Ag Tech Unfiltered: ‘It’s Just Soil Sampling’
September 10, 2025 The other day, a friend and I were in a conversation with a retailer discussing soil sampling. In that conversation, the retailer made the comment “It’s just soil sampling! It’s not that hard!” At first, the comment was just that, a passing comment and pretty much the way most of us think about it. It’s just soil sampling. It’s not that hard. But after the retailer moved on, my friend and I continued the discussion and focused on that comment. We think about soil sampling as an “oh, by the way” task and not what it really is. The foundation of how we make crop decisions year after year.
Over the last few years, in conversations with retailers, soil sampling seems to have become more of a bother than an opportunity. I’ve learned that more than a few retailers and even some consultants are contracting their soil sampling to third parties. When I ask them why, they tell me they just can’t make any money soil sampling. I can make more money selling or making recommendations.
So then, what is the value of soil sampling? How have we sold the value of soil sampling to the grower?
In the past and to some degree even today, we include the soil sampling with the sale of the fertilizer. And we tend to not charge for the samples, even if they don’t buy their fertilizer from us because we don’t want to upset them. So, as a whole, soil sampling has only been a means to a sale rather than an opportunity for a revenue stream and a critical agronomic service that drives crop production decisions.
That drives more questions. What about today’s economy? What about today’s focus on environmental impact? What about the focus to reduce commercial fertilizer without losing production? Shouldn’t soil sampling be the foundation on how those decisions are based?
I’ve worked with people and companies that didn’t know the importance of consistent timing of sampling, (fall sampling is always fall sampling and spring sampling is always spring sampling), knowing the soil conditions, proper placement of the sample sites, cores, or site sampling, ensuring the cores are full and at the proper depth. All the basics that we were taught when we started sampling still apply.
In today’s agriculture, we constantly hear about the value of the data and ensuring the data is accurate so that we can make business decisions based off the data and information. Isn’t one of those foundational pieces of data and information the soil and having good soil samples?
For liming applications, this affects decisions that have long-term effects — not just in application of lime but also the availability of nutrients and efficacy of crop protection. That, in turn, affects application decisions. For some areas, it affects one season. In other areas, it could affect up to four seasons.
Now most of you are reading this and thinking that this is a stupid article and we all know this information. And you’re probably correct. But, as I wrote in this article, we forget the basics. And if we don’t get the basics right, none of the rest matters.
As with a lot of things, soil sampling is very simple. But it’s not easy. We need to think about what we are doing and make sure that we either have the right people in our organization doing the work or we are vetting our third-party vendors to ensure that they provide high-quality work.
I’ll leave you with one key point to remember. Our customers’ operations are banking on the data, information, recommendations, and decisions. And their operations and legacy are counting on us to get it right.
You must be strategic in your thinking. Develop the tactics to accomplish your goals. And intentional in your actions to be successful.
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