How Farmers Can Stay Profitable and Resilient After a Tough 2025

As 2025 winds down, many farmers are ready to put this challenging year behind them. From low corn and soybean prices to stubbornly high input costs and ongoing trade tensions, farmers faced a long list of headwinds. In conversations with farmers and ag experts, I ask, “What can Successful Farming do to help farmers weather this storm?”

Resources for 2026

Those conversations didn’t just spark concern — they sparked ideas, including two print feature stories for next year:

• “Is U.S. Ag in the Midst of a Long-Term Downturn?” in February
• “Surviving the Financial Squeeze” in April

When our staff discussed those stories, we realized just how many articles we’ve written that cover how to be resilient, how to diversify, how to improve your bottom line, how to be a better marketer, etc. Here’s a compilation of those stories:

1. Focus on What You Can Control in Today’s Grain Markets: Discover how staying focused on your marketing plan more than the headlines can improve your grain marketing results.
2. Farm Marketing Plans to Hit Above-Average Prices: If you ever thought about making a marketing plan for your farm, it’s time to make it happen. You can do it! Let’s look at how you can make a plan that works best for your farm.
3. How Smarter Machinery Investments Can Cut Break-Even Crop Prices: Managing machinery costs and investment can go a long way toward increasing your bottom line and lowering break-even prices for crops.
4. How Farmers Can Boost Yields and Cut Costs with Smarter Crop Rotations: Diversifying your crop rotation can improve yields, reduce input costs, and strengthen long-term soil health.
5. Practices of Profitable Producers: Profitability in farming comes from multiple efficiencies — from tracking costs and managing debt to timing purchases and land decisions — that together make top producers stand out.

From our 15 Minutes With a Farmer podcast, here are lessons learned from farmers whose business and financial backgrounds helps them on the farm.

1. Farm Like a CPA: Canadian CPA-turned-farmer Kristjan Hebert explains why scale matters for farm succession, how his business system helps manage growth, and the surprising ROI of technology and logistics.
2. Top Tips From a Farmer-Lender: As a farmer and ag lender, Drew Cox has a unique perspective on legacy, succession, and the future of agriculture in Missouri and beyond.
3. How Today’s Farm Economy Stacks Up to the 1980s and What Farmers Can Do About It: As the chief economist for the National Corn Growers Association, Krista Swanson studies ag markets and policy for a living, but she also has skin in the game as an Illinois corn and soybean grower, farming alongside her husband, Brett, and his family.

Be Humble, Ask for Help

I recently met with Robb Ewoldt, a soybean, corn, alfalfa, cereal rye, and soon-to-be former pig farmer from Davenport, Iowa. I asked what he was doing to prepare for 2026, and his advice for fellow farmers.

“This is survival right now,” he said. “If you’re going to survive this, you have to be open-minded.”

He emphasized getting creative and looking for strategic partnerships. “My neighbor is my competition. But he’s also my neighbor,” he said. “So how do we survive together to make this work?

“You have to set your pride aside, be humble, and say, ‘I can’t do this, but maybe you can help me, and we can work together and get through this,’” he continued. “I truly think that’s where the answer lies. And I think that mentality will help the farmer if they can admit that and have a partnership.”

Asking for help doesn’t just apply to a partnership with your neighbor. If you need care for mental health, stress, or depression, ask for help. Check in with your neighbors and friends and ask how they are really doing. To search a collection of resources for helping yourself and others, visit Agriculture.com/mentalhealth.

And remember that while it may feel like it, as Ewoldt said, “You are not alone.” If we keep showing up for each other — in the field, at the coffee shop, and over the fence line — that’s a reason to be optimistic as we head into 2026.