Wesco International By: Andy Gunkel, Eli Sykes, Connor McVein

Wesco International is one of the largest hay exporters in the state of Washington. Founded in 1971, it was originally a wool exporter but made the transition to agricultural products with a specialty in hay distribution in 1973. Don Schilling, the owner and President of Wesco Int. has been with the company for over two decades and has seen the ups and downs in the industry. We chose to do our second project on Wesco because one of the group members, Eli, is an employee at Wesco International. We were able to tour the facility and interview Eli’s boss Jordan, and get a great inside look into the daily operation of Wesco.

Jordan is the Human Resources, Safety, and Employee Development Manager of Wesco. A man with many hats, Jordan splits the responsibility of managing 60 employees with 5 other division managers and Don Schilling. We received a full tour of the offices and facilities associated with the company. He gave us detailed information of the different products they provide and sell, the ways they distribute them, and the clientele they serve.

The company does most of its sales and distribution of products with overseas clients but buys local grown products from growers all around the Northwest. The clients range from domestic farmers around the United States, to international clients as far away as Japan, China, South Korea, and the Middle East. The quality of hay sold by Wesco is in such high demand for international clients because it is difficult for them to grow domestically and is the best quality for the animals they raise. It is most commonly used for animals like racehorses, dairy cows, cattle, and utility farm horses. Japan is about 85% of Wesco’s international sales and uses the products to feed ...

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... problem retaining the employees that are currently working there. As for suggestions we would make for Wesco’s management, there are a few things that could be improved on which involve its website, logo, and outsourcing.

At the moment the company website is simply just a blank page with hay in the background. This should definitely be changed soon to fit in with a market continuously becoming more high-tech, as it could potentially bring in more customers. There is no company logo, which should be changed to provide customers with an image marking Wesco’s quality product. And finally the company could use a bigger fumigation barn (used to put pesticides on hay) in order to stop the outsourcing of this work to other companies. Other than these few suggestions, Wesco is a very well put together company and we think it will continue to thrive in the future.