Are more small-sized growers contract growing than I think? Exactly 50 percent of respondents to our Top 100 Growers Survey said they use contract growers. So there must be quite a few of them out there. Will we keep seeing a decline in the number of medium- to small-sized growers or will contracting pick up? And where do big and small growers meet to get their businesses to work together.
At OFA Short Course, I heard a little about Maumee Valley Growers, an association "committed to sustaining and growing the greenhouse industry in northwest Ohio." Here's their logo.
They've got an energy purchasing program. So are small growers in as much trouble as everyone says they are?
2 comments:
Sara,
I don't know if we are in big trouble but smaller growers really need to be creative and damn good at what they do to stay in business. We must become as efficient as possible and maintain our prices in order to keep some kind of competitive advantage and above all else we must produce high quality products.
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I forgot to add that we contract grow quite a bit of product. It's nice because we can move a big chunk of greenhouse space quickly which allows us to turn the space again. It's difficult at times as well. This spring, when the first 2 weeks of April was bloody awful, we had to eat some product because our destination grower had the same weather and the product had nowhere to go. But, when the weather breaks it is nice to move trailer loads of product at a time.
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