Website Connects Farmers To Food-Buying Customers

Website Connects Farmers To Food-Buying Customers COMPUTERS George Duggan knows that farmers are good at growing and producing food but they often lack expertise when it comes to marketing direct to customers That’s why Duggan created Eat From Farms com a website created specifically so farmers can better manage the inventory sales and distribution end of their business Duggan says EFF is very affordable for farms offering food products direct to consumers or restaurants “EFF provides farmers with a website platform that allows them to manage their own online real time inventory of products for sale so customers know what’s available at a glance ” Duggan says “The system automatically organizes orders by neighborhoods delivery dates or farm pickup ” Customers can pay for products by cash check or credit card and also draw against a pre-paid balance Transactions processed through the system by credit card are charged 2 9 percent plus 30 cents per transaction and there is no monthly fee An EFF account costs just $150 a year to setup and maintain and carries a full money back guarantee for 90 days EFF also charges a small fee per transaction which provides an incentive to help farms grow their sales “We’ve had very good success with the program and have farm customers in 25 states ” Duggan says “Many of our farmers can’t believe how easy the system is to operate and how well it organizes their marketing efforts The system works well for marketing to individuals resturants or anyone who wants to buy direct from farmers ” Dale and Linda Hudspeth operate a grassfed meat farm in Texas and use EFF to market their products to families and restaurants The Hudspeths like the scheduled opening and closing times for placing orders and say several of their chef customers like using the system because they can order day or night “EFF has cut down our invoicing time because it does the math and we can just print the orders Customers then have an online record of their past orders and invoices ” the Hudspeths say Ohio dairy farmers Jacob and Elizabeth Coleman like the EFF system because it gives them an easy-to-edit shopping cart/website system The Colemans are a grass-based dairy that participates in herd sharing so other owners can easily look over their stock and order their biweekly selection “We’ve expanded our direct marketing in a way we couldn’t have done before ” say the Colemans EFF also has marketing materials to help promote direct sales to interested buyers Brochures can be sent to targeted portions of neighborhoods within a farm’s primary market area EFF also helps farms with website content logos branding and pricing Contact: FARM SHOW Followup Eat From Farms 431 Old Best Road West Sand Lake New York 12196 ph 518 326-1638; www eatfromfarms com; George@eatfromfarms com

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