this. I have to go find something. So, and

Vance Crowe [00:30:16] So where do you get your information

Susan Stroud [00:30:18] Over the past few years? I have compiled link after link after link of, you know, the places that I can go to to get import export data or, you know, I'm just always on the hunt. In fact, I have, if, if I ever get hit by a bus, the the thing you want to go to first is the spreadsheet that I have that's called links because it gives me, I just have to make sure that when I see something that I know has value or could, you know, could bring value, gotta make sure that I hang onto it. So I spent my morning today updating import export stuff for Brazil and the US and then, you know, taking, taking that info and putting us and Brazil soybean exports and corn exports side by side in the same chart. So you can, you can start to understand that, you know, we have northern hemisphere, southern hemisphere and when we have harvest going on for soybeans in the northern hemisphere, so us sees this huge build in bean exports October, November, and then we start to, you know, trail off December, January and then here comes Brazil and you know, you can start to kind of understand a little bit more about how trade flows work. Just, yeah, I'm gonna go down a nerdy path.

Vance Crowe [00:31:44] This is fine. I mean I think that it's, I think most people when they're putting something out, they're like, what is the fastest way I can get this thing put out? Yeah. And that's why most of the things that you read are junk, right? It's because somebody's like trying to put con you know, like content out instead of being like, I'm gonna put something out that matters or something that people can get value from.

Susan Stroud [00:32:05] I remember when I was first hired by a DM and we had to do this afternoon market recap or we're supposed to send something out to customers and I used to copy and paste just the, you know, just this long drawn out stuff that I wouldn't wanna read. Well if I don't wanna read it, who else is gonna want to read it? So just have to, I want people to be able to walk away and be like, well I learned something there. I went down a rabbit hole yesterday because I do, I do a weekend, I do three updates a week and they're, you know, you're not the normal title, you're not gonna find updates titled this way anywhere else. So the Tuesday hot take, so we have what's hot, what's not, and we have hot nuggets and I try to bust it up into those things. So, you know, we always have, there's always three sections to it. We're always gonna talk about something that's hot or a few things. It could be that it's something, you know, hot the weather, we might might also have a market that seems to be on fire, what's not. We'll, this week we'll talk about how pitiful us corn exports were in August. And then on Thursdays I do, it's a, it's just a list of 10 of something, the 10 spot. But the weekend update is what I like the best, the weekender because it's, you can kind of go back and look it, it always sucks up all of my time on the weekends, but I go back and look at performance from the week prior, see the thing, the winners and called the winners and losers always do headline of the week.

Susan Stroud [00:33:56] Just, I don't know, everything has a little bit of a theme.

Vance Crowe [00:34:00] And the funny thing about what you're doing, and this is for anybody that's doing something that's before it happens, like sports commentators or anything, when you go back and look at articles that you wrote and then you know, what happened moving forward, how does that feel? Is that like a cringing thing or a a

Susan Stroud [00:34:18] Well I really don't, I try to make sure that it's more about like we're here to state the facts and let's observe what happened and then kind of be thoughtful about how we need to approach it going forward. But I don't, I don't know, I just, I try to make sure that it's, I just always want someone to walk away feeling like they learned something new. I, yesterday I wrote a little bit about Coca-Cola stock having just plummeting because of more like us or world demand or recession recessionary type fears. But then I went off into talking about how they used 17% of the world's industrial aluminum supplies. Yeah, I was just talking about how they're a massive user of natural resources and then of course how they use a tremendous amount of high fructose corn syrup, which is obviously made from corn. And so then that sent me kind of down the path where I ended up on a Department of Energy website of all things that showed this big breakdown of like use uses for corn every, you know, each marketing year and high fructose corn syrup is the fourth largest like use for corn only behind feed ethanol and exports.

Vance Crowe [00:35:50] It's wild like America

Susan Stroud [00:35:52] And our sugary drinks here.

Vance Crowe [00:35:53] Yeah, that's right. And it's wild to think about just how much that cheap sugar has made it like just changed everything about our whole culture, right? It's like I, I don't know if there's something chemically different with high fructose corn syrup or not. I'm told by the large corporations there's not. But you have to admit that if you were buying all of that as either cane sugar or even sugar beets, the price of sugar would be so much higher that it would make things a lot more expensive.

Susan Stroud [00:36:20] Yeah, that's just an example of how my, my brain works. It's kind of like a,

Vance Crowe [00:36:26] Yeah, I love it. That's great. Let's

Susan Stroud [00:36:27] Connect the dots and we will eventually come up with something that's of interest.

Vance Crowe [00:36:32] What's been some of your favorite connecting of the dots? The ones that you tell at dinner parties and you're like, can you believe this?

Susan Stroud [00:36:39] Oh, this is probably why, oh, I should not say this probably, but this is why I don't have a lot of female friends because I'll go to, you know, I go to like a kid's birthday or something and I remember specifically a couple years ago a mom made a comment and of course I live in rural America, so mom makes this comment about how great it is because there's a new Dollar General, you know, right there, right there close to their subdivision. And so then I had written about it just a couple weeks prior. I mean, dollar General doesn't really have anything to do with updates about corn and soybeans, but I get off on these, what I find, if I find something that is interesting or really makes me go, Ooh man, that's a crazy stat, then I end up writing about it. So she's talking about how convenient the Dollar General is and then the next thing I am like spewing facts about the, how they choose locations based on demographics and how they opened 1100 stores a year prior. And I'm just rambling on. And so these other moms in the circle are like, Hmm, so, so then eventually I'm like, oh yeah, it's really convenient right

Vance Crowe [00:37:53] There. So being a mom, you have, you have kids and you write on weekends and throughout the week.

Susan Stroud [00:38:00] Yeah, that's why I get up at four every day. This is why, what

Vance Crowe [00:38:05] Time do your kids wake up?

Susan Stroud [00:38:07] Hopefully seven. That's the goal.

Vance Crowe [00:38:09] Yeah. We have a 1-year-old that's now starting to wake up at 6:00 AM which is like, there's no way to tell her like go back to sleep.

Susan Stroud [00:38:16] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:38:16] So you're just dealing with it.

Susan Stroud [00:38:18] Yeah, sometimes my little one is up and enjoying the fun too. So it's only, it's when she says that she wants to either work, work on my computer with me as she calls it. Yeah. So a lot of times productivity just goes out the window and you have to deal with it. But I always put pictures of the kids pretty regularly in my updates and I have a lot of longtime customers and now subscribers who they've told me that they see more pictures of my kids than they do of their own grandkids or

Vance Crowe [00:38:56] You know, everyone

Susan Stroud [00:38:57] Takes an interest in what my kids are doing. Which is good because at the end of the day I think people forget that we're all just people, you know, we all

Vance Crowe [00:39:08] Trying to figure it out. Trying to, like I, before I had kids, I mean I, I was never mean to people that were parents, but I was running around in corporate America being like, I don't know why you guys can't get this work done. I don't know why anything would take priority over getting these projects done. And then all of a sudden you have kids and you're like, oh, they didn't want to stay up until 2:00 AM with a coughing child that doesn't want to go to bed or

Susan Stroud [00:39:31] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:39:32] Yeah. Like that was a, that was a much bigger wake up call for me than I thought it was gonna be.

Susan Stroud [00:39:37] Yeah, yeah, definitely. It changes things and you just have to learn to, you know, you can only, I dealt with this yesterday because I had, I had purchased movie tickets for the afternoon for to take my daughter and I was trying to rush through and I finally, I'm like, you know what? We're just gonna have one managed money chart. We're gonna throw it all on one page today and people can deal with it. We'll do the full rundown next week.

Vance Crowe [00:40:06] And what movie did you go see?

Susan Stroud [00:40:08] Paw Patrol.

Vance Crowe [00:40:09] And how was it?

Susan Stroud [00:40:10] It? It was tolerable.

Vance Crowe [00:40:12] Tolerable?

Susan Stroud [00:40:14] Yeah. It was okay.

Vance Crowe [00:40:16] Before we started the podcast, I was asking you to spell your name and you were like, wait, wait, I have something. I've been dealing with this for the last little while. Yes.

Susan Stroud [00:40:25] Yeah. You know, I was on Agri Talk maybe a month or so ago and the name change thing was pretty, was pretty new. So Davis comes on and, and introduces me or says something about and uses my, my old name. And then I was on with Ted Seyfried, he was taking Chip's place that day. So then Ted comes on and he's like, oh no, it's Susan Stroud now. And then Davis is either clueless or just trying to make for fun conversation. And so it was the most awkward thing as they went back and forth and did, yeah, it was just, we managed to go through the whole thing without someone saying that she's divorced now, but

Vance Crowe [00:41:17] The name change thing, that's like a real sacrifice. And my wife was very smart when she negotiated for getting the name, like to change her last name to mine. She also negotiated that then she got to name the children,

Susan Stroud [00:41:32] Which was

Vance Crowe [00:41:33] A very good negotiation. But I also didn't realize how much work it was to change your name. I can't even imagine changing it back.

Susan Stroud [00:41:40] Yeah, well I got married when I was 20, so you know, when you're 20 it's not like you have many things anyway. You need a, you need your marriage license and you get a new driver's license and maybe you have a credit card, a bank account. That's about it. But I'm almost 40 now, so this is, it's been quite the process. So it was driver's license first, then passport, then once you get your passport, then it's kind of, and you get your license back then it's bank accounts, credit cards. But I do think the most interesting thing slash pain in the backside is with TSA for pre-check and then all of the airlines, if you have, you know, you're a member of Advantage or whatever program it may be, you can't just go in and change your last name in your American account or your United account or Southwest. You have to upload your divorce decree, you have to upload a picture of an old id, new id

Vance Crowe [00:42:48] And this is on everything, like everything you're touching.

Susan Stroud [00:42:51] Yeah. Yeah. So my attorney warned me that I needed to just carry around a copy of the papers and she was correct because it's, yeah, it's great.

Vance Crowe [00:43:03] Well now that you've got all that done, you can go to far off places like Panama.

Susan Stroud [00:43:10] Yeah, yeah. Whatcha are

Vance Crowe [00:43:11] You doing down there?

Susan Stroud [00:43:13] I am really excited. So I've always wanted to go to the Panama Canal and so I just decided, okay, I'm going to play in this. So I'm doing a boat tour and then also a, like a land tour as well. So

Vance Crowe [00:43:32] Do you know where you're getting on?

Susan Stroud [00:43:35] Oh, on the boat.

Vance Crowe [00:43:35] On the canal? Yeah.

Susan Stroud [00:43:36] Oh, I think, oh, I don't know. I think I'm, I'm starting in Panama City and then working my way up through like the first three locks or something along those lines. So it's only a partial transit. But actually this is my goal is that eventually I will start doing like group trips of sorts in the winter months that are, you know, have like an ag focus. So conference in the summer months and then organize a group trip in the winter.

Vance Crowe [00:44:09] That'd be great. I've had a chance to do the Panama Canal and there's a reason why you do one side and not the other because the Panama City side, it's beautiful. This is like the bridge to the Americas and it's just great. And you go up these locks and you go up several of them and then you're on a lake and you go past it. But when you get to the other side, that's Balboa and that is like rough, rough, rough. Very rough.

Susan Stroud [00:44:34] Okay, well I feel like I've booked the right thing then.

Vance Crowe [00:44:37] Yeah, you did for sure. That was like some of the most trouble I ever got into was, was being on the other side that like, there's just not the development. So it's like a sailors town.

Susan Stroud [00:44:49] Oh, okay.

Vance Crowe [00:44:49] In Latin America.

Susan Stroud [00:44:50] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:44:51] Where it's like a rough place to, or at least it, I don't know. I haven't been there in 20 years, but when I was there 20 years ago it was pretty rough.

Susan Stroud [00:44:58] Alright, well,

Vance Crowe [00:45:00] But it's, it's pretty cool and I think it will be pretty advanced now because I think they've done some big upgrades to it. Yeah.

Susan Stroud [00:45:07] And kind of the, I guess the reason that was that it's on my radar is that Panama is dealing with a drought of historic proportions as well. So that's limited some of the transit through the canal. Oh there are some draft restrictions, but I'm not certain that it affects the bulk carriers so much as it affects maybe the container ships, but, so backup of boats and that kind of thing. So that's part of why I,

Vance Crowe [00:45:40] It's so cool. You pull the ship in and then these, they, they bring these guys, they're called Pasa cobbles and they hook your ship in and there are trains that go and they like hold the ship in place. It's the most bizarre thing

Susan Stroud [00:45:52] My parents went through on a cruise, I don't know, several, several years ago. It's probably been 10 years ago. So I was at my mom's over the weekend and she had this DVD that she had purchased from, you know, from the cruise line. And so she put it in and we watched it and I watched it a couple times just so I could write some things down. But I saw what you were talking about the mules.

Vance Crowe [00:46:15] Yeah,

Susan Stroud [00:46:16] Mules.

Vance Crowe [00:46:16] Yeah. Those big trains that they just pull 'em. Yeah. So

Susan Stroud [00:46:20] Yeahm pretty pumped.

Vance Crowe [00:46:21] And so you're able to do this because like you're putting on conferences for Noble. Tell me about that.

Susan Stroud [00:46:28] Well, it's only one so far.

Vance Crowe [00:46:29] Oh, that was only one. That

Susan Stroud [00:46:30] Was something.

Vance Crowe [00:46:30] See this is why I'm telling you, you seem like an overnight success because I heard about that from a lot of people about the fact that that conference was going on. Well

Susan Stroud [00:46:39] If you had been with me maybe like two weeks prior, I was screaming I will never do this again because I've never planned anything like that before. Well

Vance Crowe [00:46:51] You shopped for the moon 'cause you did it down in Ballpark Village and yeah.

Susan Stroud [00:46:54] So tell

Vance Crowe [00:46:55] Me about it. What did you envision and how did it come out?

Susan Stroud [00:46:58] I just feel like in the indu in ag in general, we, there aren't many events where you see people come together, not just farmers, but just all different types of people from the industry. So, you know, you might go to a conference but it's all grain elevators or you might go to a conference and it's like top producers. So it's a bunch of producers and you just don't have a really good mix of a lot of different types of people. So this, you know, it was grain companies, finance farmers, seed insurance, rail barge, ethanol, soy processing. Just a really interesting mix of people that were just all there to learn about, you know, learn about kind of the new, the, the theme was the bullpen, the next generation agriculture. And honestly I think I might just stick with that same theme because it's, I mean it's kind of like how we talk about the market. It always, you know, we're always front running and I think that we always have to be looking forward because, and just so many new, new technologies, new innovations and just the things and markets are ever evolving. It's kind of like we were talking about with the corn market. We knew, we knew it evolved into, suddenly we have this huge demand for renewable fuels and ethanol.

Susan Stroud [00:48:35] We're seeing that same change now underway in the bean market. So I just think it's really important that we continue to focus on what's up ahead and what's next because that's ultimately the only way you're gonna survive as a producer or anyone else in the industry is you have to, you have to be adaptable to change.

Vance Crowe [00:48:56] And what kind of change do you see on the horizon?

Susan Stroud [00:48:59] The thing that I'm probably am really passionate about the renewable diesel boom and the way that that's transforming soybean crush industry here in the us. I think the next thing is sustainable aviation fuel. You know, it's so new that it's not even to the point where the government is reporting separately on sustainable aviation fuel or I should say the energy information administration. So, you know, the interesting thing about sustainable aviation fuel is that you can, you can make it two different ways. You can either use a carbohydrate, so like an ethanol to jet type process. I think it's with ethanol it takes 1.7 gallons of ethanol to make the equivalent of one gallon of sustainable aviation fuel. So big opportunity there on the corn side.

Vance Crowe [00:49:54] Is it 'cause they can let the engines run so much hotter or like why? I wonder why that is. I,

Susan Stroud [00:50:00] I guess, I don't know. No,

Vance Crowe [00:50:01] I would know idea that's total guess. Yeah, I have no idea.

Susan Stroud [00:50:03] I mean it seems like you'd have to have a little more bang, you know? Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:50:06] A little

Susan Stroud [00:50:07] More oomph if you're gonna have power jet. The thing that kind of put sustainable aviation fuel, my radar initially was, it's been right at two years ago a DM announced a, I think it was just a memorandum of understanding or whatever, they announced a partnership of sorts with gvo, which is a, a sustainable aviation fuel company. And so they're, they're working on this big, they have this big pilot project. I think they're kind of like the leader in that space, but they, but the thing about that is that just my, all my rambling there, the biggest thing is that they announced that they were transitioning half, I think it's half of their existing ethanol producing capacity to sustainable aviation fuel. So when you have one of the biggest corn processors, ethanol producers in the country say that they're making this transition, I think it's really important that you take note. And so here we are a couple years later, you know, it's, we're still in, it's in its infancy I guess sustainable aviation fuel is or that industry. But the craziest thing about it is, what I started to say a minute ago is you can make it from either carbohydrates, so like an ethanol or you can use the same process that you can use a lipid. So it could in theory be competing with renewable diesel for soybean oil use, cooking oil, like all of these other,

Vance Crowe [00:51:42] And are any of these things competitive with like regular petroleum products?

Susan Stroud [00:51:48] No. Like sustainable aviation fuel is the one that is the aviation is the most difficult to decarbonize simply because I guess it takes, it's the large quantities and I, I guess it's something like we were talk, you know, you need more oomph if you're gonna be able to power a plane.

Vance Crowe [00:52:11] What a wild time, like I hear you say sustainable aviation fuel and it seems not real, but I'm sure through government decree you can make these things happen quite, quite fast.

Susan Stroud [00:52:22] Yeah. Net zero by 2050, let's see, it's the grant Sustainable Aviation Fuel Grand Challenge, I believe is what the Biden administration called it. And, but I couldn't tell you about the specifics much more than that. But I do know that most of your major carriers have already made some sort of commitment, you know, like a 10% blend by 2035. I did a write up on it, it's probably been six months ago. And I think that if for all the sustainable aviation fuel that was produced in the US last year, it would've only powered the US like jet fleet for six hours. I think. I mean it was something tiny,

Vance Crowe [00:53:11] But

Susan Stroud [00:53:11] Again, it's just, I don't know. Another, it's another government thing.

Vance Crowe [00:53:18] Yeah, I mean like, that's why I have my strong, you know, doubts and suspicions about it because you can't hold these things up forever that, that the money that makes those things possible comes from someone.

Susan Stroud [00:53:29] Yeah. While the inflation reduction act, that was, that's where we saw more support for the biomass based diesels and sustainable aviation fuel has a, a big tax credit of some sort in there too.

Vance Crowe [00:53:44] So do you have to read all these bills that come out and I mean they,

Susan Stroud [00:53:47] No, no, I just, I go to Google again, I get, I get down rabbit holes, like I go chasing after something and then fortunately now I am to the point, and especially with working on planning that conference that I've made enough connections that generally when I need, you know, when I have a question about something, I know someone that knows more. You know, the old, it's not what you know, it's who you know, but I'm not, I don't use that with like clout in mind. I use it because it's like, oh, I know someone that can answer

Vance Crowe [00:54:28] This question, I can answer any question I want. Yes. I mean that's the Henry Ford thing. Like, you can ask me anything you want. Then you just picks up the phone and calls people. And so you said you didn't wanna do your conference again, but then you said you're gonna do your conference again. Tell me what do people get when they come to a conference with you?

Susan Stroud [00:54:46] So, you know, for starters, the experience. So you know what Ballpark Village is like, and I decided that I, I didn't want this to be, I wanted this to be an opportunity where we have a lot of different people from the industry and producers coming together, we're learning about new things, but at the end of the day, you're meeting new people, making new friends and you know, you always, there's always opportunities in those new conversations. So I think that the networking aspect of it is just really important and I wanted it to be different and memorable. And that definitely was achieved with Ballpark Village because I don't think most people were expecting, I don't think they knew what to expect. Yeah,

Vance Crowe [00:55:30] It's this cool kind of enclave done by Cardinal Stadium where it's like all kinds of bars and nice restaurants. Like as an oasis in, in St. Louis.

Susan Stroud [00:55:40] Yeah, so the place was ours for the day, for the meeting. They have a, there's a stage there. So I think the most interesting thing about it is that I noticed while I'm up on stage with the different panelists and I'm moderating the discussion, I could see out in the crowd and other people were either they're paying attention or maybe they're talking to themselves, having their own conversation, which I don't care. I'm not, you know, the whole point is, is that you're there, you're learning something, you're meeting new people. So if you're paying attention to every moment on stage or not, it doesn't matter. But that's kind of the beauty of the space is because it's big enough where you can hear everything. But if you need to step off to the side and take a phone call or you wanna have a conversation with your neighbor, it's not awkward like it would be in a hotel ballroom.

Vance Crowe [00:56:34] Well if people wanted to read more, if they wanted to find your newsletter, how would they and then kind of interact with you more? Where would they go?

Susan Stroud [00:56:41] My website is no Bull Ag like a g.com. So that's probably the best place to start.

Vance Crowe [00:56:48] And then are you on social media?

Susan Stroud [00:56:51] Yes. Susan? No Bull at Susan. No Bull or Susan,

Vance Crowe [00:56:55] You didn't have to change your name on that one.

Susan Stroud [00:56:56] I know I didn't.

Vance Crowe [00:56:59] Well Susan, this has been really fun. Thank you for coming in.

Susan Stroud [00:57:02] Thanks for having me. Ah.