Welcome to Premier!

Human Resources PREMIER | November 2014 1

Did you know that 53% of unsched-uled days off are due to family issues, personal needs, or stress and burnout. 35% are due to personal illness. Our Employee Assistance Program has been in place since August 1st and several employees have voluntarily come forward to express their grati-tude for this service. They expressed the ease and professionalism of the program. We are all fortunate to work for an organization that appreciates the precious time we spend at work and our even more precious time at home with our families, that they want their employees to have harmony and balance. Life gets busy and life changes quickly. Relationships can get complicated. Our EAP can help employees deal effectively with personal and family issues, and take steps to improve their health. There is an endless supply of resources available to you and your family – all strictly confidential. Your Manager should have by now shared with you a wallet card – one for yourself and one to take home. The website www.lifebalance.net is a good place to start and explore.

UserID: pel Password: eap Or call the confidential telephone number to speak to someone at 1-877-630-6701. Please remember this service is here for you to help balance all that life throws at you – both good and bad!

Remember the Faberge shampoo commercial “you tell two friends, and they tell two friends…and so on, and so on….”? Ok, maybe I’m aging myself a little bit but this is exactly how you can earn some extra cash? Our Bounty Program is a great way for you to explore your network of current friends and professionals and share with them the opportunities available at Premier – specifically our technician opportunities. Employee referrals are our #1 source for finding candidates. I encourage you to spread the word that we are always looking for techs. If any-one expresses some interest, follow the Bounty process on SharePoint to refer them to earn your cash!

wanted - great technicians to join the premier team. we need your help to find them!

level 3 tech bounty Certificate of Qualification for Farm Machinery $2,5005 years + experience as a Certified Tech level 2 tech bounty Certificate of Qualification for Farm Machinery $1,5001-5 years experience as a Certified Tech1-5 years experience as a Certified Tech level 1 tech bounty Certificate of Qualification for similar trade $1,0001 + years experience as a Certified Tech

In order to be eligible for the referral bonus, all referrals must be sent to hr@premierequipment.ca during the interview process.

Please refer to Section 28 of the Staff Manual for more details.

Bounty paid to referring employee or customer if they refer a suitable candidate, that is hired. Bounty paid 50% after 3 month probation, remainder paid after

1 year of employment. Managers and Leads are excluded, as well as technicians currently employed by

other John Deere Dealers.

Katelyn PoerschSales Representative/Yard Coordinator, Mt. Forest

Jonathan ChamberlainParts Consultant, Mt. Forest

Jeff Pyke Service Manager, Mt. Forest

HR Update from Tracy

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Human Resources PREMIER | November 2014 1

Cory QuesenberryPrecision Sales & Support

Representative, Elmira

Aaron MurrayYard Coordinator, Simcoe

James MillerSales Representative, Simcoe

Jason KuepferSales Representative, Mt Forest

Megan Ferguson Junior Accountant, Corportate

Dean Sinnamon Technician, Elmira

Steven OakesAccounting Assistant, Corporate

Hunter WilsonSales Representative, Alliston

Nick JantziYard Coordinator, Elmira

Brandon Den Boer Technician, Simcoe

Ryan KraemerRental Representative, Elmira

Steven NevilleRental Coordinator, Smithville

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Like every other store this past spring we got off to a slow start in the field with the late spring we had due to weather. As a result, everything and everyone started the same day - or so it seemed! There was a stretch in late May that Brock went out on a service call 15 days in a row. Included in this stretch were 2 Sundays. I took the opportunity one day while Brock was eating his lunch to thank him for all he had done over the past few weeks and for the time he had spent away from his family to keep our customers happy. This was his response, “that’s my job. I want our customers to tell their friends that we provide the best service there is”.

Another small example of his dedica-tion to our customers and to Premier happened about two weeks ago. Brock went up north fishing for the weekend and a tech from another store called his cell with a GPS prob-lem. Brock spent some time walking him through how to solve the issue while on his fishing trip.

Brock is an extremely hard working man and has never once complained about the long hours/evenings/week

ends that he has worked to keep our customers happy.

A very good customer of the Listowel store had purchased a 7930 and the customer had the unfortunate experi-ence of having the engine go down on this tractor. Ralph being the techni-cian on the job was very courteous and reassuring with the customer. He took the time to go over the engine failure with the customer after it had come apart. Showing him which piston had failed, going over the parts list for what we were going to replace and what we could use again. Ralph’s confidence and demeanor instilled confidence in the customer that this would be repaired, and would be done so in a manner that would give him continuous life from this engine rebuild. After the customer had OK’d the repair, Ralph went at the engine job with a passion and care that is rarely seen - working a lot of late nights. Even though Ralph had many responsibilities at his family operated farm, he made sure this customer unit came first. In the last days of as-sembly Ralph was getting very close on a Friday evening to completing the engine job, and at the end of a very long day Friday he still had some loose ends to complete in the process. Saturday morning Ralph was the first one through the shop door, putting in a 5 hour day to complete the engine for the customer.

Overall Ralph did an amazing job but this is not out of the ordinary for him. He leads by example every day - of-fering help and knowledge with a kind and respectful tone. His efforts and professionalism embodies the true spirit of being the Best in Canada.

Thank you Brock & Ralph for your continued com-mitment and your effort in helping us achieve our BHAG to be the Best John Deere dealer in Canada!

PREMIER | November 2014 1

July Winner! Brock PurvisShop Foreman, Alliston

August Winner!Ralph Habegger Technician, Listowel

Human Resources

Who do you know that deserves to be recognized for a job well done? The co-workers that you work around every day are likely doing fantastic things for our customers and each other – why not recognize their ef-forts and submit a nomination today!

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Tornado damages homes in Angus

Alliston Team Steps Up

Most of you by now are hopefully familiar with our Friend In Need community initiative. We have had a few situations that we have contributed to but perhaps our biggest situation thus far, was the recent tornado that touched down in Angus. Brad Buchanan who is our store rep in Alliston had this to share:

Andrew (who is an employee in Alliston and lives one street over from the devastation) my-self, and Greg (another employee) made the trip over to Angus. We were granted access from the OPP to go down the street that was affected. We were able to walk up the street with boxes of coffee and donuts/muffins. I would say that 80% of the people we seen were workers or police but we were able to speak to a few residents that were trying to grab what they could. The area we were in was the worst hit - there were roughly 20 houses that had red stickers on them which meant it was a tear down. They actu-ally had an excavator there starting to knock a house down. We let them know that if they needed any equipment or people to please let us know - they appreciated the offer but basical-ly told us that there wasn’t much anybody could do now because everything was in the hands of the insurance companies. After that we made the trip over to the local food bank and dropped off a few boxes of things we thought that could be of use - baby food, toilet paper, toothpaste/brushes, shampoo, etc.Andrew also grabbed a demo chainsaw on the weekend and helped clear a walking trail. Tragedies such as this one will likely be heard throughout the media but we also encourage our employees to reach out to your store rep to share tragedies/situations that could also assist from a “Friend In Need”.

As a reminder, here is the list of store reps:

Simcoe - Pete Fitch

Listowel - David Bender

Ayr - Carlos Belfast

Mt Forest - Jim Stewart

Elmira - Matt Hollands

Ospringe - Stacie Costa

Alliston - Brad Buchanan

Smithville - Geoff Heczko

Tavistock - Kim Day

Courtland - John Byl

Thanks to Brad and the other Alliston employees who jumped quickly into action and to our other store reps who acted on unfortunate news in their area.

If you have any questions about the “Friend In Need” community initiative, please do not hesitate to ask.

Even as one of Canada’s largest charitable funders of child nutrition programs, demand for support from high-needs schools exceeds available funds. Breakfast for Learning sup-ports child nutrition across Canada by providing grants to schools and com-munity sites that run breakfast, lunch and snack programs.

They fund the highest-needs pro-grams, which are programs in areas that have been identified by com-munity partners, governments and/or schools themselves as highest-needs. The programs that they support oper-ate a minimum of three days per week (but in the vast majority of cases, they operate 5 days each week) and serve a high percentage of the total school population. They also require the nutrition programs to follow provincial/territorial nutrition guidelines, serving a minimum of 3 food groups during meals, and a minimum of two food groups during snacks.

Because of the money that Premier has donated, 19,230 meals and snacks will be served to local children. Our communities that have schools that are using the program are listed below – however, there are many schools surrounding our locations that are also using thisprogram.

•Alliston

•Mt. Forest

•Simcoe

•Listowel

Breakfast for Learning –Premier donates $25,000

PREMIER | November 2014 1Community Initiatives

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Employee Happenings PREMIER | November 2014 1

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Henry P Scholten was an easy choice for Premier’s first ever employee spotlight. He is an incredible leader within Premier as well as in his local community and this is shown every day.

Henry is currently a Sales Representative at Premier Courtland, and lives within 1km of the store with his wife Jacqueline and four girls. His his-tory with John Deere is quite interesting. When Henry was 4 years old, his father started Scholten’s Farm Equipment in which Henry was obviously involved with in many ways. In 1988, when he gradu-ated from high school, Henry started working as a Technician for John Byl who was the Service Manager at the time. Henry remembers his very first job John had him complete, and that was to wash out a manure spreader because it needed a new cylinder. He says he got “all the good jobs,” as he was the boss’s son. Even though he did not think so at the time, Henry sees the value now in the experience of working from the bot-tom up in a company.

In 1991, Henry attended Sir Sanford Fleming College in Peter-borough for Small engine and Marine Technician. There, his classmates were mostly marine based, so there was a lot of focus on boats. After graduating, Hen-ry had concluded that diagnostics were not his cup of tea, so he moved into the Sales Department. He noted that Sales is a much better fit for him because their is no diagnostics, the customer tells you what they need.

In 1996, Henry and three of his cousins bought into Scholten’s Equip-ment to begin sucession planning for his father and four uncles. Shortly after, in 2000, Scholten’s Equipment and Ayr Tractor merged to form Agraturf Equip-ment Services Inc. This was a challeng-ing merger for Henry as he changed locations and became the Sales Man-ager for Tavistock. Henry mentions that he met a lot of great people in the North of Oxford County, but returned to the banana belt, Courtland in 2004 and has been there ever since.

Henry has some very interest-ing hobbies outside of work, and says a piece of advice he would give anyone at work would be to have at least one

hobby as it will better your focus at work. He designs and builds beautiful custom furniture, and loves travelling to learn about different cultures and people. Henry also enjoys making wine and experimenting with different varietals, cooking and entertaining. Those who know Henry appreciate his sense of style and that he takes time to design suits together with his tailor. He loves to sing as well but fully believes that spending time with family is absolutely the most precious of all.

Henry is very proud to talk about his wife and four daughters all of the time, and so he should. Everyone in the family has their own nick name too! His oldest daughter, Fernandee Elora (Day-Day) who is 15, has always wanted to become an Orthopedic surgeon. She has taken piano lessons for just one year now and is studying for her grade 8 Royal Conservatory Exam already; on top of that she also takes Violin lessons. Elora Mei (Woosie May) who is 13, is definitely a rare type for the age of 13 as you can open her bedroom door at any moment to perfect cleanliness. Elora has a special bond with the family pup, a 130lb Rottie. Mikayla Jacqueline (Mik-ker) who is 12, is the drama queen of the girls. She cannot tell a story without jumping up and acting it out. Mikker also plays the piano. Jannah Martenne (Little Wiggs) who is 10, will perhaps be the lawyer of the family. She has an answer for everything, whether it is school, family, friends or business she has got it figured out. Wiggs also plays the piano and violin.

When asked what he will do when he retires, Henry said, “I don’t think I can retire. We have four daugh-ters.” Henry’s wife, Jacqueline’s nick-name is Smuffle, which in Dutch means loveliness. Henry says it is her french blood that makes her passionate about everything she does, including her work teaching Academic English and Presentations. Jacqueline is a gourmet cook, and wanted to go to Chefs School at one point. Henry states that she, of course, is the family glue.

Henry has an extreme passion for all that he does. That is what makes him so interesting. He says that the best part about working at Premier is the people. “It’s always about relation-ships with people.” he stated. His advice to those who are just getting started at Premier is to befriend an older, more experienced person. He has a few older European friends who immigrated from Italy and Hungary, and has learned a lot from them especially expressing grati-tude and appreciating what you have.

Employee Spotlight PREMIER | November 2014 1

“The first job he had me do was wash out a manure spreader because it needed a new cylinder!” Henry’scurrent position as a Sales Representative, doesn’t smell near as bad as his first job.

“I don’t think I can retire, we have four daughters.” They keep him busy, but Henry P is an extremelyproud and loving father to his girls

Henry P Scholten, Sales RepresentativeCourtland

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@PremierEquip17

PREMIER | November 2014 1

Events PREMIER | November 2014 1

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Sales PREMIER | November 2014 1

with PVC patch.

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OrdersArriving Soon!

Premier “Fast Start/Green Fever” Q1 Initiatives and Advertising

• Sales Team meetings and goal roll-outs in early November • Radio Advertising – Compacts, RLE and Utility Tractors • Inserts/Flyers – Ontario Grain Farmer, Better Farming, The Grower • Group Advertising – Ontario Farmer • Website and Social Media Support

Parts PREMIER | November 2014 1

Premier’s Parts & Service Managers will be travelling to Phoe-nix, Arizona in December for John Deere Aftermarket Expo... be sure to catch up with your Manager’s when they return to find out what’s new!

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OIL + FILTERon ALL engine, transmission + hydraulic oil, all filters and grease.

ANNUALSALE

Buy now, save big.

Offer valid from January 1 - February 28, 2015. Visit with your Parts Consultant for complete details.

SAVE %

2015Here to grow with you.

WINTER PARTS ORDER

December - January

2015Program

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Premier Q1 Parts Initiatives • Peel to Reveal – Christmas Promotion – cards, VS and signage in stores now. Customers have a 1 in 200 chance of winning their purchase, with a 100% chance of winning at least 10% off. While supplies last. • Annual Oil and Filter Sale – December – January. Details and new info coming soon!

Service PREMIER | November 2014 1

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Premier Q1 Service Initiatives • Fall/Winter PSI campaigns! • Winter Ag PSI booking program. o Mail to happen late November o Program to be supported by: Ad in Ontario Farmer Counter flyers/handouts VS networks and in-house signage.