The question we’ve come to ask is why Jordan and Jennifer Lindgren made the strange choice to turn being a grain farmer into such a public life.
Unlike most farmers, the Lindgrens’ marketing campaign puts their farm and their family right in the public spotlight. Can it possibly pay? And what’s it like behind the scenes?
We ask because for most grain farmers, “marketing” means picking the right time to sell the crop and choosing the right terminal to haul it to. And while these farmers are big users of social media, they don’t worry too much about whether their grain buyer is following them on TikTok, because, well, why would they?
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For the Lindgren family in east-central Saskatchewan, though, none of this is true — at least not anymore. Since they started selling and cleaning seed, and now that they’ve become input retailers, Jennifer and Jordan actively promote their business — on social media, in their community and via any other opportunity they can find.
The Lindgren Farm
Jennifer and Jordan’s first brush with publicity came in 2018, the year they were named Saskatchewan’s Outstanding Young Farmers and the same year they purchased the seed business that would become Lindgren Seeds.
“Everything happened at the same time,” Jennifer says over the phone on a morning in late September. The OYF award brought a flurry of media attention and speaking opportunities. Before this, Jordan says, “that kind of stuff was never on my radar.” Harvest was still underway that morning, but Jordan had stepped into the house to join Jennifer on the call for a few minutes, since it was still too damp to get the combines out into the field.
In fact, Jordan says, “10 years ago I was just head down, working as hard as I could to ensure we could take over the farm from my uncle and my dad. The last thing on my mind was being in the public eye. It was all about work — hard work, and putting my heart and soul into it to make sure I didn’t screw it up.”
As the OYF award proves, things were going well for the Lindgrens. They were growing grain, pulses, and oilseeds on 11,400 acres near Norquay, four hours east of Saskatoon. Their four children were aged eight to 12 and were all helping on the farm and the couple had recently (in 2014 and 2017) purchased Jordan’s family farm, buying shares from Jordan’s father and uncle.
By the time they became Saskatchewan’s OYFs, the Lindgrens had already built strong human resource skills and were running their farm with two full-time employees and other seasonal help. They have a close relationship with their employees; one of their long-term staff members is the husband of Jennifer’s best friend.
“We treat our employees like family,” Jennifer says. It’s more than a working relationship. They work hard to make their employees’ whole families feel like part of their operation. “That’s one thing we can pride ourselves in,” Jordan says. “We’ve never had a problem finding people and keeping people.”
Before 2018, the Lindgrens were already developing their management skills, joining PowerFARM, a peer group run through Saik Farm Management Group. They’re still a part of this, meeting four times a year with a close-knit group of nine other farm couples to discuss goals and strategies and to exchange information.
The PowerFARM group often talks about new technology when they get together and Jennifer and Jordan do too. Jennifer is proud to point out how Jordan spent time this past summer working with John Deere employees to develop the latest tractor.
But their farm has always been multi-dimensional. Long before the Lindgrens were marketing seed and inputs, they were active members of their community, taking part in events and volunteering anywhere they were needed.
Things were going well. The Lindgrens had a great farm, great relationships with their employees, and a life they enjoyed. Why would they want to make a change?
Making the change
Their four kids gave the Lindgrens the motivation to change. Jennifer remembers the day she and Jordan asked each other: “If they all want to come back, how can we make the business sustain all of us?” Their oldest son has just started classes at the College of Agriculture and Bioresources at the University of Saskatchewan, and the three younger kids still at home all work on the farm.
“Our dream,” Jennifer says, “is to have our kids all come back and have a portion of the business that is theirs that they are proud of.” Jennifer and Jordan’s children will be the fifth generation on the farm. “That is our ultimate goal — that we can sit back one day and look out our window and see our kids doing what they love.”
Some farmers solve this problem by buying more land. The Lindgrens have done this too. Since 2018, they have increased their land base from 11,400 acres to 14,000 even though competition for land has been very strong, with land often selling before it’s advertised.
“Any opportunity we’ve had to expand our land base, we’ve done so,” says Jordan, adding, “We maximize production on the land we have.”
With four kids, though, even 14,000 productive acres might not be enough to keep the next generation farming.
“We had to find another way to diversity,” Jennifer says. “Not just with acres, but ‘how can we make our business grow and become profitable for our kids?’”
To make this happen, the Lindgrens have expanded into a new line of business. In 2018, they bought a seed cleaning plant from the neighbouring seed farm. Now they grow pedigreed seed on about 15 per cent of their 14,000 acres.
They retail this seed through their new enterprise, Lindgren Seeds. They’ve also recently added another dimension, retailing canola seed and crop protection products through Bayer and BASF.
“That’s where we hopped on with the PR,” Jennifer says.
How they live now
A lot of the things the Lindgrens do now are things they would have done anyway, like pausing to take photos of the family, working on community projects or speaking at conferences. But now they’re doing all these things with the help of a PR firm.
This has been an adjustment for Jennifer and Jordan, and for their staff. “Our guys are not social media people, and are definitely not ones that like to be in front of the spotlight,” Jennifer laughs. “They are adjusting.”
So these days, a big part of Jennifer’s job is making sure their farm employees do take time to pose for the cameras when news media show up at the farm.
As for their children, “they’re fine with it,” Jennifer says. Since they were between age eight and 12 when the Lindgrens first became Saskatchewan’s OYF, the Lindgren kids have grown up being photographed for Twitter campaigns and magazine articles.
Yes, it’s busy. Their PR agent has advised: “Never turn down an interview, so they continually promote their business, and the ag industry as a whole.
Do they like it?
“It’s certainly not the reason why I wanted to farm,” Jordan says. “But these days it’s part of the business. You have to build your brand.”
That said, “We’re very real here,” Jennifer says. “What you see on social media is what we really are.”
New management
The new approach has brought many changes. With the growing business, Jordan says, “the more I delegated the jobs I like doing, the more I ended up in my office.” Not that he minds office work, but it wasn’t what he’d planned to do. “I wanted to work side by side with my kids and Jen.”
Recently, the Lindgrens hired a new sales manager to work alongside Jordan and take some of the load off his shoulders. “You learn who people are and find their strengths and put them in the proper roles,” he says.
Even with added staff, the Lindgren farm is still a family farm. “We just have other help to get us to our end goal,” Jennifer says.
While Jordan is unofficially in charge of crop production and machinery decisions, Jennifer takes the lead role in PR and human resources. The Lindgrens joke that Jordan makes the money, and Jennifer spends it, on PR, marketing and employees. But the truth, Jordan says, is that “she’s a sounding board that keeps me grounded and gives me a second opinion.” Jennifer says Jordan “needed a gentle push” to get involved in public marketing campaigns, but now he’s come around. In general, they agree: “We’re a pretty good team.”
As well as extra staff and new marketing strategies, they’ve added a bit more formality to their management approach.
With only the two of them responsible for the farm, they had taken a relatively informal approach to strategic management. “We both know what the goal is, and the direction of the farm, and what we want to see happen,” Jordan says. They set internal goals and review them quarterly, but mainly rely on their communication skills to keep each other informed about the farm business and keep their financial plan on track.
Starting the retail seed business brought a new layer of structure to the business. They developed a written business plan for this operation. “That was something new. A little more formal,” Jennifer says.
What’s next?
For now, Jennifer and Jordan are focused on growing their new retail business and making the most of the time they have left with their young children. When their oldest son went off to university, Jordan says, “it triggered that we only have five years left with these other ones.”
To get away from the farm, and away from the urge to post things on social media, the Lindgrens bought a remote cabin, a place where they can go to turn off their phones, ditch their screens and just spend time with each other.
The Lindgrens measure their success by the time they spend with family, and the legacy they can leave for their kids. They try not to focus solely on production or short-term profits. If you do that, Jordan says, “if it doesn’t rain, you don’t succeed.”
“If you can’t find (positive) take-aways, it will slowly grind you to nothing,” he says. “You have to forge ahead. There are things that are out of your control, no matter how hard you try. Day to day, it’s important to get a sense of accomplishment from other things, like watching your kids work together and learn new things.”
With Jordan’s father still helping on the farm, Jennifer says, they have three generations working together now, and that brings them great joy.
“We don’t work hard so we can retire or live on the beach or move away,” Jennifer says.
“That’s not us.” They’re happy to stay on the farm, building businesses for the next generation. “Does this sound cheesy?” Jennifer asks. Then she realizes she doesn’t care. “We are cheesy. We really love being farmers.”
Feeding employees like family
Jennifer Lindgren has a really big crockpot. All through the harvest season, in addition to occasionally filling in on the combine cab, running errands and keeping track of kids, she says, “I cook for 20 people every night.” No matter what other jobs come up during the day, “dinner always goes out.”
A late-September discussion by Saskatchewan farmers on social media focused on whether farm families should serve food to employees during harvest and seeding. The very idea of the discussion makes Jennifer laugh. “How could you not?” she asks.
Sometimes a new farm spouse might feel pressured to cook meals for the field because that’s how the previous generation did things. This wasn’t the case for Jennifer. Before she married Jordan and became part of the Lindgren farm, her mother-in-law didn’t make hot meals for everyone. But Jennifer had grown up on a farm where things were done differently and she wanted to take it on. “I know how gratifying a hot meal can be,” she says.
It takes a lot of time, effort and preparation to cook meals for 20 people in the middle of the busy season, but Jennifer doesn’t see this as optional. In fact, she goes the extra mile to bring in more people to cook for. When they’re harvesting rented land, Jennifer invites the landlords out to join the family for an in-field meal.
Harvest meals are also a key part of the Lindgrens’ mission to treat employees like family. Jennifer takes great pleasure in seeing how satisfied everyone is after they eat.
In a quest to focus on the business of farming, from mission statements to cost-of-production spreadsheets, it’s easy to forget the importance of a hot meal during the working day — for family members and employees. Jennifer doesn’t forget. She shares recipes with friends and searches out new meals to simmer in the crockpot while she’s working during the day.
“It’s the most gratifying job I do,” Jennifer says.
Out in the community
The Lindgrens were always active in their community, but opening a retail business has given them a reason to take on new roles in that area too. This year, they started an initiative they call Growing Forward, to raise money for the Norquay area.
Partners and sponsors donated seed and crop inputs, the Lindgrens donated 80 acres of land, machinery and labour, and now the profits will be used for community projects like sponsorships and education projects. “We want to be able to make our community better,” Jennifer says.
Food Farm is another big initiative on the Lindgren farm. They’ve teamed up with Ag in the Classroom to invite kids in Grades 3 and 4 in four nearby communities to visit their farm twice a year. These kids have a chance to see how crops are seeded and then harvested.
Planning and running large-scale events like this takes a lot of time, and there’s a cost to having employees stop what they’re doing on a busy day to explain an air seeder to a busload of eight-year-olds. But the Lindgrens like this part of their work.
“Our local communities are a big part of why our operation is successful,” Jordan says. “We like finding ways to bring these people together to give back to the community.”
– This article was originally published in the November 2023 issue of Country Guide.
