What did AGCO do with New Idea

When agco purchased White - New Idea in 1993, they discontinued the Uni-Harvestor. In December of 1998, agco closed the doors on New Idea, discontinuing all of their products.

Edited by bigal121892 - 14 Oct 2018 at 10:10am

That Hesston by MF is so dumb,,, Hesston had its own greatness, then drag it down with Massey Ferguson name???? Makes no sence

I have to give agco credit for the parts support for the many line of older machines. However if it was me Massey would be tractors, hesston hay equipment, gleaner combines, white planters and tillage equipment, new idea spreaders and various farm lot equipment. I know I left out Allis but anything they would put together today would disappoint me anyway.

In 1984, New Idea went to White Farm Equipment (Not a part of AVCO), and was then sold to AGCO when White left the farm equipment market in 1993. AGCO announced they were closing the New Idea factory on December 8, 1999. You could still get New Idea branded stuff later on though (I remember we looked at a new manure spreader of theirs around 2005). Stuff like this: https://www.tractorhouse.com/listings/farm-equipment/for-sale/27017671/2008-new-idea-3726 was still made, but I think it had a connection to another brand (Like "Hesston by Massey Ferguson")

bbbbut its the #1 brand worldwide and to indians who overload their wagons to the moon and steer with their brakes.

Edited by CAL(KS) - 15 Oct 2018 at 10:32am

Agco really wanted the Coldwater plant - however there was the issue of the EPA - the old plant was so bad it went into the govt superfund clean up. I heard one of the Agco founders talk about some real horror stories they found.. leaded paint etc...most of the stuff went to Hesston... as to the comments on MF... listen to me as you read this - Agco and what is left of the AC heritage - and I WAS an AC employee and have a ton of AC equipment and love the brand = owes its life to the Massey brand - Agco would not have survived if it were not for the MF brand acquisition. I was told this point blank by Jim Seaver and he knew the books best of any of the founders. Every time I have to have a 'captive' part for my Gleaners or AC's or NI mowers or other Agco purchases that saved them from chapter 7 , I have to thank the MF guys for being there to sell the AGCO to allow them to have the revenue to survive the tough times. MF may be the ugly mother in law in the family but if it were not for her you would not enjoy the pretty wife you enjoy daily...I could say more but I learned to the bitter taste of swallowing ones pride was a medicine for survival in a tough field of farm equipment.

Can understand most of your point about the MF brand, AGCO screwed up by just painting Same- Deutz tractors Or whatever they were, but gotta remember AGCO was working with no debt from the start, and buying companies aggressively,,,, hard to think of a chapter 7 in the company

Kind of look at FIAT over on the side with part of the farm line of Ford, New Holland, as well as CASE/IH and Allis Construction line, Case Construction, as well as fingers in Chrysler Motors . 
 Seems the Italian Giant has fingers into many things .  

Lonn wrote: And another thing......... people say we can thank Massey for saving AGCO. Where was Massey before AGCO bought them? Well Canada had to bail them out. And why did Massey sell out later? So who should thank who? Without the Allis Gleaner Company there would be no Massey Ferguson.

Lonn, I couldn't agree with you more. I have just finished a letter last week stating almost exactly what you said.
After reading what tbran said, I can see MF could have been a lifeline, especially if you put in overseas sales. Though in the US, I must be blind because like most others just dont see it. I remember the Massey dealer in town shut down in 2005 when AGCO forced a consolation with another one. They sold a few tractors but not as many as I saw go through the one that sold AGCO's. It shouldnt that hard for AGCO to paint something a different color and badge it differently with some cosmetic changes. There cant be that much cost difference to do it, heck they paint Valtra what ever darn color a person wants. Piss poor US marketing in my book.

Wow. Hard to believe that New Idea is celebrating 20 years this year of being a "goner" under AGCO. Very unfortunate.   Great discussion and many thanks to all the contributors for chiming in!

   We bought a new Massey tractor this spring . I hate the Massey color scheme and it does feel like AGCO took a giant crap on AC fans. Everything AGCO aquired should have become AGCO. They have a brand party issue in my opinion. I may repaint is someday.
    When dad went to replace their David Brown in the early 70s who went to the local Massey dealer. There were 7 or 8 new Massey’s there with the rear ends out. That’s how he ended up at the Allis Chalmers dealer.

New Idea actually made it to roughly 2004.
But it died in one of Agco's silent deaths like Glencoe, Black Machine, Tye, Agcostar. Etc.
As for Massey saving Agco that's a bunch of BS.
The only only thing Massey sold in the mid 90's was the odd axial(White) combine and a handful of swathers(PMI) they were virtually extinct up here in Canada.
In 2001 when they merged White in with allis they should have dumped the red as well. They claimed at that time having marketing resources in three lines of tractors wasn't working.
Well here we are many years later and they still have three brands of tractors and hardly any market share.

Tbran would know what he's talking about, and I can see what he's saying, and I can even understand as to why they dumped the orange tractors, (What I didn't like was being lied to about it). My question is, then why has agco abandon MF? You can't buy a Massey FWD, they won't bring the Massey sprayer to North America, doesn't sound like Massey will get the new combine. You can go to the Massey dealer, and purchase a 36 row planter, but can not buy a tractor to pull it with, much less one that will stay ahead of it.

My feeling is AGCO has a brand identity problem that is holding them back and it’s mostly their own doing. At least in the US. Not sure about the rest of the world. In England I saw New Holland’s and JCB in the areas I’ve been to.

Agco's goals are not to put a chicken in every pot. The super series Gleaners are doing very well, even still gaining market share in small amounts. Dealers sign on the dotted line for combines. It takes a strong dealer to pop for half a mill just to stock a combine in hopes of selling it for a profit. That's also about $2000 / month interest... that has to be payed each month and added to the combine. Anyone here want to be a dealer and put a half dozen machines on the lot at current commodity prices? Can you say presell and wonder why so much incentives and emphasis are put here? The days of a dealer in every county are over; even if one had the money and credit needed to open a dealership in a new area with no machine population, this one would have to be an egotistical financial moron to do so. Full line dealerships are like big farmers who need 300 hp tractors - if you didn't inherit or marry into it chances are you ain't gonna be one.
Although I also question a lot of exec decisions, Agco is not as stupid as is often stated. They have no idiotic ideas to put selling dealers out of business. In fact they invest millions in dealer assistance, training and incentives to help them grow. You wonder about the future? Agco does too - the median age of the American farmer is now 60 years of age. Who is going to be around to sell to in 10 years? The % of the population that can buy a new Combine or Tractor besides the wanna be toys, is about 1% of the N.American population. Write a marketing /advertisement plan for that!. The numbers are shrinking every year. Power is being consolidated in fewer and fewer farms.. Corporate farms - you bet - most of these are just family farms trying to secure a future - there are no outside corporations looking to 'farm' . It will not work financially because to make a profit farming there has to be some long hour low pay positions - just like most equipment dealers.