Success StoryMarketing for All 3.0: Helping Local Farms Strengthen Their Business
Marketing for All 3.0: Helping Local Farms Strengthen Their Business
Author: Gretchen Plocek
Planning Unit: Oldham County CES
Major Program: Economic and Business Development - ANR
Plan of Work: Strengthening Agriculture Production, Management, and Marketing Skills
Outcome: Intermediate Outcome
The state of Kentucky boasts the existence of around 69,425 farms with a net farm cash income of $2.4 billion dollars. In Oldham County, the number of farms contributing to the statewide accounts are 410 family farms with an average acreage of 136 and a net farm income of $6,868 according to the last agriculture census from the USDA. While there is no dividing definition between small commercial farms and small family farms, Oldham County contains a plethora of small farms according to USDA guidelines. These small farms contribute to the production of beef cattle, vegetables, soybeans, corn, and poultry which support our county economy and feeds our residents. However, our family farms continue to find challenges in selling their meat and operating their businesses as they navigate various farmer's markets, on farm sales, auction houses, and market sales. In a survey of the latest cohort of Marketing for All 3.0 participants, a third (33%) of the participants rated their confidence in marketing their product as "not confident" while almost half (42%) rated their marketing confidence as "somewhat confident" before learning the program content. With our family farms relying on the income that is produced by these sales and the confidence of our growers in their marketing skills, the Center for Crop Diversification created the Marketing for All 3.0 program and partnered with Oldham County, Shelby County, Trimble County, and Henry County to host and provided participants. After refining the program since 2017, Marketing for All 3.0 was advertised to every family farmer in the four counties who sold product at markets, online, and in auction houses to create a targeted cohort that could go through an intensive training for 6 weeks. Topics discussed include Farm & Business Branding, Graphic Design, Selling Online, & E-mail Marketing. This spring's cohort contained around 15 local farmers in the areas of beef, specialty crops, microgreens, cut flowers, and vegetable production who were interested in bettering their marketing practices. Of this group, 64% stated that they increased their knowledge about taking photos for their business and advertising, 55% increased confidence in their ability to use online presence to generate sales, and 46% increased knowledge about how to communicate their brand to others. As the program ended each producer in our cohort was armed with the knowledge that they needed to boost their sales game and apply their knowledge to the market season that was just beginning.
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