This article originally appeared in the Allegan County News and has been republished with permission. If you are an Allegan Public Schools graduate and would like to be featured in an article, contact our Communications Director.
By GARI VOSS
Allegan County News
Allegan High School’s footprint has expanded into international agriculture equipment with AGCO thanks to Joe Granger. Granger is a 2011 graduate of AHS who has taken his love of the German language, interest in his Germanic heritage, and knowledge of supply-chain management to numerous countries around the world.
Joseph Granger was born at Holland Hospital and grew up in Allegan. During his elementary school years, he felt fortunate to be influenced by his mother’s grandparents. The couple were German immigrants who spoke German and shared their culture with their grand and great-grandchildren.
“When my great grandparents both passed, I was 11. They left books and letters in German. The letters were from family in Germany, but no one in Allegan could read the messages. About that time, my brother was studying German in college, then he decided to study abroad in Germany. I visited him during the summer of my junior year in high school. When I came back, I started to teach myself German.”
Teaching himself German came rather naturally. Granger admits that Jane Kiel, the high school French teacher, was a big influence. “I had taken high school French classes for 5 years (One year was 8th grade.) and that really gave me the building blocks to learn German on my own. Her teaching stuck, because when I was in France two weeks ago for work, I was still able to use what I learned all those years ago.”
It was Granger’s senior year that he began learning German, and he advanced so fast in his self-study that when he entered college, they were ready to give him 4 semesters of German language credit. “I decided to skip only 2 semesters because of my mom’s recommendation.”
Granger’s high school years were more than his desire to be immersed in German and the German culture. During his junior and senior years, he participated in Quiz Bowl and swimming.
“I was drawn in by my friends. Quiz Bowl was a lot of fun. Swimming was hard work. To compete in swimming, I had to catch up with others who had been competing. It was a lot of personal development, because swimming is really an individual sport where you are trying to improve personal bests. Competing did involve personal reflection that supported me as an individual.”
During the summer, Granger could be found at Camp Kidwell. The first summer he worked as a CIT (counselor in training) where he was able to develop his leadership skills. The second summer, he was a cabin counselor where he was responsible for a cabin of grade school aged boys.
As his senior year progressed, Granger spoke with different universities regarding what he would do once he graduated. “When I was in high school, I thought that I was interested in engineering and took all the shop classes from Mr. Stewart at AHS. Then I realized the amount of math it required. Representatives from Western Michigan University made appointments with me. The professors were from the Business College and German Department. I was surprised that as a high schooler anyone from a big college would sit down with me for about an hour each, and plan everything out. That was a big reason why I chose WMU.”
As the discussions progressed, Granger decided to study Supply Chain Management. “With the German Department being so helpful, and the business professors being willing to work with me, I actually studied abroad 3 semesters in Germany. First, I was in Paderborn for seven months. While there, I decided that I really liked it, so I applied for another scholarship that allowed me to stay in Berlin for a full year,” Granger reminisced. “It was a dream come true. I had always been fascinated with big cities and had wanted to go to Berlin since I was 10 or 12 years old, and now I was living there for a year!”
Granger did not toot his own horn regarding the scholarship that allowed him to study in Germany for a full year. This was a Diether H. Haenicke Scholarship that is awarded to only one student each year. The award covers tuition, books, room and board, and even some travel expenses so students experience more of a country, or area, than just the educational institute. For the review committee, Granger’s application, background and passion left no doubt that Joe was an excellent candidate who earned this award.
When Granger came back to the U.S., he spent time working at Perrigo as a Warehouse Specialist. But his first job in his career path was with Mann+Hummel as a Commodity Buyer. In addition to working in Portage, MI, Granger was able to live in Ludwigsburg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany for about a year as a Project Buyer.
After about three years with Mann+Hummel, Granger began looking at AGCO. In part, this was due to a visit he had made with one of his German cousins to a plant in southern Germany, which was set up by his current boss with whom he was connected through Bret Wagner. a professor at WMU. They had stayed in contact over five years before Granger was offered a position with AGCO in the Atlanta, Georgia area.
Even this step in his career journey had a back story. Granger had met Sarah Krzak who was from Naperville, Illinois, but attended college in Michigan. Sarah was a middle school English teacher who began her teaching career in Muskegon.
To be closer to her family, Granger decided to apply for a position at the AGCO plant in Batavia, Illinois which is near Sarah’s family. He reached out again to the AGCO contact he had made through WMU. His soon to be boss convinced Joe to take another position in the Atlanta area that would better fit his skills.
That led to some quick moves. When Granger was offered the job with AGCO, he became engaged to Sarah. Within six months, they were married and living in the Atlanta area.
The marriage and decision to work in Georgia have led Granger to a great place in his personal and career lives. AGCO has been able to send Granger to oversee projects in Brazil, Germany, Switzerland, and Finland.
Granger’s timing was sometimes less than impeccable. In 2020, Granger was assisting a plant in Nuremburg, Germany. During the seven-week project, COVID-19 began. “I left a few days before the official ‘suspending travel from Europe to the US’ warning came out in March of 2020.”
The plant in Finland was short managers for several reasons. The irony came as Granger was ready to return to the U.S., and Russia invaded Ukraine. With the talk that Finland would be joining NATO, and threats against Finland, Granger decided not to return right away after his first deployment.
AGCO is one of the top five agriculture companies in the world. Tops are Mahindra (India) and John Deere (U.S.), along with CNH Industrial (Multinational) and Kubota (Japan). AGCO services about 140 countries at any given time and owns Massey Ferguson, Fendt, Challenger, Valtra and GSI (the grain silos). The equipment and materials exported and imported depend upon the country and a country’s regulations.
“The current plan is to work with compact utility tractors, the smaller imported tractors. Many are produced in Japan, Indonesia and India,” explained Granger. “These are really popular in the U.S. as they are used for hobby farming. I will be working on the importation of those.”
This project takes coordination. “We will finish the assembling of those in the U.S. because they arrive partially manufactured to fit compactly in shipping containers. They come into different ports – Baltimore, Savanna, Tacoma. Once they arrive, we put tires on them, the front loader buckets and backhoes before we ship them out to the dealerships.”
Granger continued, “There are some complexities because this is a secondary manufacturing process, plus they come from so far away. I think it is 10-weeks transit time before they arrive from Asia. There needs to be planning on how to deal with them when they arrive on the coast.”
When receiving components from different areas of the world, Granger shared that the parts are of a high quality even though the metal used may vary because different countries have different grading equivalents.
The Grangers have been able to take advantage of Joe’s assignments to different countries. During one of Sarah’s summer vacations, Joe had a 3-week break in Europe. They enjoyed time in Venice, northern Croatia, Budapest and Vienna. They currently plan to visit Spain in October.
“We would like to have a last big trip before we start a family,” stated Granger.
At this time, Joe continues his work with AGCO. There may be time spent in Baltimore, Savannah and Tacoma but he will be ready to embark upon other projects in any number of countries where AGCO supplies the agriculture industry.
An aside, on the Allegan Homefront, ARCO flew Granger in from France to represent the company during the Luke Bryant Concert at Schaendorf Farms on September 16. AGCO’s Fendt and Luke Bryant collaborated to make a limited edition popcorn that has been sold to support the Future Farmers of America. For those interested, Fendt & Luke Bryan’s Boldly Grown Popcorn, packaged in “Bold Butter” and “Chart Toppin’ Churro” flavors, was launched on August 25, 2023 exclusively on its website for a mere $5 a bag.
