As covered in the June 28 Ag Equipment Intelligence On The Record, AEI editors analyzed the North American Dealers Assn.’s annual Dealer-Manufacturer Relations Survey results released earlier this month. In this annual NAEDA survey, dealers rank their suppliers in 12 categories on a scale of 1-7, including:

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 The association’s rankings of Full-Line Manufacturers includes AGCO, Case IH, Claas, John Deere, Kubota U.S., Kubota Canada and New Holland. NAEDA continues to evaluate Claas as a full-line manufacturer, despite holes in most industry definitions of a full-line manufacturer. Meanwhile, NAEDA evaluates Kubota Canada separately from Kubota U.S.

Overall, mainline manufacturers dealers average mean scores were slightly lower than 2023, meaning less satisfied mainline dealers. 

In the 2024 survey, Kubota’s Canadian operations continued to earn the highest marks of the survey in every category but product availability – a ranking held by Claas. Kubota Canada performed significantly higher than its U.S. counterpart, which generally performs in the middle of the 7 manufacturers examined.

Outside of Kubota Canada, Claas had the highest scores in 8 of the 12 categories. 

The average mean scores by OEM are shown below.

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For the first time, Ag Equipment Intelligence editors conducted additional data analysis, grouping the 12 individual categories into 3 larger headings of Availability, Quality and Administration. As seen in here graphic, Kubota Canada and Class again came out on top. 

At the bottom of this analysis were the CNH Brands. Case IH had the lowest Quality composite score, while New Holland scored lowest in Availability and Administration’s composite scores. New Holland had the lowest average mean score of 4.19 on a scale of 1-7.

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New Holland scored particularly low in this year’s survey, finishing the lowest of all majors in every category except product quality, in which its brethren, Case IH took the lowest position. This score is consistent with other recent surveys and comments shared with AEI.

New Holland’s score of 3.71 in the category of communications with management was the worst score by any OEM in any category. Next was Case IH’s score of 3.7 out of 7.0 in product quality. 

The full report is available for sale through NAEDA. AEI’s own evaluations and analyses of dealers’ rankings of the suppliers in tractors, shortlines and outdoor power equipment will be available to subscribers in future editions of the AEI monthly newsletter. 

Watch the full version of this episode of On The Record