BIG Consulting

Name: BIG Consulting
Brand: BIG Consulting

Business intelligence and data analytics for Agribusiness

Est 2015|5 Ref Customers

LinkedIn 2K|Website|FTEs 4|HQ Cottage Grove, Wisconsin, US

MarketsBusiness Intelligence (BI) and Analytics

Published Sep 23, 2026

01Common complaints

- Buyers that require public, enterprise-grade compliance documentation before engaging; BIG does not publicly document SOC 2 / ISO certifications in accessible materials. - Buyers that need transparent, self-serve SaaS pricing and immediate checkout; BIG’s model is proposal/scoped and multiple products are listed as “call for pricing.” - Buyers seeking a single global vendor with very large staffing depth for an extensive multi-year, multi-geo transformation; BIG is a boutique specialist and larger SIs may be preferred for extremely large programs. - Buyers whose primary need is market/trading intelligence rather than internal BI integration; specialized market intelligence tools may be more appropriate. - Organizations lacking internal stakeholder availability for KPI definition, data validation, and change management; BI projects generally require business engagement for success. - Procurement teams that require substantial third-party review evidence to proceed; BIG has limited presence on mainstream review platforms in accessible, attributable sources. - Current limitations acknowledged by the vendor - BIG’s public materials do not list explicit known issues, product limitations, or roadmap items with dates. - Likely limitations and buyer diligence items - Vendor transparency - Limited public pricing for most offerings - Limited public security/compliance detail - Productization maturity - Some offerings appear closer to solution packages than fully self-serve SaaS; buyers should clarify: - Hosting model - Release cadence - Tenant isolation (if SaaS) - Support model - Dependency on customer systems - If ERP/batching systems are difficult to extract from or have inconsistent master data, dashboards may require significant remediation effort.

Deal disqualifiers (poor fit)

Organizations seeking a low-cost, self-serve tool with published pricing and instant deployment.
Organizations that require publicly documented security certifications as a strict procurement gate.
Organizations whose data is not accessible or is extremely low quality with no internal capacity to remediate.

02Why they buy

- Agriculture-first BI specialization - The vendor positions itself as focused on agriculture rather than generic BI. - Packaged, agriculture-specific analytics products - Grain Bids Navigator: aggregates bids from many locations into one interface (industry press described it as subscription-based). - Precision Feed Manufacturing: statistical process control / variance visualization approach to feed mixing accuracy. - Accounts Payable Insights: dashboards built for Square 9 Softworks AP workflows. - Collaborative delivery model (vendor-described) - Emphasis on steering committees and client-influenced roadmap. - Balanced reality check - These unique selling points are primarily vendor-asserted and partially supported by third-party coverage (e.g., industry press and partner case studies), but are not strongly validated by large volumes of independent end-user reviews.

03Field reports

Important context on review availability

- Unlike mass-market SaaS, boutique consultancies and niche agribusiness BI providers often have limited coverage on G2/TrustRadius/Gartner Peer Insights. - In this research, no clear BIG Consulting listing with end-user star ratings was found on major review sites that was accessible and attributable specifically to BIG Consulting (as listed on the vendor's website). Gartner Peer Insights may be difficult to search for boutique firms and can be partially access-restricted.

Vendor-published testimonial

The BIG homepage includes a testimonial from Donald Schlising (Chief Administrative Officer at ALCIVIA) describing a long-term partnership and referencing BIG’s understanding of agriculture and the cooperative business model, as well as its business intelligence solutions.
Critical note: this is a vendor-selected testimonial and not an independently verified outcome.

Third-party case-study style testimonial

An AgVantage case study describes Landmark Services Cooperative using BI tools developed by BIG Consulting; a Landmark leader described the engagement as a positive joint venture between AgVantage, BIG Consulting, and the cooperative.
Critical note: this is closer to marketing collateral than a neutral review platform.

Employee sentiment (mixed/limited relevance)

Job-review sites show a “BIG CONSULTING” employer profile with a small number of employee reviews and an overall rating (sample size is small and unclear).
Critical note: It is not fully clear this listing maps precisely to BIG Consulting's website versus similarly named companies. Also, employee reviews do not substitute for customer outcomes.

Community/social sentiment (consulting industry generally, not BIG specifically)

- Reddit discussions about “big consulting” frequently raise concerns about: - Burnout / long hours and variability in work-life balance by project - Perceived low value or “PowerPoint-heavy” deliverables in large-firm consulting - Hacker News threads similarly critique “big consulting” for quality risks (inexperienced staffing, change-order incentives) while acknowledging that outcomes vary widely by team and engagement. - Critical note: These discussions are not about BIG Consulting specifically; they are useful as general buyer risk heuristics when hiring any consultancy.

Why customers appear to choose BIG (evidence-based signals)

Specialization in agribusiness/co-op operations is emphasized by vendor materials and is supported indirectly by agriculture-specific products and partners.
Stated ability to integrate with existing ag ERPs / systems rather than requiring platform replacement.

Why some customers might not choose BIG (inferred from gaps)

Lack of public security/compliance documentation may slow vendor onboarding for risk-sensitive enterprises.
Unpublished pricing can complicate early-stage budgeting comparisons.
If an organization requires globally recognized certifications, a very large consulting bench, or 24/7 support, larger consultancies/system integrators may be preferred.

Precision Feed Manufacturing (PFM) case study (vendor-published)

- BIG’s PFM case study describes a Midwest multi-species feed mill, where PFM dashboards surface ingredient mixing accuracy issues that were not apparent in aggregated batching-system summaries. - The case study explains that PFM uses batch-level visualization to detect variation and outliers across many batches and supports remediation. - Critical evaluation: - This appears to be a vendor-authored narrative; the facility name is not disclosed in the excerpted portion. - Quantified business impact (e.g., cost savings, quality improvements, reduced rework) is not clearly presented in the portion reviewed; buyers should request hard metrics and methodology.

AgVantage / Landmark cooperative case study (third-party collateral)

AgVantage describes a partnership with Landmark Services Cooperative and BIG Consulting to build BI tools for ERP data visibility.
Critical evaluation:
- Provides external validation that BIG works in cooperative ERP contexts.
- Still not a rigorous ROI study; it is a case study–style document with limited quantitative proof.

Whitepaper: Identifying Business Growth Opportunities Using Historical Data (vendor-published)

BIG provides a whitepaper describing how BI can identify lost customers and growth opportunities and includes an "About BIG Consulting" authored by Kent J. Schultz.
Critical evaluation:
- Useful for understanding BIG’s BI philosophy and dashboard patterns.
- Not independently validated; treat as thought leadership rather than proof of outcomes.

04Best fit

Company sizes (estimated)

Likely best fit: mid-market to enterprise agribusiness operations that have multiple locations, multiple lines of business (grain, agronomy, feed, energy), and enough data complexity to justify BI integration work.
Vendor materials state work with single-location cooperatives through multi-state enterprises, implying flexible sizing.

Industries / verticals

Agricultural cooperatives
Grain handling / grain marketing
Feed manufacturing
Agronomy retail and nutrient/chemical/seed sales
Agriculture-adjacent energy operations

Roles and personas

Economic buyers
- COO / GM of cooperative
- CFO / finance leadership (margin, profitability, AP insights)
- CIO/IT director (data integration, governance)
End users
- Grain merchandisers / marketers
- Agronomy managers and sales teams
- Feed mill operations managers
- Plant/operations analysts

Pain points the product addresses

Disparate data sources and limited cross-functional visibility
Slow reporting cycles and reliance on spreadsheets
Lack of operational process control visibility (e.g., feed batching variability)
Need for daily-use dashboards rather than quarterly reports

Qualification criteria (strong fit)

Accessible data (API/DB/report exports) from ERP/manufacturing systems is available for integration.
The buyer can assign internal subject matter experts to define KPIs and validate data.
The organization is prepared to invest in ongoing iteration and governance.

Real customer examples (from public references)

ALCIVIA (testimonial on BIG site)
Landmark Services Cooperative (via AgVantage case study)
New Vision Cooperative (referenced in press materials)

05The pitch

What the product does (core value proposition in objective terms)

- BIG Consulting is an agriculture-focused business intelligence (BI) consulting and solutions provider that connects disparate operational data (ERPs, spreadsheets, line-of-business systems), builds dashboards/visualizations, and provides reporting intended to support faster decision-making in agronomy, grain, feed manufacturing, energy, and related agribusiness functions. - The offering spans: - Custom BI engagements (connect → build dashboards → ongoing evolution) - Packaged SaaS-style products (e.g., Grain Bids Navigator, Precision Feed Manufacturing, Accounts Payable Insights)

Target market and market positioning

Target customers appear to be North American agribusiness organizations—especially agricultural cooperatives, grain marketers, and feed manufacturers—that already have substantial operational data but struggle with accessibility, integration, and actionable reporting.
Positioning emphasizes an agriculture-specialized focus (versus generalist BI consultancies) and the vendor states it can work with existing systems without a full platform replacement.

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