Title: Director of Engineering
Company: Growmark Inc.
Location: Bloomington, Illinois, United States
Austin Falconer, director of engineering at Growmark Inc., has been recognized by Marquis Who’s Who Top Engineers for dedication, achievements, and leadership in agriculture and engineering.
Mr. Falconer, director of engineering at Growmark Inc., has excelled in his role since 2021, responsible for design and project management and overseeing a team of skilled engineers and project managers. Working alongside a construction superintendent, the team works on 75 to 85 projects at any given time, all at different stages, from conceptual design to troubleshooting and greenfield site development for the Growmark system. Additionally, Mr. Falconer is conscious of industry regulations and actively engages in conceptual design certified by the company.
Based in Bloomington, Illinois, Growmark Inc. is recognized as an agricultural cooperative serving approximately 400,000 customers across North America. The company specializes in providing agronomy, energy, facility engineering and construction, as well as logistics products and services and grain marketing management services to its clients.
Before being promoted to his present position at the growing company, Mr. Falconer was a facility engineer II from 2017 to 2021, where he managed multiple energy projects and pressure vessel projects, including propane and anhydrous ammonia bulk plants and fuel terminals, up to $14 million from conceptual stages to completion. After earning a professional engineering license, he was promoted to a facility engineering position, working on AgChem and fertilizer facilities, offices, warehouses, and other facilities that provided better services to the farmers.
Entering the industry in 2012, immediately following college, Mr. Falconer joined Sargent & Lundy, an engineering consulting firm in the power plant industry in Chicago. After serving as a nuclear power technologies associate I, he accepted a staff augmentation position at the Davis-Bessee Nuclear Power Station in 2014 and then served as a nuclear power engineering analysis associate II from 2013 to 2014. From there, Mr. Falconer became a nuclear power engineering analysis associate III between 2014 and 2017. During that time, he was also involved in staff augmentation at the Fermi II Nuclear Power Plant in 2016. Choosing to pivot, he joined Growmark Inc. without any formal agricultural background.
A graduate of Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, Mr. Falconer received a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering in 2011. Beyond his professional success, he contributes to his community and nonprofit initiatives, including donating to Saint Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
Mr. Falconer has experienced several remarkable accomplishments throughout his career, including his contributions to dry fertilizer facilities. Because of the complexity of the shape of the piles of dry fertilizer when stored, it was hard to accurately project how much product was inside. He and the team partnered with a company that developed a custom solution, which is now seeing incredible results. They aim to take the product to market in 2025 and begin installing it in their locations and others throughout the industry.
Among other successes, Mr. Falconer was instrumental in devising a means of doing butane injection at his company’s field terminal, which resulted in a significant revenue stream. As such, he implemented it at five facilities with a budget of $250,000. He met the budget and the critical timeline, and the project paid for itself in its first week of operation.
Excited about his future, Mr. Falconer is eager to continue advancing. Eventually, he envisions overseeing the entire engineering and construction division in the coming years, where he can have more impact.
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