Two honorees from The Scoop's latest 40 Under 40 awardee class tackle a different side of the same challenge: making ag retail work smarter for growers. David Vail, an Insights and Analytics Specialist at Simplot Grower Solutions in Boise, Idaho, uses tools like Power BI and ArcGIS to turn sales and spatial data into fast, actionable insight for crop advisors — freeing them up to spend less time digging and more time with growers. Dakota Patton, CFO at United Prairie, a 13-location ag retailer based in Tolono, Illinois, is solving a related problem from the finance side, using Agvance and the AgVend grower portal to run a growing operation efficiently and get farmers the information they need on their schedule, not the retailer's. Together, they offer a look at how the next generation of ag retail leadership is putting data and technology to work in service of the grower relationship.