One of the tools available to farmers to help determine the success of their business relative to other similar businesses is industry benchmarking. These are measures and standards which a business can use to compare its performance with other similar businesses. For example, greenhouse operations may find that an average labor costs are 21% of their gross sales. By comparing their own labor costs against this measure, the greenhouse operator can determine whether his labor costs are in line with the industry and take steps to reduce these costs.
The Farmers Market Federation of NY and Cornell Cooperative Extension of Broome County are conducting a study of farmers markets with funding provided by the NY Farm Viability Institute,. Our goal is to acquire enough data on both farmers and markets to develop a set of industry standards or benchmarks. These benchmarks, once defined and published, can be used by farmers to analyze their own businesses. By comparing yourself to industry standards, you can evaluate your successes against other farmers with similar products, markets, etc as well as define the areas where you are struggling. Comparisons with industry benchmarks will allow farmers to see their areas of relative weakness and strength and enable them to make critical decisions about how they market their products.
To determine these benchmarks, it is important to survey farmers market vendors to gather data so we can the define industry standards. In fact, 500 farmers and producers are needed to provide enough data to ensure accurate results.
**Help to support the farmers market industry by completing the Farmers Market Benchmark Project survey with your farm information. The survey is located at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FMFNYBenchmarks. This survey is open through December 31st, 2014.
The survey will ask for baseline information on your farm, then move on to questions about your market participation. There are questions for each individual market you participate in, up to 5 markets.
While this survey is lengthy, each question is designed to provide data to allow for multiple comparisons against a wide variety of far types, product lines, and markets. It should take you only 10 – 15 minutes for the baseline information and first market, with an extra 7 – 8 minutes for each additional market.
Thank you in advance for your participation. Watch for the results to be published on our website at www.nyfarmersmarket.com.
For more information or questions, please contact Diane Eggert, deggert@nyfarmersmarket.com or Laura Biasillo, lw257@cornell.edu.
