Some Nebraska Tire stores close as owner prepares to be taken over

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By The Lincoln Journal Star

Some Nebraska Tire stores have been closed as their owner, Countryside Cooperative of Firth prepares to be taken over Sept. 1 by the Farmers Cooperative of Dorchester.

Interim CEO Terry Samuelson said Countryside members voted 92 percent on July 24 for the co-op to be taken over  by Dorchester, a larger cooperative. 

Meanwhile, Countryside has been downsizing its Nebraska Tire operation.  Samuelson said the Seward store and the North 27th Street store in Lincoln have closed,  the lease on the Old Cheney Road store in Lincoln has been taken over by John Davis,  a store in Kimball closed in March and stores in Elm Creek,  Gering and Sidney have been taken over by Nebraskaland-Kansasland Tire Group.

The Nebraska Tire stores remaining are in  Firth, Nebraska City,  York and Fremont.

The rationale behind the merger, Samuelson said, was primarily to be able to address capital needs for agriculture for the future.

“Very fine companies are being challenged,” Samuelson said. 

“When we had corn at $6, approaching $7, it takes three time the amount of capital to do the same amount of business as it did three years ago.”

Countryside also owns elevators, fuel and propane stations, feed stores, ammonia plants and other operations at Firth, Pickrell, Princeton, Diller, Cortland, Sterling, Syracuse, Pawnee City, Hallam, Filley and Crete, according to its Web site.

Farmers Cooperative of Dorchester has operations in 35 other communities in Southeast Nebraska and Kansas, according to its Web site.