Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
The key is to not over-pressurize the taster. It is far better to locate the
food for sale that is being tasted about
1
m (
1
yard) away from the sample
station. This gives the customer both thinking and breathing space and as a
result sales should increase.
Apart from the tasting itself, this is a wonderful opportunity to engage
the customer. By this very factor alone the farmer is able to show they are an
expert and gain the confidence and trust of the consumer.
7.
Retailing is about always being consistent
It does not matter if a producer is excellent or bad at what they do, they can still
be successful. What annoys customers is inconsistency in standards. Customers
want to feel comfortable with the business they are dealing with and its team;
they can only feel comfortable if the producer is consistent at what they do.
Think about all the franchise companies out there. They all started as one
site businesses, but they managed to multiply because they set a standard
and then kept to it. They know that the formula for success is consistency.
How do they achieve that? They have checklists and they check stand-
ards all the time. They do this because they are aware that if they leave it to
chance they will become store blind and miss the obvious things that the
customer will pick up.
A successful farmers' market must have a checklist that sets the standard
for all stallholders to abide by and organizers should be checking those
standards every time the market opens.
Having said that, we would not recommend that it is left to chance.
Every stallholder should have their own checklist that they use. Once they
have finished building the stall, they should get the checklist out, give it
to one of the team and get them to check the standards to ensure the com-
pany is providing a consistent standard. The following is an example of a
checklist.
YES
NO
STALL
Clean
Floor clean
Produce labelled
Waste bins empty
Linked sales obvious
Produce well displayed
Signage in place
Skirt clean
Litter-free zone
TEAM
Name badges on
Uniforms worn
POINT OF SALE
Change available
Bags ready
