We ran across this AgTalk post by Mark Wilsdorf, who markets an add-on to Quickbooks for farmers. If anyone has figured out how to make this ubiquitous small business accounting program function as an effective farm financial management tool it would be Mark.
Many farmers use Quickbooks for one or more of these reasons:
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Their accountant uses it or is familiar with it and can import data files.
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It's relatively inexpensive.
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Intuit is a big, successful company.
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The farm press and Extension give it a lot of free coverage.
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It's simple to use.
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It adequately performs the only accounting task they care about: tax reporting.
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They're not aware of any alternatives.
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They really, really want to make it work.
It's notable that approximately half of our new clients have switched from Quickbooks. What did they discover, and why did they make the transition? Please check out Mark's insightful review, which because of his fully-disclosed vested interest, has to represent the best results you can ever expect out of Quickbooks.
Please share your thoughts and experiences with Quickbooks here.
