Agri-Pro Enterprises: Entrepreneurs Who Stick to Family Values

posted on Thursday, July 25, 2019

Agri-Pro Enterprises: Entrepreneurs Who Stick to Family Values

“We share common values in our commitment to quality, efficiency, treating
people well and giving back to our community and industry.”
– Lari Rabe, President, Agri-Pro Enterprises

Agri-Pro Enterprises was born in Bob and Dorothy Volsoh’s basement in Iowa Falls, Iowa, in Matt, Joe, and Lari in front of Agri-Pro Enterprises 1979, when Bob began marketing a French-manufactured water proportioner for swine and poultry farms. Since then, the product line offered by Agri-Pro has grown to more than 3,500 items, servicing the swine, poultry, dairy, beef and sheep industries. In addition to animal health, the company is expanding into the greenhouse, automotive, industrial and marine market spaces. Company headquarters have moved twice since the beginning and now are located in a massive, two-acre warehouse—still in Iowa Falls.

Agri-Pro takes pride in helping farmers keep herds healthy and biosecure, offering selections of veterinary surgical instruments, animal feeding tools and hand-held sprayers. Disposable wearables for livestock biosecurity—such as booties—is another critical and ever-expanding product offering.

While Agri-Pro Vice President Steve Klein says they sell their products mostly to other distributors and retail outlets, Agri-Pro and Iowa Select Farms have been together since the beginning.

Entrepreneurs Flourish in Iowa Falls

The Voslohs and Iowa Select Farms’ founders Jeff and Deb Hansen are entrepreneurs whose Inside Agri-Pro Enterprises Warehouse enterprises go back to the late 1970s.

Sharing the same hometown, it really is no coincidence that the two entrepreneurs’ companies have flourished on a parallel track for four decades.

“My dad’s career always was rooted in the animal health business, and he had tremendous respect for Jeff,” said Lari Rabe, Vosloh’s daughter and President of Agri-Pro. “Before they started their own ventures, they partnered for several years hosting Iowa Swine Equipment Expos.”

Agri-Pro Enterprises a Family Affair

When Bob Vosloh retired in 2011, Lari and her husband, Joe, purchased the company and Lari Agri-Pro Enterprises Supplies assumed day-to-day management as president. That same year, Agri-Pro Enterprises moved into it’s current 65,000 sq ft building giving them 10 times the space to grow and better serve it’s customers. In 2015, their son, Matt, also joined the sales and marketing department, making Agri-Pro Enterprises a third-generation family business.

As both Agri-Pro and Iowa Select Farms have grown, Rabe says their mutual respect has only intensified. “We share common values in our commitment to quality, efficiency, treating people well and giving back to our community and industry.”

“We sell to Iowa Select Farms because of the longstanding relationship and friendship between Lari, Joe, and Matt Bob and Jeff, which preceded either company,” said Klein. “In many ways our ongoing affiliation is a benefit to the entire industry, because they serve as a live market-development site for us. Anytime we are trying a new swine product or working to improve one, they can give us almost instant feedback by taking it out and using it. That allows us to communicate back to our manufacturers and turn out improved tools more quickly.”