IN THE SPOTLIGHT
A Nice Guy Who Finished First
Roy Orton’s track record at National Grape
and CoBank earns top honors from NCFC
By Patricia Daughrity
Editor’s note: Daughrity is a freelance agricultural writer based in
western New York and is the daughter of Roy Orton.
hink of a bib overall-wearing farm boy who
relishes playing practical jokes and shooting
his BB gun more than cracking the books.
Think of a persevering inventor who ignores
sneers of “It can't be done,” and finally
proves that it can.
Think also of a business leader of a fruit beverage
company who has the guts to do what is right — even if it
costs him his position. Think of a cooperative director who,
as the dark-suited chairman, helps set the course of a
sophisticated, $52 billion cooperative bank.
What four people come to mind? In this case, these
descriptions all apply to one man: Roy Orton, who has led
three major U.S. cooperatives during his career.
For his 53 years of involvement with cooperatives —
including service as president of National Grape
Cooperative, and chairman of Welch’s and CoBank — Orton
was chosen as the 2008 Director of the Year by the National
Council of Farmer Cooperatives (NCFC). The honor goes to
farmer cooperative directors who “take the lead to help their
board of directors make decisions vital to their cooperative.”
NCFC President Jean-Marie Peltier saluted Orton for his
“outstanding leadership” and “dedication to the principles of
farmer-ownership.”
“Whoever raised Roy Orton knew what they were doing,”
says Ted Wolfe, former executive vice president of Welch’s.
How did Orton go from farming to winning NCFC’s
prestigious award? The answer is rooted in purple grapes.
Invention revolutionized
Concord grape industry
In 1938, in rural Ripley, N.Y., Joseph Roy Orton was born
to Ross and Martha Orton, the middle of three children.
Oblivious to the world’s hardship during this era, little JR (as
he was then called), along with siblings Lois and Donald,
romped with the
chickens and played
cowboys and
Indians, straddling
de-barked lengths of
sumac that served
for horses.
As he grew, JR
worked alongside his
dad in the chicken
coops and orchards
as the family farm
grew into the
largest poultry and
cherry operation in
the county.
Gathering eggs,
hauling chicken
feed and moving
10-foot ladders during cherry harvest filled the boy’s
weekends, nights and summers. Hard work and discipline
were served fresh daily on the farm.
At age 20, Orton purchased his first farm — a Concord
vineyard next door to his parents’ farm. At that time, the
juicy, thick-skinned grapes were hand-trimmed, hand-tied
and hand-picked, then were trucked to Welch’s for
processing into juice and jelly.
As in any farming operation, hand-picking grapes is
sluggish work, weather dependent and costly. Inspired to
streamline vineyard operations, Orton and his Uncle Max
brainstormed on a faster, cheaper way to harvest the indigo
fruit. Exploring mechanization, the Ortons knew their
contraption had to be substantially faster than hand-picking
and would have to pick the vines clean.
Making the odds longer was the narrow window of
opportunity in the autumn to test their ideas while still handharvesting
the crop. They also had to contend with
naysayers. Even Orton’s alma mater, the esteemed agriculture
school at Cornell University felt “…it was impractical to pick
the [single curtain]…vines mechanically,” according to the
Finger Lakes Wine Museum newsletter.
Nevertheless, the men experimented with an over-the-row
framework, with vibrating internal “fingers” that jiggled off
the fruit. The framework was a cinch. The main challenge
was in finding the right material and a shape for the fingers.
Converting horizontal motion into vertical motion also
proved critical to clean-pick the vines.
A resolve to succeed
At the time, Orton was (and remains) a member of
National Grape Cooperative, the growers’ co-op that owns
Welch’s. As word of Orton’s experiment spread, many
responded with cynicism. But the doubters did not shake his
resolve.
By age 26, Orton had built a slick prototype harvester and
reached a deal with a licensee-buyer for his patent on his
mechanical grape harvester. In 1967, Chisholm Ryder Co.
built a model using Orton’s patented machine.
The new machines slashed
harvest costs. Grower returns
ballooned.
One farm worker would do
well to harvest a ton of grapes
per day, whereas the big blue,
self-propelled machines that
used the Ortons’ technology
could harvest four or five tons
per hour. This huge advance
prompted more acres of grapes
to be planted, because growers
could now manage more vines.
“No new product of ours has
ever had such immediate
acceptance, and no other new
product seems to have fewer
mechanical problems,” Lee
Towson, of Chisholm Ryder,
said at the time. Sales of the
harvesters shot up like a
champagne cork and the
naysayers quickly moved on,
raining on someone else’s
dream.
Reflecting on the innovation
that revolutionized the grape
industry, Orton, with
characteristic humility, says “We
didn’t know any better.”
Past CoBank Chairman Otis
Molz remarks, “One of the very
prominent characteristics of Roy is he isn’t afraid of change.
He’s always willing to try something new if there is a chance
of improvement.”
In 1970 he was elected to the National Grape board. In
1981 he became chairman of the two-board system of
National Grape and Welch’s, a position he held for 13
consecutive years.
Do what is right, not what is popular
Orton instinctively knew that the popular vote is often
aligned with a short-term (often financial) gain. But the vote
for what is right for a co-op is often based on the
organization’s long-term health. Leadership favoring the
former may flicker briefly, and such decisions may prove
quite popular. By contrast, leadership that promotes the longterm
good of the business will often face strong resistance.
Colleagues say Orton earned a reputation for leadership
based on his integrity. He favored what was right for the
membership, regardless of how it impacted his short-term
popularity. Ironically, it was that philosophy that probably
cost him re-election to his 14th term on the board in 1993.
One of the toughest challenges the dual, National
Grape/Welch’s boards faced in the years before that election
was the issue of declining quality
and yields from Arkansas
grower-members. The co-op
maintained a facility in Arkansas
to receive the crop, but over
time the economics there grew
worse. One year production in
Arkansas dropped to less than
2,000 tons (about the production
of one large grower in a highproduction
region). In addition
to low yields, the Arkansas crop
repeatedly did not meet the coop’s
rigorous quality standards,
according to Everett Baldwin,
former Welch’s CEO.
The directors and
management resolved it was in
the best interest for the co-op to
pull out of Arkansas. But the
popular opinion pushed for
maintaining the status quo.
Emotions ran high in Arkansas,
and growers there filed a lawsuit,
naming Orton and Baldwin as
defendants.
Orton recalls this period
being made even more difficult
because “they were some of the
most loyal members I ever met
in my life.” The litigation lasted
a year, the end result being that
the growers there were dropped by the co-op, although they
were awarded a small settlement.
“Roy was never afraid to take on an unpopular cause if he
felt it was in the best interest of Welch’s, and, by extension, in
the best interests of the membership,” says Dan Dillon,
former Welch’s CEO. As
upsetting as the lawsuit was,
Orton “grew in stature,
composure and [in his] ability to
ask tough questions,” says Welch’s
Ted Wolfe.
Service with CoBank
Orton’s accomplishments with
National Grape led to his election
to the board of the Springfield
Bank for Cooperatives (in
Massachusetts) in 1992. Two years
later the bank merged into CoBank, which was initially
formed in 1989 when 10 of the 12 Banks for Cooperatives
(part of the Farm Credit System) were reorganized and
streamlined to cut administrative costs and better serve the
financial needs of agricultural cooperatives.
In 2002, Orton was elected chair of CoBank, in part due
to his proven ability to build consensus from a table of
diverse thinkers.
Humility is unlikely to have its own chapter in a leadership
textbook, but it is clearly one of Orton’s secret weapons.
Consistently downplaying his own contributions, he strove to
shift the limelight toward others, enhancing his rapport with
other directors, management and stakeholders.
Jack Cassidy, CoBank’s secretary and senior vice president
of board and government relations, notes that Orton is
known for “lack of ego and uncommon humility.” The values
he exhibits that come from being a
farmer from a small town in rural
New York are refreshing in the
financial world, he adds.
Orton’s “what-you-see-is-whatyou-
get” persona didn’t always
mesh with those who are less
forthright. “You can get cynical in
this business,” Cassidy confides,
pointing out that Orton found
ways to work with people with
different value sets and still get
results.
“You know the saying that ‘nice guys finish last?’ Roy
proved that statement wrong. He kept his values,” Cassidy
adds.
Striving for inclusiveness
While a dictatorial leader imposes his/her beliefs on
others, the inclusive leader works with others to develop
options and reach consensus. “Roy always gave every director
a chance to voice his or her opinion,” says Stan Dean, former
CoBank director, adding that Orton earned a reputation for
being fair to both sides of an issue.
“He doesn't keep information to himself as a way to
control other people,” says Cassidy. A case in point was the
1994 Springfield Bank merger into CoBank, and how he
handled the resulting need to reduce the board size. After the
Another advantage for the cooperative
is the revenue for the cooperative’s
propane subsidiary, Shelby Energy,
Bernson says. Shelby won a 2007
Expanding Excellence Award from CS
Week, an electric utility customer
service organization, and Electric Light
and Power magazine. The award
recognizes outstanding contributions,
innovations and excellence in utility
customer service.
For every 100 generators installed,
the cooperative can increase peakdemand
control by 1 megawatt (MW).
Every MW of controlled demand can
result in about $50,000 in annual power
cost savings. These savings can be
passed on to customers and increase
system stability. During a 10-year
period, the net benefits are expected to
exceed initial project implementation
costs, according to the cooperative.
$500,000 annual savings
The cooperative’s goal is to install
enough generators to achieve 10 MW
of interruptible capacity, which could
save more than $500,000 in annual
power costs — nearly 5 percent of
Shelby’s total power supply costs.
Installation of enough generators could
reduce the need to turn on peaking
units, used when electric power is in
high demand.
Bernson noted that Shelby’s farm
and residential customer-members who
are participating in the demandmanagement
program enjoy the
benefits of knowing that during power
outages, their generators will continue
to supply electricity to meet their needs.
“One of our customers, a farmer,
told us that now he doesn’t need to
worry about making sure he has
somebody check his property if he’s
away when an outage occurs. He no
longer has to mess with generator fuel
and fuel storage, or manage generatorsafety
concerns, such as extension cords
and proper ventilation. He doesn’t need
to deal with the elements to get his
generator started during outages.
“It’s a safer way to go,” Bernson
notes. “Best of all, our members who
participate can save money each month
and we keep peak load costs down.”
