Tey started using pallets for their sod in 1969. Randy says, “We had self- unloading trucks back then too. Te driver did the unloading. Tat kept me slim for a while.”
When his uncle retired, Randy joined in the sod business with his dad, taking an even more active role. “I sold sod on the farm and through the trucking company,” he says. “And I continued to work closely with my Dad on overseeing all aspects of sod production. My brother left the trucking company in the late 70s. Te timing was right for all of us and the transition was easy.”
First Harvester Randy’s parents attended the American Sod Producers Association (ASPA) Conference in 1972. It was the beginning of a long company and personal relationship with the family of sod producers that helped them grow their business and strengthen it over the years.
Tey met Gerry Brouwer at that meeting and ordered a harvester from him there. Te wait time was about a year. Tey got the harvester in 1973 and finished its assembly at their farm. Automatic harvesters changed the industry, allowing greater productivity with less labor. Te changes required more strategic planning to keep sod in the pipeline and develop markets for it.
Keeping equipment operating properly was part of the picture. Randy says, “Te big red barn was our main shop for years. Te traditional barn door was too small to move the harvester through. So we’d take it apart; carry the pieces inside to work with; then carry them back out and put the machine together again.”
The Randy and Hilda
Story Begins Randy and Hilda met through a mutual friend around 1976. Randy was working with his Dad and Hilda was working full-time in the office
of a plumbing shop. Hilda says, “We started going out on Friday nights. Ten he invited me to a car event that included my accidental fall into a snow bank two-feet below the edge of his friend’s driveway. Our reactions, shared apology and shared laughter, brought us closer together as a couple. He’d developed a love of street rods, a bug he caught from his grandfather, who owned a car dealership—and he’s passed that passion on to all of us.”
Teir car club held its traditional “Rod Run” over Memorial Day weekend and they’d planned a romantic dinner date for the next weekend. Te marriage proposal came then, in early June of 1979, at the Boulevard Inn in Milwaukee. “Randy presented the ring and we celebrated with a bottle of champagne,” says Hilda. “We ordered the same brand for our wedding toast when we married on June 14, 1980.”
Randy’s mom handled the office and kept the books. Hilda began taking phone orders and helping her with “the little stuff” on Saturday mornings, but kept her full-time job. Randy and Hilda welcomed their daughter, Dawn, on May 29, 1983. “It was our Rod Run weekend, so of course the club members kidded me for timing the birth to get out of working on it,” Hilda reports. “Mark was born in 1987. It wasn’t until 1988, when business growth had expanded the workload and technology was advancing, that Randy’s mom told us she would like to step back and have me come in full time and take the leadership role in the office. Te transition went very well as she worked with me as I learned the processes and gradually took on the supporting role. We moved the offices to the basement of our home and in the early 90s brought in our first computer, a big Epson with double floppy disks.”
More Growth Randy says, “As we continued to grow, both in acreage and in sales, and incorporate more technology both in the field and in the office, Mom decided to retire about 1995. Dad did say he was retired several years after that, but farmers never really retire. He came out to the farm every day like he always did, running the farm with me until 2006.” Mark began helping out on the farm in grade school, working with his dad and grandpa, and loving it.
In 2003, the Jaspersons purchased their first harvester from Trebro. Randy says, “Part of the deal we made with Gregg Tvetene was that someone from their company would come to our farm to set up the machine and to teach our mainly Hispanic crew how to operate it. Te person was Gregg.”
Gregg Tvetene with Randy and Hilda Jasperson and their new Trebro sod harvester in 2003.
Also in 2003, the home office was moved from Randy and Hilda’s basement to a main floor office they’d added to the back of their home. “My sister, Patty Sauls, who has now been working for us for nearly 20 years, was already playing a key role in the office,” Hilda says. “She, Randy and I all had computers. We felt it was time to modernize our space, as well as our equipment.”
Te eastern section land expansion continued, building from those original 40 acres. Some is owned; some is leased and a lot of those parcels are 40 and 80-acre farms. “We started developing the other section early in the 2000s, when we bought 200 acres,” says Randy.
TPI Turf News September/October 2017 37
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