As I was enjoying my morning
coffee (organically grown and fair traded) and eating my breakfast
(organically grown, rolled oats, long-cooking), I read several articles
in the February Vegetable Growers News, which by the way, I enjoy
very much.
Your piece about the ludicrous advertising methods and the general
lack of consumer understanding of the whole process of how food gets
to them really struck home with me. It made me think of all that the
last four years have taught us about marketing, educating and just
finding people to connect with.
My husband Starr and I both have farming family in our backgrounds
even though it wasn't our parents. We have had a garden for 30 years,
and five years ago this June we moved to the northcountry of New York:
Boonville, in Lewis County, zone 3 or 4. We found a former dairy farm
with wonderful soil and abundant water on a relatively quiet county
road. Heaven! We both work regular jobs, but are running a Community
Supported Agriculture (CSA). Intending to start small, we began with
6 families the first year. I thought based on that, that we might
be able to handle 10 or 12. We only found three families the next
year while we expanded the growing area to about 1.5 acres, and Starr
built a fence using telephone poles, which he set entirely by hand.
To make a long story a little shorter, this will be our fourth year
as a CSA, and my third year as a member of the local farmers’
market (22 miles away). This is what we have learned:
1. This is a rural area, but the people don't eat vegetables. Certainly
nothing much more than tomatoes, green beans and sweet corn –
maybe the occasional butternut squash at Thanksgiving.
2. "Heirloom" or "organic" doesn't mean much to
the real locals. One woman returned her purchase of an Arrowhead cabbage
and yellow tomatoes because her husband said they "weren't cabbages
or tomatoes."
3. The locals are not adventurous with new food ideas: red tomatoes,
large round pale cabbages, green lettuce, long, giant-sized zucchini
is what they want.
4. My best customers are people who have moved into the area from
somewhere other than New York.
5. I have always understood that educating the public was important,
but I never realized how long that can take – a farmer could
starve to death before enough people realize how good his produce
is!
6. A new rule we are thinking of adopting is no free samples. Around
here, it seems that if you give one away, they expect it to always
be free. Even if people rave about how much they loved that particular
vegetable, they never come back and buy any.
7. I have also learned that humor in the marketplace may go over peoples
heads. For example, I love growing pumpkins. I grow about eight kinds.
I made signs for the farmers’ market display that said "Very
Sincere Pumpkins." Almost nobody knew what that came from! The
only folks who got it were over 45, but the others just had this blank
stare. It should have provoked a question, at least!
8. And last but not least, we have learned that taking things slowly
and being patient is extremely important. We can't give up our day
jobs yet, but have every hope that it will happen. We will keep plugging
away because we have seen progress. The market is the best resource
for customers that I have found. It seems that my niche market may
be people with food allergies and damaged immune systems – they
are finding me!
How about we form a group called RID-OF , as in "getting rid
of professional advertisers who are blatantly stupid" (Righteously
Indignant Descendants of Farmers) to go after these crazy ads that
make fun of farmers, as you so eloquently put it? We could set up
a site on the Internet that lists the companies that employ this kind
of ad, tears apart their campaigns, and then show the truth about
the food and its origins. Done with humor and facts, it could be effective.
I am sure that you will know at least one name in the following quote:
"When Adelle Davis, the famous nutrition writer, appeared on
the Johnny Carson show, she was asked to give a rule of thumb for
healthy eating. She said, ‘If it is advertised in the media,
don't buy it.’ An excellent rule indeed. Unfortunately, the
TV station blipped her out. The viewers never heard the comment."
(quoted from Sally Fallon's “Nourishing Traditions,” pg.
141)
I agree totally with your paragraph about being saddened by the "commercials
that feed ignorance." I would also use the word outraged. Getting
people to understand that their food choices affect their health and
that of their families, and ultimately the health of the world, is
a huge task. So we don't need marketing "experts" getting
in the way with their ridiculous ideas and their taking of the high
percentage of the profits.
I understand your idea of the "magic" component as it applies
to fairy tales, but food production isn’t magic, it’s
hard work, sweat and money expended by the farmers. There is the element
of mystery in the life of the soil and plants, and a good farmer understands
that, but consumers don't need to get into that unless they want to
have the total picture.
Lynn Klein
Westview Farm
Boonville, N.Y.
