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IntegratedFile_EnvControl_Staffing_CostCalc_ver2.xlsx
Imamura here. This is the story of being told, over and over on the vertical farm floor: “We’d love a proper system, but there’s no budget — just make it work in Excel.”
Just Make It Work in Excel
“Hey, this spreadsheet isn’t working.”
Somewhere in every office, that line gets said. The speaker is usually wrestling with an Excel file where multiple sheets are tangled together and macros are woven through every corner.
I was the kind of person who tended to end up building those files. The so-called “Excel wizard.” A flattering title — though not one I can wear with much pride. Mostly because the difficult requests always follow.
It always starts the same way.
“We’d really love a proper system, but there’s no budget — Imamura, can you just make it work in Excel?”
At first I thought it would be simple enough. Pull together a harvest schedule, add some formulas, throw in a macro if needed. I genuinely believed that, for a while. Looking back, I was being naive.
The File Grows
Over the years, I’ve built no small number of Excel files. One of them started as a simple harvest schedule.
Somewhere along the way, it started handling environment control, staffing, and cost calculations too — and eventually got named “IntegratedFile_EnvControl_Staffing_CostCalc_ver2.xlsx.” Just the name alone makes you hesitate before opening it.
I once told a colleague: “This file references more than ten separate sheets internally — if you’re going to touch it, let me know first.” I still remember the look on that colleague’s face. Their hand froze on the mouse for a moment, and they looked at me instead of the screen. They had decided, I think, that this was something not to be touched.
From that day on, the file took on a kind of “do not touch” status in the office. I had only ever wanted to make it useful — but what I’d done, in the end, was build myself a small black box.
The practical reality is that a file like that can only be maintained by the person who built it. Or more precisely: only by the person who built it — and only within three months of doing so.
Past three months, even I — the author — freeze up: “Why is this formula referencing that cell?” As I trace cells across the screen, time starts to feel strange. I start in Column A, but suddenly I’m looking at Column K in a different sheet, which is pulling from yet another file. In my head, I’m telling past-me, over and over: please leave yourself a comment.
We’d Love a Proper System, But…
At that point, naturally, talk of “moving to a proper internal system” comes up.
Bring in a dedicated system and we can escape the Excel trap. With proper documentation and a system designed by professionals, most problems should be solvable. I dreamed of a future where software would automatically forecast harvest volume, calculate optimal staffing, and place orders — all on its own.
But the thing is, vertical farms deal with living plants. Unexpected changes are the daily reality.
Say you’re suddenly told one day: “Starting today, we’re adding new crop varieties and extra steps to the workflow.” With Excel, someone can add new columns on the spot and keep the operation running through the change. The file looks a little rougher — but you make today’s shipment.
With a dedicated system, that’s not how it goes. You submit a change request, get budget approval, wait for a developer’s schedule to open up. By then, the shipment window you had in mind has already passed.
The same goes for when you want to adjust a growth prediction algorithm because you’ve changed the LED layout. In Excel you can update the formula the same day. With a dedicated system, modifications take time. Of course, “same-day update” also means “same-day disaster” is equally possible. That’s the uncomfortable part.
Once, I heard that another department had successfully switched to a dedicated system and felt a pang of envy. Six months later, that same department was complaining that “the system can’t keep up with changes on the floor.” They’d ended up running both the dedicated system and Excel in parallel — double the work.
When I heard that, something in the back of my mind went a little quieter. Suddenly, the grass on the other side didn’t look so green. Switching to a proper system doesn’t solve everything. The floor is not that simple.
The Final Version That Never Ends
Ideally, you’d build a perfect system from scratch, all at once. But that takes enormous time and budget. And vertical farms vary wildly from company to company in their facility specs. There’s no guarantee that what worked for Company A will work at Company B.
A universal vertical farm system would be useful. But in practice, the specifics — crop varieties, equipment, workflows, staffing arrangements, shipment conditions — differ slightly at every facility. Those small differences compound, and in the end they add up to something quite significant.
And then there’s the irony: the Excel file you built as a temporary stopgap while waiting for the new system has quietly become the core operating backbone of the floor. It was supposed to be a short-term fix. Five years later, it’s still running. I have a hard drive full of files like that.
That said, automation technology keeps advancing. Sensors and AI are gradually taking over tasks that used to require human judgment.
What I’m hoping for is a vertical farm where human flexibility and system stability work together in real harmony. Combine the floor knowledge of people who’ve mastered Excel with the expertise of programmers, and someday there might be a system smart enough to roll with whatever the floor throws at it.
Until that day, I expect I’ll be working with Excel a little while longer.
Speaking of which — the other day I saved a file under the name “final_FINAL_seriously-no-more-changes_ver5.3.xlsx.” When I checked this morning, someone had renamed it “final_FINAL_seriously-no-more-changes_ver5.3_revised_NEW.xlsx.”
Even writing this now, that filename makes my shoulders sag just a little. The fight with Excel never really ends, does it?