The Amarillo Grain Exchange is a family owned business providing official inspection throughout North-central Texas and the Oklahoma panhandle. The agency’s motto is “Service with Integrity” a motto that has been a mainstay of the agency’s almost 100 years of service to the grain industry.

Cash and Sharon Burris are second generation owners and believe their agency is the oldest business in Amarillo. The agency is headquartered in Amarillo, Texas and has a second office in Guymon, Oklahoma.

In March of 1920, John F. Ross called a meeting of about 15 Amarillo grain men at the Amarillo Hotel to organize the Amarillo Grain Association, which was to be the forerunner of the present-day Amarillo Grain Exchange. It was Mr. Ross’ vision that Amarillo was destined to be the grain center of this section of Texas and one of the major shipping points of the Southwest. The company operated for eight years as an association, then received a State charter and incorporated as Amarillo Grain Exchange, Inc. on February 6, 1928. Ross, a licensed inspector, was the company’s first Chief Inspector until 1931, when C.M. Goodnight succeeded him. The office’s location changed several times until its last move in 1966.

The Burris family became involved when Don Burris’ father, who was the Weighmaster at the Lubbock Grain Exchange, told him the Amarillo Grain Exchange was looking for a Weighmaster and he should go listen to what they had to offer. Don was hired in August of 1958 as a Weighmaster; by 1976 he was the General Manager of the Amarillo Grain Exchange, Inc. Don came from very humble childhood, but quickly gained the confidence of everyone at the exchange and all the customers. He was involved with the Terminal Grain Weighmasters National Association and named their ‘Man of the Year” in 1969.

It was in 1977 that controversies concerning grain inspection agencies throughout the nation arose. Although, Amarillo Grain Exchange experienced no such controversy, it was impacted just the same, by the national uproar. Growers were concerned by the fact that most inspection agencies were run by a Board of Directors consisting mostly of the owners and operators of grain elevators and feared this would adversely affect pricing. The Federal Government stepped into this situation and ordered that all conflicts of interest be dissolved. No longer could an elevator owner be involved as an owner or investor in a grain inspection agency. The government required that inspection agencies meeting this banned criterion be sold to people with no involvement in elevator ownership.

Don Burris was just the man to fill the bill, because he was respected by the Exchange and its customers. In June of 1978 the Amarillo Grain Exchange, Inc. asked the Federal Grain Inspection Service (FGIS) to approve the transfer of operations to Don Burris, the current General Manager of the exchange. Don had no connection to farming, held no investments in any elevators, and was not barred from ownership by government policy. On August 14, 1978, his designation as sole owner of the Amarillo Grain Exchange, Inc. was approved. In December of 1983. Don borrowed $300,000 from the bank on a 30-year loan and paid it off in three years. Don added another full-time laboratory in Guymon, Oklahoma. Don was self-educated trough correspondence courses and with his pride of ownership, devotion to customer service, and integrity the business continued to succeed. A 1982 newspaper article reported that Amarillo had expanded to the largest private agency in the nation with offices in Amarillo, Fort Worth, Guymon and Lubbock.

Don Burris held the position of owner and official agency manager for the next 22 years, until his death in November of 2000 when Cash Burris became President of the corporation. Cash along with his wife Sharon, both manage the agency.

Cash’s involvement with the agency started as a teenager doing everything from sweeping the floor, dumping file samples and changing oil in the company cars. In the early days the agency used sedans with tubes strapped to the top as the means of transportation to probe cars and collect submitted samples. Once Cash finished high school, he began working full time at the agency along with his older brothers.

In the early years large amounts of wheat were grown in the area, and there were small elevators everywhere. As time passed, the train tracks were taken up from these small elevators and a few large elevators took their place. Farming also changed. Cotton began to make inroads into wheat acres, and urban sprawl depleted some farmland. In the 70s feedlots began to spring up in the area. Farmers began growing more corn and sorghum for the feedlots. The feedlots also began purchasing grain from other areas to meet their needs.

The feedlots were not early adaptors of the official grain inspection system. However, as they began to receive grain that did not meet the quality, they had paid for they realized something had to change. They began working with the grain industry to develop the Southwest Scale of Discounts for grain not meeting contract specifications and they began using the official inspection system to independently determine quality.

This bolstered the need for official inspection and offset some of the wheat inspection losses. Amarillo has eleven employees at its two locations and services four shuttle loaders, two of which are sessional. Shuttle trains typically go to the Gulf or Mexico. Eighty percent of their business comes from the feedlots. Corn is the primary grain inspected with wheat and sorghum making up the rest.

The agency was tested about five years ago when a multi-year drought hit the area, but through Cash and Sharon’s resolve, and some hard choices, they made it through the dry spell and are thriving today. Cash says that “everyone at Amarillo wears at least two hats, and Sharon and I wear four or five”.

“Service with Integrity” continues to serve the agency well as they get ready to start their second century of service to the grain industry.

Amarillo has a wonderful corporate history documented on their website.

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