Farm tires for combines and tractors can be tough to find

HILLSBORO, Kan. (KSNW) — Rod’s Tire in Hillsboro is looking everywhere for combine and tractor tires.

“Oh, we have stock right now,” said Rod Koon, owner of Rod’s Tire and Service. “But we are looking down the road. We are fortunate to be in a position to keep stock. Not everyone does.”

Koon has been selling to new markets since the tires have become a hard find. He’s now selling more to areas like Oklahoma, Texas and far western Kansas.

Some farmers are buying when and where they can.

“We were lucky,” said Brian Mitchell with Mit Farms.

Mitchell is in the middle of soybean and corn harvest. He recently needed tires for his grain cart.

“Lucky to find them 45 miles away, to be able to go get them and not be down very long,” he said. “Because next step would be searching all over the web, and wherever we would have to go, we’d go.”

Mitchell says there are a lot of supply chain issues for farmers right now.

Koon, meanwhile, says he is having issues like so many.

“Again, we have tires. That’s what we do. We are just getting creative getting in more stock. It’s been this way for about six to eight weeks,” he said. “Domestically built product is really just a real challenge. We’re a Firestone dealer, and our deliveries from them have just been bleak since the spring. We’ve had to go to other brands, imports so we can kind of keep people going.”

Koon is waiting on supply containers from other countries.

“We kind of knew this was coming. So we have been searching for a while to keep inventory in stock,” he said. “We’ve got multiple containers that are on order coming from India and Thailand. But nobody knows when they will arrive, so that’s going to be a challenge,” said Rod. “We don’t see any improvement (soon) on the domestic side.”

Some co-ops and farm supply stores told KSN they also have stock. But some say the stock is getting harder to find.

“We have a lot of supply issues on the way, I fear,” Mitchell said. “A lot of farmers aren’t making a lot of planting decisions because they can’t get fertilizer and the prices, so.”