40 or more miles.* Increased travel
time and the added expense of long
drives will, however, discourage many
persons from visiting a remote farm.
Michigan growers' experience for ap-
ples and blueberries shows most pick-
your-own customers travel less than 20
miles, but some much further.
 When customers travel 50 miles or
more, it is usually for once-a-season
harvest of a product for canning, freez-
ing or storage. Those who travel far-
ther usually purchase larger quantities.
Carefully planned advertising is neces-
sary to draw customers from distant
areas. A location on a well improved
road is a necessity. People object to
traveling over poor roads to reach a
pick-your-own operation. The location
should be easy to find. Ideally on a
state or county highway, straight out
from a town, with directions easy to
give and simple to follow. Take time
to inform people in gasoline stations
and other places of the best way to
reach the pick-your-own location.

PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION
 As commuter transportation im-
proves, nearness to bus or rail stations
could become a factor in your sales
volume. In the past, resort areas have
furnished station wagon service to
meet trains or busses. This might also
be a business-building technique for
pick-your-own. Urban or suburban
dwellers may prefer the more relaxed
traveling by bus or train to the hazard-
ous driving on congested multi-lane
highways. If your customers use public
transportation, provide containers that
not only protect fruits and vegetables
properly, but are also attractive and
convenient to handle. Here is also an
opportunity for an advertising mes-
sage. A reusable container will offer
extra savings to the consumer.


PLANNING FOR PRODUCTION
 Planning is a very necessary part of
pick-your-own. A first concern is to
grow crops that people want for both
immediate use and home freezing and
canning.
 A succession of plantings for annual
vegetables to give a longer harvest
period is advantageous. Several vari-
*See selected reference 9.


 w~ A
S6Ztk ~t


K'2e 7


eties of fruit crops such as strawberries,
cherries, peaches or apples that ripen
over a period of weeks will encourage
repeat sales. It also makes advertising
and promotion programs more effec-
tive by giving people time to plan their
visit to the farm after seeing or hearing
announcements of available produce.
With longer harvest periods it is easier
to have a variety of items for sale at
any given time. Continuity for a spe-
cific item as well as several different
products encourages repeat business
and larger purchases per customer.
Unplanned impulse purchases increase
when more kinds of high quality pro-
duce are available.

RIPENESS AND FLAVOR
 Tree-ripe and vine-ripe quality is a
main attraction for pick-your-own. The
final few days of ripening for tree fruits
usually adds 10 to 15 percent in size.
This means a worthwhile increase in
yield and places many individual
apples, peaches or other fruits into
higher value size categories. Flavor is
always best when fruit is tree-ripened.
Freshness is promotable and saleable.
People are much less critical of fruit or
vegetable quality when they harvest
the product. An apple dropped or
found on the ground usually winds up
in the container and is bought at
full price.
 Consider field layout that permits
successive crop plantings to be sepa-
rated some distance apart. It is easier
to clean up one planting of a crop, like
snap beans, before moving on to the
next planting. Accidental, premature


harvest is easier to avoid when the
various plantings are not adjacent to
each other.
 Many management problems in di-
recting pickers to fields that are ready
for harvest can be avoided by pre-
season planning. Grower experience
will be a great help in arriving at the
best layout for a particular farm. The
size and arrangement of fields as well
as soil types, available irrigation and
other factors will influence many deci-
sions. Since you should plant crops on
soils and sites that are the most pro-
ductive, these very factors will deter-
mine where some crops are grown. As
an example, strawberries need a loamy,
well-drained soil and should be on a
high site to reduce spring frost dam-
age. A planned rotation of crops re-
duces insect and disease injury and will
improve crop quality. Since product
quality is one key to customer satisfac-
tion, only the best production practices
should be used.

PRICING THE PRODUCTS
 Know your costs. Studies of produc-
tion costs for various fruits and vege-
tables have been done by Michigan
State University specialists and Coop-
erative Extension Service agents work-
ing with commercial growers. Similar
studies have also been made in Indiana
and other states. If you do not have
production cost records for individual
crops, these studies may be your best
cost estimate. Check the date of the
studies. Any study more than one year
old should have a correction factor for
cost changes. Inquiries to other grow-
ers of the same crops may give some
idea of production costs. If you know
what it costs to produce a bushel of
snap beans or a 10 pound carton of
tomatoes, it is simple to know what the
lowest selling price should be. Another
factor in the pricing formula is the cur-
rent price levels, both wholesale and
retail. You can't afford to sell pick-
your-own below wholesale. If you price
above the retail levels for your area,
you are not likely to move much vol-
ume. A point between these two fig-
ures is usually the price where you can
move volume and also show a favor-
able return. Some saving over compet-
ing retail prices is usually needed to
encourage people to pick their own.


14-3