Reading Time: 7 minutes No matter how closely they watch the skies, farmers can’t control the weather. Nor do they have any influence over the amount of volatility in their markets. But pricing? Well that, says Irmi Critcher, is one aspect of farming that producers can exercise some control over, and that she works hard at. “You can put […] Read more
Active marketing on the farm
On these farms, marketing is no longer a matter of waiting for the right price
A marketing strategy for stored grain
Is it worthwhile to store your grain on the farm while you wait for commodity prices to rise?
Reading Time: 5 minutes Storing grain on the farm can be a good marketing strategy because, if managed carefully, it can increase a producer’s profits, but it’s important to have a handle on your storage and opportunity costs to assess if it’s actually going to put money in the bank. The capital costs of storage vary depending on whether […] Read more
Built on the basis
For this farm, finding a way to participate in how local grain prices get calculated has opened the door for growth and success
Reading Time: 6 minutes Top marketers know that marketing isn’t only the act of selling, it’s the act of knowing. In particular, top farm marketers not only know their own strategies, strengths and needs, they also know how they can make them mesh with the strategies, strengths and needs of their customer, whether that’s an elevator down the road […] Read more
Digital Marketing 101 and social media tips that help promote your farm
In this last column of our value-added series, we look at how social media can boost your value-add project
Reading Time: 5 minutes Anyone can tell you (in fact, they probably already have, more than once) that the Internet is too powerful a tool to ignore for marketing your value-added products. But exactly how can you harness its potential to reach your own goals? When creating an online presence, Nigel Gordijk, owner of Common Sense Design in New […] Read more
Best practices for direct farm marketing and five things you need to avoid
Once you’ve got your value-added product or service ready to go, the hard part’s done, right?
Reading Time: 5 minutes Not so fast. Chances are you are going to need to work hard to build product awareness. The experts agree you need a plan for how you’re going to let your potential customers know why they’re going to want to do business with you. The marketing plan is a vital part of your business plan […] Read more
Will value adding on the farm work for you?
This first in our four-part series on value adding for farmers starts with the most important question of all
Reading Time: 5 minutes So you think you have a great idea for a value-added business on your farm. Before you even begin to evaluate your idea to see if it will fly, however, it’s a good idea to ask the even more basic question: Is this kind of business venture a good fit for you and your family? […] Read more
Getting your crop marketing plan down on paper, and beyond
Why put your marketing plan on paper? Because it pays, no matter where the market goes
Reading Time: 9 minutes A military phrase jumps immediately to mind. Veteran soldiers often say that no battle plan ever survives its first brush with the enemy. On the farm, you might think it means that the time you’d put into laying out a marketing plan is time you could better spend on any of the thousand other things […] Read more
Vegetable grower starts small to grow big
Is diversification the best way to get a start today? As Nathan Klassen is learning, even if the answer is yes, that doesn’t make it easy
Reading Time: 6 minutes Nathan Klassen might not have grown up on a farm, but for as long as he can remember, he’s wanted to be a farmer, so in 2011, in the midst of North America’s record-smashing run-up in the price of farmland, he made that dream come true. Klassen was 24 that year, and he bought his […] Read more
Making sense of ag markets
Agriculture can’t escape global economic trends, but farmers can adapt their market plans to key numbers. In this second of five columns, market analyst Errol Anderson tells us how
Reading Time: 7 minutes Grain prices rise, and grain prices fall. Sometimes it’s a straight supply issue. more grain gets produced, or less gets produced, and prices react accordingly. but those movements tend to happen over the short term. Often too, they’re tough to plan for because they’re sparked by either good weather or bad. Other issues hit on […] Read more
Smarter option use for your market plan
Reading Time: 3 minutes There’s been lots of talk about grain and oilseed growers who lost money on grain options. But it’s a different story this crop year. As a strategy, using put options to protect commodity returns close to their drought-year highs has paid off in spades. That’s because put options act as price insurance. These “puts” place […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
