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  • From: "Rick Hopkins" <rdhopkins AT americanpasturage.com>
  • To: <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: RE: [Market-farming] Relational/Network Marketing
  • Date: Sun, 9 Feb 2003 19:35:03 -0600

Dave and others,

We do not have a big advertising budget, so much of our advertising is word
of mouth. Even in a crowd of strangers, when I hear food mentioned I can
often find a way to become part of the conversation. This usually leads to
"what do you do?" and the response is a sales pitch with a few business
cards.

My pastured poultry friends regularly have customers drive 70-90 miles just
for chicken. They refer them to us for beef and as we are in the area (25
miles or so) they will swing by here while they are out.

I regularly deliver to the urban area as I have to go in for class each
week. These are farmers' market customers who want meat all year long. A
few minutes to visit makes the added time in my travels worth while. These
are the core customers who do a lot of our advertising for us and they also
know I can be somewhat resourceful if they are seeking something besides
meat. I am amazed at the number of farm fresh milk requests I get just
because we have cows. It shows the lack of knowledge by the consumers, but
they know what they want and will buy it if they can find it.

There was a comment earlier about making claims. We can make any verbal
claims we want in advertising and a few well written research summaries that
support what the customers want to hear shows them that we are interested in
their well being.

Back to advertising. Farming is a business. It happens to be fulfilling
and honest work. But a business must have a profit to survive. Any
business requires advertising whether it is by conventional means or a new
gimmick. Jay may know some suggested percentages for advertising, but I
remember reading something a long time ago about taking all of the initial
profit in a new business and returning it to advertising if one wanted to
grow.

Rick H.




-----Original Message-----
From: market-farming-admin AT lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:market-farming-admin AT lists.ibiblio.org]On Behalf Of Dave
Lilligren
Sent: Sunday, February 09, 2003 6:03 PM
To: market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [Market-farming] Relational/Network Marketing


Dear Friends:

How many folks on this list have done well through word-of-mouth marketing?

We live about 85-95 miles from our major metro area (the Twin Cities), and
yet we have done well marketing our grass-fed beef and pastured poultry
through word of mouth. They love the beefy flavor of grass-fed beef and
rave about the great taste of pastured poultry. Then, they tell others, who
tell others... And they don't mind driving 90 miles to get it!

We have one friend who lives in Chicago (450 miles away) who is driving up
next month to pick up a half of a steer. This summer they want to come back
and pick up 125 broilers. Why? They told their friends in Chicago, who
want them to pick some up for their friends as well.

As we expand our operation, I'm sure that we will need to expand our
marketing techniques. We do have a whole foods-type store in our small town
that gladly posts flyers and ads for local farmers. We did get a good
egg-buying customer last year when we put a flyer up there.

Right now, we are thankful that the demand for our products exceeds our
supply. What a blessing!

Take care,

Dave Lilligren
Sandstone, MN


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