Pick Your Own (PYO) marketing has become very popular since the l950's. In New York State, the number of farms marketing PYO in l974 was 335, and had increased to 634 in l979. By l984 the number of farms with PYO products had not increased significantly. Although many have concluded this plateau represents market saturation, little data exist to support this contention.

     In l985, Monika Crispin of Cornell Cooperative Extension in Tompkins County surveyed customers patronizing PYO farms within 20 miles of Ithaca, NY. Nine growers participated in the survey, and combined acreage was 88. Eight hundred fifty six surveys were returned, and a profile of customers was obtained from the results. Her conclusions follow.

     "One factor that's probably obvious to you when you're in the field - is that there are about 3 females picking to every male picking. This has implications for advertising - since the audience is primarily female you may want to place ads in food sections or include recipes in ads, as means of targeting the female audience.

     Now let's look at age - these results were actually a bit surprising to me. The predominant group was in the 25-40 year category. I guess I expected an older population of pickers. Again age is important to consider when planning for advertising. When I looked at age and advertising influence - an important fact emerged which creates an advertising challenge - the younger and
older age groups are influenced more by advertising than the middle group, which is the predominant population of pickers. This makes sense if you think about the fact that young folks listen to the radio more than those people who work all day and older folks who are retired also have more time to pay attention to radio and ads in papers.

     So how do you reach the middle group of pickers? Well obviously some are coming because they've picked before, but for the middle group mass media advertising may be less effective than
a post card that tells them that fruit is ready to pick. Undoubtedly there are other strategies that could be used but that's one that comes to mind readily. The impact of advertising is difficult to assess. In the survey we assumed that anyone who indicated they saw or heard either the generic ads or the farm ads was influenced by advertising to some extent. For the total survey population about half were not influenced by advertising at all - that means they apparently didn't hear or see any ads. 2l% were somewhat influenced and 28% were apparently influenced by advertising.

     A question was asked about why a customer picked at a particular farm? I looked at this in relation to picking experience. A small percent of first year pickers had apparently picked before in the same season, most come to pick because they get recommendations from friends. 26% of the first year pickers came because they heard/or saw some form of advertising. Location doesn't seem to be important. What changes as pickers gain experience is that advertising and word of mouth have less impact on the decision to pick. These people are coming back to pick presumably because of positive experiences in previous years. It's important to continue to provide these positive experiences for repeat customers. I asked if customers planned to pick strawberries again in the same season, and 53% indicated they did, 25% said maybe and the rest said no. That indicates that a relatively high percent could be enticed to come back for other u-pick crops in addition to strawberries.

     Picking experience is an important way of determining whether you are reaching new customers. I found that 58% of the customers have picked strawberries for more than 5 years. 33% have from 2-5 years experience while only 9% represented first year pickers.

     It's obvious that the u-pick business currently relies heavily on repeat customers. If the annual growth in new pickers is under l0% this has implications for the u-pick business. If growth in
acres and yield exceeds the number of new pickers each year, it's clear that supply exceeds demand - hence the saturated market. A challenge for the u-pick business is now to attract new pickers.

     It`s important to know why people pick in order to develop a strategy for attracting customers. Quality was the most important factor where reasons were ranked, price came next and enjoyment
third. In tabulating the frequency of the checked answers - enjoyment came out on top, quality next, price third. Quantity didn't seem important in either case.

     Once you get them in the field what is important? I asked customers to rank the farms in our survey on these factors - all the farms received high marks - only a few people indicated need
for improvement. 3-7% of the customers felt that field conditions, parking, advertising, picking instructions and ease of picking could be better. That's a pretty low percentage. Customers were
obviously very satisfied with checkout facilities, quality, price and sales and field help. Other similar surveys indicate that lack of information about pick your own farms is a problem.

     In a survey comparing rural and urban populations - fewer urban folks know about pick your own, and indicated that they weren't interested or didn't have time to pick. It seems there may
be opportunity to attract more urban customers as they seemed more interested and had more time than rural folks. Most u-pick customers presently come from rural areas. In consumer survey
questions about why people don't pick - the most frequent response was lack of free time, the inconvenience, or that farms were too far away.

     OK, let's look at several other factors - I mentioned most customers are rural - so how far are they driving to pick berries? A majority drive under l0 miles - 78% drive under 20 miles. The
average miles driven in our survey was l3.6. This corresponds to other surveys conducted in rural areas. Most customers come from within a 20 mile distance or about a half hours drive. Once they drive all that distance - how much do they pick? The farther they drive - the more they pick. The average quantity picked per customer in our survey was l2.95 quarts. 4l% pick 8 quarts, 29%
pick 9-l6 quarts and 29% pick l6+ quarts. I looked at picking experience and quantity picked and also found a neat linear relationship - as a customer's experience increases - they pick more. Bring those customers back - postcards with discounts for returning customer is one way that one of the farms in my survey attempted to secure repeat business.

     A few last comments on other questions in the survey. Picking time - a majority of u-pick customers pick in the morning, other surveys indicate that 9 to noon on weekends are popular times, 33% customers come on Saturday, l9% on Sunday; picking during weekdays varies.

     In our survey we found that 35% of the picking population had gone to high school, while 65% of the population had some high school and college. A Vermont survey had similar results.

     In other surveys where more demographic information was gathered about customers - they find that a majority of customers have incomes ranging from $l0-40,000; and that a majority of pickers come from 4 person households, suggesting that pickers tend to represent family groups. Most pickers also own their own homes and 70% have their own gardens."

     Surveys such as this one usually indicate the need for increased advertising. As noted in the April issue of this newsletter, PYO farmers spend a much smaller percentage of gross sales on advertising than other businesses. The North American Strawberry Growers Marketing Council conducted a survey in Illinois in l985. They found that 7l% of households bought freshb strawberries within the past year, but only l4% picked their own. Of those who did not pick (86% of all households), more than half were not aware of PYO strawberries! Nearly half of these said they would pick if they knew a PYO farm existed in their area. These data indicate that the number of potential customers is more than twice what you see this year in your fields. It certainly is something to think about.


Farmstand Main Farm Stand Directory Publications Contact Us Markets	Bureau of Markets - Farmstands Profile of the PYO Customer Pick Your Own (PYO) marketing has become very popular since the l950's. In New York State, the number of farms marketing PYO in l974 was 335, and had increased to 634 in l979. By l984 the number of farms with PYO products had not increased significantly. Although many have concluded this plateau represents market saturation, little data exist to support this contention. In l985, Monika Crispin of Cornell Cooperative Extension in Tompkins County surveyed customers patronizing PYO farms within 20 miles of Ithaca, NY. Nine growers participated in the survey, and combined acreage was 88. Eight hundred fifty six surveys were returned, and a profile of customers was obtained from the results. Her conclusions follow. "One factor that's probably obvious to you when you're in the field - is that there are about 3 females picking to every male picking. This has implications for advertising - since the audience is primarily female you may want to place ads in food sections or include recipes in ads, as means of targeting the female audience. Now let's look at age - these results were actually a bit surprising to me. The predominant group was in the 25-40 year category. I guess I expected an older population of pickers. Again age is important to consider when planning for advertising. When I looked at age and advertising influence - an important fact emerged which creates an advertising challenge - the younger and older age groups are influenced more by advertising than the middle group, which is the predominant population of pickers. This makes sense if you think about the fact that young folks listen to the radio more than those people who work all day and older folks who are retired also have more time to pay attention to radio and ads in papers. So how do you reach the middle group of pickers? Well obviously some are coming because they've picked before, but for the middle group mass media advertising may be less effective than a post card that tells them that fruit is ready to pick. Undoubtedly there are other strategies that could be used but that's one that comes to mind readily. The impact of advertising is difficult to assess. In the survey we assumed that anyone who indicated they saw or heard either the generic ads or the farm ads was influenced by advertising to some extent. For the total survey population about half were not influenced by advertising at all - that means they apparently didn't hear or see any ads. 2l% were somewhat influenced and 28% were apparently influenced by advertising. A question was asked about why a customer picked at a particular farm? I looked at this in relation to picking experience. A small percent of first year pickers had apparently picked before in the same season, most come to pick because they get recommendations from friends. 26% of the first year pickers came because they heard/or saw some form of advertising. Location doesn't seem to be important. What changes as pickers gain experience is that advertising and word of mouth have less impact on the decision to pick. These people are coming back to pick presumably because of positive experiences in previous years. It's important to continue to provide these positive experiences for repeat customers. I asked if customers planned to pick strawberries again in the same season, and 53% indicated they did, 25% said maybe and the rest said no. That indicates that a relatively high percent could be enticed to come back for other u-pick crops in addition to strawberries. Picking experience is an important way of determining whether you are reaching new customers. I found that 58% of the customers have picked strawberries for more than 5 years. 33% have from 2-5 years experience while only 9% represented first year pickers. It's obvious that the u-pick business currently relies heavily on repeat customers. If the annual growth in new pickers is under l0% this has implications for the u-pick business. If growth in acres and yield exceeds the number of new pickers each year, it's clear that supply exceeds demand - hence the saturated market. A challenge for the u-pick business is now to attract new pickers. It`s important to know why people pick in order to develop a strategy for attracting customers. Quality was the most important factor where reasons were ranked, price came next and enjoyment third. In tabulating the frequency of the checked answers - enjoyment came out on top, quality next, price third. Quantity didn't seem important in either case. Once you get them in the field what is important? I asked customers to rank the farms in our survey on these factors - all the farms received high marks - only a few people indicated need for improvement. 3-7% of the customers felt that field conditions, parking, advertising, picking instructions and ease of picking could be better. That's a pretty low percentage. Customers were obviously very satisfied with checkout facilities, quality, price and sales and field help. Other similar surveys indicate that lack of information about pick your own farms is a problem. In a survey comparing rural and urban populations - fewer urban folks know about pick your own, and indicated that they weren't interested or didn't have time to pick. It seems there may be opportunity to attract more urban customers as they seemed more interested and had more time than rural folks. Most u-pick customers presently come from rural areas. In consumer survey questions about why people don't pick - the most frequent response was lack of free time, the inconvenience, or that farms were too far away. OK, let's look at several other factors - I mentioned most customers are rural - so how far are they driving to pick berries? A majority drive under l0 miles - 78% drive under 20 miles. The average miles driven in our survey was l3.6. This corresponds to other surveys conducted in rural areas. Most customers come from within a 20 mile distance or about a half hours drive. Once they drive all that distance - how much do they pick? The farther they drive - the more they pick. The average quantity picked per customer in our survey was l2.95 quarts. 4l% pick 8 quarts, 29% pick 9-l6 quarts and 29% pick l6+ quarts. I looked at picking experience and quantity picked and also found a neat linear relationship - as a customer's experience increases - they pick more. Bring those customers back - postcards with discounts for returning customer is one way that one of the farms in my survey attempted to secure repeat business. A few last comments on other questions in the survey. Picking time - a majority of u-pick customers pick in the morning, other surveys indicate that 9 to noon on weekends are popular times, 33% customers come on Saturday, l9% on Sunday; picking during weekdays varies. In our survey we found that 35% of the picking population had gone to high school, while 65% of the population had some high school and college. A Vermont survey had similar results. In other surveys where more demographic information was gathered about customers - they find that a majority of customers have incomes ranging from $l0-40,000; and that a majority of pickers come from 4 person households, suggesting that pickers tend to represent family groups. Most pickers also own their own homes and 70% have their own gardens." Surveys such as this one usually indicate the need for increased advertising. As noted in the April issue of this newsletter, PYO farmers spend a much smaller percentage of gross sales on advertising than other businesses. The North American Strawberry Growers Marketing Council conducted a survey in Illinois in l985. They found that 7l% of households bought freshb strawberries within the past year, but only l4% picked their own. Of those who did not pick (86% of all households), more than half were not aware of PYO strawberries! Nearly half of these said they would pick if they knew a PYO farm existed in their area. These data indicate that the number of potential customers is more than twice what you see this year in your fields. It certainly is something to think about.