The American Seed Trade Association looks back fondly on over 75 years of conferences in Chicago.
“You’re going to Chicago? In the middle of December?”
It’s a question the American Seed Trade Association’s (ASTA) staff was used to hearing, especially since the ASTA CSS & Seed Expo has been housed in Chicago, Ill., for almost 76 years. The convention has found many incarnations throughout the years — starting as the Hybrid Corn Industry Research Conference in 1946, until the name changed in 1966 to the Corn & Sorghum Seed Research Conference.
It wasn’t until 1994 when the Corn & Sorghum Seed Research Conference combined with the Soybean Seed Research Conference. Though the name has changed, and the city gets blistering cold in the winter, ASTA found itself a second home in Chicago to network and collaborate.
But, Jennifer Crouse, senior director of meetings and services at ASTA, remembers that question sharply in her memory — especially one year where, while setting up the Seed Expo exhibitors near the hotel’s main loading docks, the dock door had gotten stuck.
“The temperature was in the single digits in Chicago that week,” she says. “While the Hyatt Regency Chicago team were frantically working to get the door shut as soon as possible, the hotel’s director of engineering walked around the show floor, passing out complimentary hot chocolate to all of the exhibitors and offering apologies and reassurances.”
Though the door eventually was shut, Crouse and the exhibitors were reminded of the hospitality the Regency Chicago worked to show ASTA every year — and about how cold December gets every year!
“This director of engineering attended our closing Exhibitors Meeting on the final day of the show,” Crouse says. “He didn’t exactly receive a ‘warm’ welcome there either, poor guy!”
But, the ASTA staff aren’t the only ones with fond memories of the Chicago show — plenty of seedsmen throughout the industry remember the conference fondly.
Don’t Know Anyone? Let’s Change That!
Jim Schweigert’s ASTA journey started back in 2003 at the CSS & Seed Expo, before he was involved with his family’s business, Gro Alliance. At the time, he had just returned to the industry after working outside of the business in public relations.
One of the challenges he found, was while he had some meetings booked, there weren’t many folks outside his family and company that he knew.
“I found myself at a retirement party for a seed industry professional, and there was only one other person there,” Schweigert, now ASTA chair and president of Gro Alliance, says. “I walked up behind him at the bar, and he asked: ‘What do you think of this conference so far?’ I said, ‘Well it’s amazing, but I just don’t know anybody, and there’s not really a way for me to get to know anyone.’ He said, ‘Well, why don’t we do something about it?'”
Schweigert was talking with the then current chair of ASTA, Don Wertman — and what started as a happenstance meeting at a retirement party turned into some phone calls, then conference calls, but eventually led and laid groundwork for Schweigert’s work with the Future Seed Executives Initiative (now LEAD committee).
“That was my pathway into chairing a committee and ultimately going onto the board and finally to chair the association,” he says. “You know, as a first-time attendee, you might be thinking: ‘Boy, I just want to see what’s going on,’ but get involved, talk to people and meet people. There’s a lot of senior folks in the industry that want to be a mentor to new people.”
College Students, Take Note
It wasn’t just Schweigert who found a home at the ASTA CSS & Seed Expo at a young age — both Ben Ford and Blake Croegaert say their first experience with the conference were during their years as students.
As a graduate student, Ford remembers that while people’s calendars were filled to the brim with meetings, they still made time to catch lunch with him and talk about his goals for the future.
“We’d kind of talk over what my goals were, where I saw myself as I wrapped up graduate school — just a couple of really neat opportunities then to get some advice and get started thinking about where I might land in the industry,” Ford, head of corn breeding at Syngenta, says. “That really meant a lot to me as a graduate student to get noticed, and have people see me as if I were important for the future of the industry.”
Croegaert says he was interning during his first ASTA conference and had an interesting first business dinner there.
“I had my first ever business dinner with a co-worker,” Croegaert, now director of Verdant Partners, says. “My co-worker’s daughter had a baby and had to leave immediately.”
This left Croegaert in the hands of the Independent Professional Seed Association’s Todd Martin.
“Poor Todd was left with me as an intern, and he actually stuck the dinner out,” he says. “Much to my surprise — and I appreciate that, and we’ve had a really good relationship ever since.”
Just like Schweigert notes, Ford confirms — many ASTA members are eager to network, learn and care about folks in the industry, no matter their age.
“There’s a lot of people there that really do care, not just about the kind of business or their company, but want to see the industry do well and move forward,” Ford says, noting that since his days as a graduate student, ASTA’s CSS & Seed Expo has help build new relationships and experiences that will stick in his memory.
Chicago Will Be Missed
Though ASTA is moving forward to a new home for the CSS & Seed Expo members will miss the home they’ve found for years.
“Chicago has been a staple of the industry, and when we get there, you can just feel it,” says Ben Peterson, account executive for Peterson Genetics. “It’s got a big feel to it, and it’s something that really brings the industry together.”
Peterson says that Chicago has been a staple on his calendar — it’s something to mark down and look forward to all year long.
“My first year, I remember not knowing what the heck was going on — I just decided, let’s just go ahead and dive in. The people there will help you out, and you’ll learn a lot,” he says.
ASTA will continue hosting the CSS & Seed Expo in Orlando, Florida, starting in 2023. Though the location might change, Crouse says the experience will only get better from here.
“In Orlando, we’re not going to have to split the show up to different floors or different towers — instead, we’re going to bring it closer together,” Crouse says. “Exhibits can be more front and center, so exhibitors can get more traffic. But not only that, all the private meeting rooms are in the same hallway, so there’s less separation to network. It was really a win-win-win everything — it all feeds into each other.
“We’re looking forward to new experiences that will change the nature of the event entirely,” she adds.
