AGRITOURISM — It’s not just young and newbie small-scale farmers who embrace agritourism to help their farm’s profit. The long-time small-scale farming community is also restoring its rural livelihood with agritourism as well.
Here’s Farmer Bob Ricci in his own words about his journey back to full time farming:
My great-grandpa homesteaded our farm in 1888. My father planted a small strip of sweet corn for me in 1982. I was nine years old. I sold the corn on the side of our country road much like that of a lemonade stand. This little business of mine slowly grew over the years until the time came for me to go off to college in Pullman. I drove home every weekend during the fall (with the exception of home Cougar football games!) After graduation, I returned home and expanded to wholesaling my corn to Safeway. This was a great deal of work on top of running the dairy with my dad. We were a dairy farm until 2001 when my father made the tough decision to sell our cows. This turned into a blessing in disguise.
I added a pumpkin patch and a corn maze that year. The biggest addition that year was turning our calf barn built in 1898 into a country store. This was a fantastic improvement over our little corn stand we used for the previous 15 years. However without the dairy, I had to get a full time job off the farm to support my new family. I figured I would only have to work both jobs for maybe 2-3 years until our farm operation could support us. A funny thing happened during those next few years, my wife Sarah and I kept having one daughter after another. Each time we had a new baby girl, I would tell my employer that they had me for at least another year. I dare not leave a good job with full medical and dental! Well nearly 8 years and 5 daughters later, I finally was able to leave my job April 30, 2009.
This was my first season completely focused on the farm, and what a difference it made. We increased our revenue by 35% even with a soggy October. I could not have done it without the blessing of the Good Lord, the help of my amazing wife Sarah and my parents and our dedicated group of volunteers. The Snohomish Festival of Pumpkins and the NABC (Northwest Agriculture Business Center) have also played a major part in this story as well. I am absolutely living my dream.
Our goals for this next year include traveling to Lancaster, Pennsylvania for the North American Farm Direct Marketing Association conference to get new ideas for our farm. We would like to add more attractions to entertain our visitors.