THINKING OUTSIDE THE PROVERBIAL BOX

WHEN MARKET FARMING and GARDENING

We are now at the point of dealing with the Covid-19 Pandemic for a year. For some market farmers and gardeners, they may have found the farmers’ markets to not have as many customers as they had in previous years. However, some may have found it to be even better, depending on location and severity of the virus in their area at the time the Farmers’ Markets were in full swing.

One thing the pandemic made me consider is this, what if you were selling only at one type of market like restaurants. This could be an unbelievably bad blow to your market farming business income, since many restaurants have closed or simply cut way back on products they purchased, especially if your prices were a bit higher than what they could buy similar products off the restaurant and food supply trucks. So, what do you do? What can you do? You need to make a living and support your family, possibly pay payments for loans you took out to get your business off the ground, make mortgage payments or vehicle payments, etc. You need to keep as many of those customers as possible, but if they have closed their restaurants and gone out of business, what’s the next step? You begin thinking outside that proverbial box. Always have a backup plan or a Plan B that you can implement if, and when you need to fall back on it. Even a Plan C isn’t a bad idea to have, just in case.

Ask yourself “what kind of businesses would need good fresh produce, meat, eggs, and dairy products? Most everyone knows you cannot beat locally grown fresh foods, right? Think about  grocery stores, hospitals, nursing/residential care facilities, long-term care facilities, schools that did have some classes in session, maybe even start your own boxed dinner service and deliver them locally, just to name a few of the businesses that may be interested. You will not only make new customers but increase your business to help you keep growing and selling your products. When your restaurant customers open back up, for those that will, you have now placed your product on a higher demand and grew your client/customer list to boot!

HAPPY DANCE!

If you still haven’t thought of what to sell and where, perhaps changing up your niche to accommodate the times. What I mean by that is if produce, meat, eggs, and dairy aren’t selling well, then why not approach flower or herb gardening? Or even what I wanted to do, but got sick and couldn’t do it, was incorporating worm farming. When you get your back against a wall, mentally tell yourself it’s not a wall but just a door to the next step. You just need to make yourself open it and step through it. Begin researching everything you can about what you want to try next. Go talk to the floral shop owners and managers that buy the flowers to see what they would like to buy locally if they had those flowers available. I have several stories of successful acquaintances that have done extremely well growing flowers, and only flowers.

Remember, you have the power to overcome any challenge. To quote Queen Elizabeth II, in a recent AARP THE MAGAZINE article by Bryan Kozlowski, “The trouble with gloom is that it feeds upon itself.” Powerful words to live by.

Remember, Knowledge IS Power!