3 ms·

John Deere was the Apple of tractors, 20 years before Apple was Apple. It's killed off all the competition [1] for their tractors' ability to "just work" - eve

by toufka 12y ago

John Deere was the Apple of tractors, 20 years before Apple was Apple. It's killed off all the competition [1] for their tractors' ability to "just work" - even at a premium. Deere coupled high quality hardware with high quality service, whereas most other tractors tried to compete on cost by dropping one. Apple vs HP; Deere vs Case. It served them well in the long run, if made things dicy early on. There is no competition any more. And the development lead and capital required to compete with their machines, and their repair/distribution network is immense. [1] http://www.tennesseetractor.com/assets/Uploads/jd-timeline.jpg http://www.tennesseetractor.com/assets/Uploads/jd-timeline.j...

zzalpha 12y ago
Put slightly more technically: there are natural barriers of entry to the marketplace that make it tough for a disruptor to displace a incumbent monopolist (or in this case oligopolist... Deere basically splits the market with a few other competitors, all of whom collude on this issue).
- wmeredith 12y ago
  Would this be considered cartel behavior?
ghshephard 12y ago
One hopes that if farmers really care about this, then JD's competition (http://seekingalpha.com/article/2523975-john-deere-versus-the-competition http://seekingalpha.com/article/2523975-john-deere-versus-th...), will dive in and start providing an alternative, at a profit. We'll see if farmers really care about this though, or whether it turns out to be something like "Replaceable Batteries" or "SD Flash slots" on smart phones.
metasean 12y ago
If John Deere is the Apple of tractors, then Open Ecology is the Linux of tractors. - http://www.ted.com/talks/marcin_jakubowski http://www.ted.com/talks/marcin_jakubowski - http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/LifeTrac http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/LifeTrac
jessaustin 12y ago
John Deere is better than crappy old "American" brands like Case IH, but it is in the process of being disrupted from below by imports like Kubota. And from above by Cat. The picture might not be as rosy a decade from now.

by toufka 12y ago

zzalpha 12y ago

Put slightly more technically: there are natural barriers of entry to the marketplace that make it tough for a disruptor to displace a incumbent monopolist (or in this case oligopolist... Deere basically splits the market with a few other competitors, all of whom collude on this issue).

wmeredith 12y ago
Would this be considered cartel behavior?

ghshephard 12y ago

One hopes that if farmers really care about this, then JD's competition (http://seekingalpha.com/article/2523975-john-deere-versus-the-competition http://seekingalpha.com/article/2523975-john-deere-versus-th...), will dive in and start providing an alternative, at a profit. We'll see if farmers really care about this though, or whether it turns out to be something like "Replaceable Batteries" or "SD Flash slots" on smart phones.

metasean 12y ago

If John Deere is the Apple of tractors, then Open Ecology is the Linux of tractors. - http://www.ted.com/talks/marcin_jakubowski http://www.ted.com/talks/marcin_jakubowski - http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/LifeTrac http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/LifeTrac

jessaustin 12y ago

John Deere is better than crappy old "American" brands like Case IH, but it is in the process of being disrupted from below by imports like Kubota. And from above by Cat. The picture might not be as rosy a decade from now.