Meet the Board: Cole Trebesch

In August 2017, Cole Trebesch’s health care provider options started dwindling. The Minnesota farmer spoke with the CEO of Farmward Cooperative – Trebesch serves on the board – and was directed to a new independent health care cooperative, 40 Square.

“I started asking some questions,” Trebesch says. “A month later, he called and said there’s this group 40 Square starting up and they’re looking for board members.”

Cole became a 40 Square member, joined the board and now serves as board vice chair. Cole says he’s invested in his 40 Square health plan because 40 Square also invests in his health. Members get back what they put in – and then some.

“I like 40 Square because it’s nice not having an insurance company that’s trying to make a bunch of money,” he says. “It’s a co-op to service its members.”

Cole lives just a few miles south of the family farm in Springfield with his wife, Miranda, and their son, Oliver, and daughter, Elise. Together with his father, Richard, Cole raises corn, soybeans, hogs and cattle.

“We live agriculture day in and day out,” he says. “It keeps us all close.”

Cole, 37, forged his own agricultural path after high school. He majored in agronomy at South Dakota State University before returning home to Brown County after graduating in 2005. After more than a decade in agricultural leadership, including completing the American Soybean Association’s prestigious Young Leader Program, Trebesch was elected chair of the Minnesota Soybean Research & Promotion Council, an organization that directs soybean checkoff on behalf of the state’s nearly 28,000 soybean growers. In July, Trebesch was reelected to a second year as MSR&PC chair.

“It’s a great privilege to direct soybean checkoff funds, and it’s a responsibility I don’t take lightly,” he says. “It’s important that farmers know where their checkoff dollars are invested, and how they can use the programs to help their business.”

Sitting on the 40 Square board has been a learning experience for Trebesch as he navigates the nuances of the health care industry, helping to blaze a trail for health care cooperatives in Minnesota.

“We’re still learning, and it seems like every month it’s something new,” he says. “We’re doing something no one’s done in Minnesota.”

Though he cautions the election and future Supreme Court rulings could have seismic ramifications for the health care industry, Trebesch sees a positive future ahead for 40 Square.

“I think it’s promising,” he says. “So much of health insurance is dependent on the government changing their minds, so there are things out of your control, and you got to prepare for the unexpected.”