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2016 Farmers Market Overview

9/28/2016

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Booth before the market started.
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Booth after the market ended.
I've ended my second season of selling at a farmers market! The results are in:

I ended out the season with a tidy $509.66 in net profits (an average of $50.97 per week- TWICE as much as last year). This was $23.30 more than I made last year, despite the fact that I only went to ten markets instead of 21.

Beneficial Changes in 2016:

1. Drove a small car instead of a large truck. This made parking, packing up and unloading so much easier. It allowed me to go to the market without a helper more often, and it also saved $3.00 per week on gas.

2. Only sold 4-5 different baked goods every week. I made one type of cookies, one type of granola, one type of pie/dessert, and one or two different types of bread. This cut down on baking time, and made it easier for people to chose what they were going to buy.

3. Simplified my booth setup. By this I mean: no brochures, signs or display shelf. Because I made only one kind of cookie/bread/pie, etc., I didn't have to put a separate sign by each item. The only little signs I had were for books, jam, eggs and produce.

4. Simplified some of my packaging, to make logistics move faster. I stopped cutting fancy corners for my labels, and started using actual granola bags instead of twist tie bags. The granola bags cost about $0.25 each, and the smallest package I could buy was 50 bags. I think this was a great investment because I noticed a lot more granola selling this year. On the other hand, I bought a huge box of pie boxes (150) for $0.25 each, but only used 26 of the boxes (and 8 of them were wasted because the product didn't sell). The boxes made transportation easier and improved the appearance of my goods, but I don't think they actually increased sales, plus they added on additional $0.25 of cost onto each item I made. Often I would spend just as much on packaging for a pie ($0.25 for the box and $0.65 for the tin) as I would spend on ingredients. I am going list my remaining pie boxes on Ebay to see if I can get some of my money back. If they don't sell, I will just keep on using them, but I probably won't buy any more. Lastly, I tried using adhesive kraft paper for jam labels. While it did improve the appearance, the labels were so big that it was hard to see the contents, and the brown color made them harder to read. The labels were also expensive and a pain to format, print and cut out. Next year I will not do the adhesive labels. 


5. Took a summer break. I took half of June and all of July and August off this year, with the exception of one week in July. I really enjoyed this time off and it helped me get excited for the fall "season" of market instead of just being burned out.

6. Tried a different market. I learned that even if a market is smaller, you can still net the same amount if costs are low enough. Next year I am going to switch markets to help lower costs.

7. Sold vegetables, fruit and eggs. These items have a 100% profit margin*, and were not much extra work to bring. The fruit and vegetables took about an hour to prepare the night before, whereas the baked goods took all afternoon, plus some.

8. Sold more jam and soap. These were some value-added items I chose to sell from my little farm. If fruit didn't sell at the market, I made it into jam and sold that later. The soap was made from goat's milk, animal fat that I salvaged, and only a few other ingredients. Both the jam and soap had a pretty high profit margin (80%) compared to the baked goods (50%-75%).


Farmers Market: An Inefficient System?

One thing I've realized after two years of selling is that you can't make a fortune at the farmers market. In fact, I can't even make minimum wage. Even though I cut my working hours by a LOT this year, I was still working 6-7 hours both on Friday and Saturday. My average net profit ($50.00) divided by average working hours (13 hours per weekend), equals $3.84 per hour.

In talking with other vendors, I learned that our market and others in the area have done worse overall in 2016 than in previous years. Though there are plenty of people walking around, many of those people are not shopping. The farmers market has become more of a social event than a shopping one. And honestly, I can't really blame the consumers. In order to make half of minimum wage selling my wares, I have to charge a high price for the things I make.

And so it starts a vicious cycle: vendors don't sell because they can't make money, and shoppers don't buy because things are too expensive. Not everyone will agree with this, but that is just how I see it. Here are two big reasons I am not making enough at the farmers market:

Problem #1- Costs: If I could take home ALL of my profits- about $100.00 per week- I would be more excited about selling. I would also be making $7.69 per hour. The problem is that I have to pay for gas ($3.00), booth fee ($20.00), costs of goods sold (about 20% of gross sales) and the cost of goods I don't sell. As you can see, out of my $100.00, $43.00 is automatically subtracted. Even more is subtracted if it is a rainy day, or if I didn't sell as much, or if I sold less produce (high profit margin) and more baked goods (lower profit margin).

Problem #2- Rainy Days: I learned in my first year that cold and rainy days cut profits by up to 50% or more. It is not worth my time to go to a market on a rainy day, but many markets need to know MONTHS in advance which weeks you will be there. So I pick my weeks, and half of them could be ruined by the weather. It's understandable that many markets want to know ahead of time who will be coming, but selling during rainy days makes it even harder to earn money.

One big reason I have for attending a different market next year is the flexibility. Some of the markets I'm looking at don't require you to sign up months ahead of time. I would be able to look at the weather on Friday, and tell the market master whether I was coming or not on Saturday. I could avoid a lot of rainy/miserable days this way and keep my hourly wage above $5.00 per hour.


Thoughts for Next Year

One big problem with my current market is booth fee, which is $20.00. By attending a smaller market, I could be saving $15.00 per week. That extra $15.00 could mean an extra $1.15 per hour, or a 29% pay raise. A market that is closer will also require less gas ($1.00 savings) which will bring my hourly wage up as well.

The other problem is what I'm selling. This summer I sold about 60% baked goods and 40% farm and garden products. Here are the profit margins for some of my baked goods:

White Bread: 94%
Quick Bread: 84%
Fruit Tart: 77%
Monster Cookies: 74%
Fruit Cobbler: 58%
Granola: 56%
Fruit Crisp: 52%

On a given week, I could easily sell $18.00 worth (6 dozen) of eggs and keep 100% of the profit to myself. In order to earn the same amount with zucchini bread, however, I would have to sell $21.50 worth of goods. In order to earn the same amount with granola, I would have to sell over $32.00 worth of products. An easy way for me to cut down on time AND costs would be to sell just produce instead of baked goods.

My big changes for next year will be 1) selling fewer baked goods in proportion to farm products, and 2) selling at smaller markets. The $20.00/wk. market is just not sustainable for me. Even after two years, I am still earning less than my $4.00/hr. "housewife wage". I don't regret doing the market this year, but $3.84 per hour is still not enough to make it worth my time.

I still believe, though, that selling at a farmers market can be a good side-hustle for the housewife with an empty pocketbook. Even $50.00 per week can go a long way for the frugal lady.

Reasons to Sell at a Farmers Market:

1. It only takes one day (one or two half days) per week.

2.You can sell things that you're going to make anyway (bread, jam, garden produce, soap, etc.)

3. You can have children help with the production, packaging, and even selling if they're old enough.

4. You don't need any special skills, as opposed to giving music lessons or doing photography for people as a side-income. 

5. Relatively small one-time investment: if you have to buy a tent and table, it will cost about $250.00 to get started. However, you could always find a cheap tent, used tent, borrow a tent or not use a tent at all.

If you would like to try doing a farmers market for the first time, I would recommend investing $5.00 in the ebook version of my book, One Season of Farmers Market. If you don't have a Kindle, download the free Kindle app on your desktop or phone, and read it that way. I guarantee that you'll save 10x what you paid for it. If you DO end up selling at a market, you won't waste money making a bunch of stuff that doesn't sell. If you DON'T end up selling at a market, you'll save yourself the cost of "learning the hard way" and investing $250.00 into stuff you'll never use again. With my book, you'll save either way!! And that is my shameless plug. 

Til next time,
-Bethany

*You do have to pay for chicken feed in order to produce eggs. However, I have regular out-the-door egg customers who provide enough income for the care and keeping of the chickens.

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Frugal Accomplishments This Week

9/26/2016

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This rose bloomed on my birthday! I bought it when I was a teenager and it came with me when I married Hubs. It has the most amazing scent.
Lately I feel like I've been a little short on frugal accomplishments. I've been working a lot on my new book, The Housewife's Guide to Frugal Food- How to Eat for $10.00 per Week. Feedback has come in from beta readers, which is exciting. Right now I'm in the final stages of editing and filling in the cracks where readers requested more information or pointed out different flaws. This was really helpful, and I'm so thankful for those who offered to help!

The subtitle of my book, "How to Eat for $10.00 per Week" came last year when Hubs and I were reviewing our 2015 spending. To my surprise, I discovered that we were spending about $80.00 per month, more or less, on groceries. This year has been similar. In fact, our average monthly spending has been about $64.00; that is about $8.00 per person per week. Earlier in the year, I decided to write a little handbook for those of you who are looking for more ways to save money on groceries. After doing additional research for the book, I've learned a lot more myself, which is probably why our grocery bill has become even lower than last year.

For the month of October, I would like to show you what this kind of spending looks like, practically. I'm going to do the best I can to take pictures of different meals and include prices of each, where I got the ingredients, etc. Fall is a good time to do this, because the garden and farm animals are slowing down and I don't get to "cheat" with all of the free milk, eggs and produce. For the next six months, we will be buying milk and eggs too, most likely.

Here is a picture of what we bought for groceries this week:
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Groceries This Week:

1 gallon milk- $1.69
1 head cabbage- $0.98
3 lbs. yellow onions- $1.94
2.6 lbs. bulk carrots- $1.75
1 doz. large eggs- $1.68
2 boxes ice cream- $6.00

You'll notice that the ice cream is not included in my photo. That is because my first thought was, "The ice cream doesn't count because it was for a special occasion." Then I reminded myself that it DID count, because every week there is probably a special occasion that we buy stuff for. 

Some other "groceries" I plan on using this week are fresh tomatoes from the garden, a small pumpkin I found in the backyard, a bag of apples my mom gave me, foraged greens, and meat from the freezer. I will probably use a lot of other things in the pantry too, like flour, spices, canned goods, or rice. I will try to keep track of these items as well.

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Frugal Accomplishments This Week:

1. Collected grass clippings to use as mulch.

2. Harvested beans, peppers, tomatoes and broccoli from the garden. I froze the broccoli and peppers, we ate the beans for dinner, and I also dried some of the hot peppers to use as spices. I used the tomatoes to make seven pints of salsa. On Friday I harvested tomatoes again, but instead of canning them I sold some at the farmers market and gave the rest away. I am really sick of doing tomatoes.

3. Sold 2 dozen eggs. The chickens are really slowing down at this point, so I've started buying eggs to supplement what we are getting.

4. Earned $22.52 at the farmers market. This was my last week of market. I have a detailed post coming about all of the things I learned this year, improvements made and possible plans for next year.

5. A neighbor let me dig up some of her echinacea and also a baby Catalpa tree. I transplanted the echinacea into my garden right away. I'm still trying to decide where to put the tree. I've noticed that many of the homes in our area built in the 1860's- 1870's have Catalpa trees planted in the front yard somewhere or beside the driveway. So I kind of want to continue the tradition with our house, which was built around the turn of the century.

6. Thursday was my birthday! To celebrate, I got a free birthday pizza from our local pizzeria. Hubs and I shared it for lunch. Later in the day we went to the R. E. Olds Transportation Museum in Lansing, followed by a visit to one of my favorite stores; William Sonoma. I did a lot of drooling over the pretty cookware, and then we left empty-handed. That was the frugal part.
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After that, we went to Goodwill. I found an old thread box to store all of my random garage sale threads for $1.00.
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After shopping, we went to a fancy Italian restaurant, which wasn't frugal but it was REALLY good!!!

This week I look forward to finish up some fall harvest tasks, finishing up my book, and doing some fall cleaning/organization projects.

What did you do to be frugal this week? What is your favorite part about autumn?
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Frugal Accomplishments This Week

9/19/2016

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After a week of travel, I was super excited to get back home and start doing some frugal stuff again.

1. Earned $34.11 (after costs) at the farmers market. Given the fact that it rained almost the entire time, I think we can call that a success. Out of everything I took to market, the only perishables I brought back were chili peppers, some tomatoes, two loaves of white bread and a bag of cookies. The cookies were reused for a potluck dish, I froze one of the bread loaves, and we are eating the other one. Yay for no waste!

I am very happy with how the farmers market has been going this year. Last year I would bring home between $20.00 and $40.00 each week after costs, and I would also bring home a lot of products that didn't sell. This year I am averaging (and that includes rainy days!) a net profit of over $50.00 each week. I spend about half as much time baking, but this year I have eggs and garden produce to sell, which are 100% profit and very easy to do, compared to baked goods. Soap and jams are also cheap, reliable sellers to make. I am not selling as many books this fall as I did in the spring, but that is probably because anyone who wanted to buy one has already done so.

2. Recycled farmers market cookies for a potluck dish. There weren't quite enough cookies, so I used a box of cookie mix ($0.75 at the bent 'n' dent) to make some more.

3. Line dried three loads of laundry.

4. Sold three dozen eggs.

5. Picked up aluminum cans to recycle while on a walk and bike ride.

6. Harvested tomatoes, peppers, grapes, peaches, pears, lavender and basil from the garden. I also blanched and froze some green beans from last week and dried the lavender and basil. I did finally get a chance to make pesto with some of the basil.

I didn't have time to do anything with the tomatoes, grapes, or pears. But that is why farmers market is so great! Instead of just letting stuff rot in the garden, I can put it into brown paper bags and sell it at $3.00 per bag. I used a few pears that were left on the tree to make two pear tarts to sell, and ended up making a net profit of $9.32, which is pretty cool.

7. One of my hens hatched out a little chick! It is SOOOO cute! I posted a video on Instagram if any of you are on there.
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8. Collected grass for the lasagna beds in my garden. I also cleaned out my future duckling brooder pen, and will use that litter on my raised beds as well.

9. Hubs helped me put a timer on the light in the chicken coop. Back in August I realized that the hens had slowed down with egg production. I thought it was because of the rain/bad weather, but as production dropped even lower in September, I realized that they needed more light in order to keep laying. Finally last week we figured out the timer, and now they seem to be picking up a little bit. I need to remember this for next year though, because I could have used some more eggs at the market last week.

10. Picked a 5-gallon bucket full of sumac fruits for my goats. I am going to save these, along with the tree hay I've been collecting, to use as feed this winter.

11. Bought packets of eggplant and marigold seeds on sale for $0.25 each. I will use these for next year. And no, I'm not really sure if we will actually eat eggplant. But it will be fun to try.

12. Got free admission to a museum. On Sunday we went to the Michigan History Museum in Lansing. Normally the museum charges $6.00 each for adults, but on Sunday the fee is waived. Hours are short on Sunday though, from 1:00 pm to 5:00 pm. It was a fun way to spend the afternoon.

13. Lastly, Shutterfly had a promotion for a free 8" x 8" photo book. I decided to make a book on our trip to Guatemala in 2014. Shipping for the book was still $8.50, so it was not entirely "free". However, my last "free" photo book from Walgreens was about the same price, so I'm confident that it's about the least you can pay for a photo book. I'm looking forward to comparing the quality of the two books.

One of my decorating goals is to get photo books for ALL of our travels, so I was pretty excited about the Shutterfly offer. As of today (Monday) it is still open, for any of you who would like to have a photo book made.

Til next time,
-Bethany
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August Hobby Farm Update

9/14/2016

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August was a good month for my little hobby farm.

Goats
WE FINALLY SOLD THE BABY GOATS!!!

We had been trying to sell the baby goats since the beginning of June, and at last our herd is down to two goats. And I'm totally okay with that. Chores only take half as long because I don't have to hide the chicken feed and keep the kids distracted while I open and close gates.

I ended up selling the kids for less than half of what I thought they were worth to begin with. In talking to different potential buyers, I learned that they are more interested in shots, disbudding and price than they are about the goats being registered. I did not plan on doing shots because the goats were not in a dirty, confined environment with a ton of other goats, but potential buyers cared less about how the goats were raised and more that they had been given shots to be "healthy".

When all was said and done, the goats sold for only $25-$50 more than comparative non-registered goats. Registration is still a good investment if you keep in mind that it only costs $10.00 for each kid. However, my start up costs for being registered (membership $50.00, tattooing kit $38.50, transfer fees for Barry & Adi $12.00) were a little over $100.00 before I ever sold the kids. So if you are a farm on a shoestring budget, save registration for a couple years down the road. People told me that I would get $100.00 more for an animal with papers, but they didn't tell me when to sell, which was obviously more important.

I think I will keep on registering any does that Adi has in the future. Membership renewal is $25.00 per year, but ADGA does provide a lot of information, networking etc. that I think might be worth the money. Plus, if we get any does next year, I will sell them at the proper time (with proper disbudding/shots/etc.) and see if they are really worth $100.00 more than non-registered goats. 

Adi and Barry are doing well. At the beginning of August, I decided to try out a weekly herbal wormer with Adi. I bought this one from Amazon. At first I tried just mixing it in her feed, but she didn't really like it that way. Then I followed the instructions to make dosage balls, which are 1) herbal wormer, 2) oat flour, and 3) peanut butter. After mixing it all together, you can store the balls in an airtight container in the fridge. One batch makes six balls, which will last me six weeks. When I gave one to Adi for the first time, she gobbled it up like candy. I know the peanut butter adds cost, but it is so much fun to watch her inhale her weekly treat.

Chickens... and Ducks!
Likewise, the chickens are doing well, especially now that the kid goats are not stealing feed anymore. We have only had one (non-violent) chicken loss since we built the coop.

At the beginning of August, we came home from the local 4-H livestock sale with three ducks; two male and one female. The female was an egg layer! When they learned that I was interested in keeping the ducks for egg production, the 4-H family offered us another laying duck. All we had to do was go and pick it up! So we now have four ducks. The only big difference between ducks and chickens is that ducks MUST have water to splash around in. I get a kick out of watching them play and clean themselves every morning.

At the end of August, egg production was down to 5-10 eggs per day, depending on the weather. We had an exceptionally hot summer, and after July raccoon attacks we were left with only 26 birds (not including the ducks). Out of the 26, there were 3-4 roosters, one "mystery layer" (it's a mystery where she will lay her eggs) and one or two hens that like to go broody (and thus, are not laying any eggs).

In addition to acquiring the ducks, I also bought/traded some Barred Rock chickens from my brother. A month ago I gave him some eggs to incubate in his new incubator, and he offered me three chicks (a certain percentage of those that hatched) in exchange. In addition to the three, I also purchased two more chicks from him. The chicks were about a month old when I got them. I really like the Barred Rocks because they are a good laying hen, but also have some meat on them if you intend to butcher.

My plan with the new chicks is to put leg bands on them, to keep track of how old they are in the coming years. When they get to be older and not laying as much, we will use them for stew hens. Right now with my mixed flock, I can't tell who is laying eggs and who isn't. I'm a little bit afraid to butcher any of them, lest I cut my egg production by 10-20%!

Profit & Loss

Expenses:
Chick Grower- $6.30 (I used a 10% off coupon!)
Herbal Wormer- $28.17
New chicks- $11.00
Total expenses: $45.47

Income:
Milk products: $24.00
Eggs: $22.00
Goat kids: $325.00
Total income: $371.00

Total net profit: $325.53

Year-to-date net profit: $382.45

I am excited about the future of our little hobby farm. At the end of August I saved my best duck eggs (and got some from the neighbor!) for my brother to incubate. If all works out, we should have some little ducklings hatching in September. I am going to see if I can butcher, and possibly sell them as Christmas ducks.

With three weeks of farmers market in September, I am pretty sure that we will have nearly $500.00 in the hobby farm pot in another month or so. This money will be needed to keep feeding the poultry and goats through the winter, when they will not be earning or even saving any money. I figure the chickens/ducks will eat about $50.00/mo. worth of feed starting in November, and the goats will be eating probably $20.00 worth of hay and grain during that time as well.

Five non-productive months x $70.00 = $350.00. 

Sustainability of Doing a Farmers Market

So far, this year's farmers market experience has been 100% better than last (literally). My average net profit per week has been about $56.00. There is less work involved, and the work I do is more enjoyable. As I move along in my second year, I am still tweaking things to make them better. Next year my plan is to spend the month of May and possibly September at my expensive market ($20.00/wk), and work a more local, cheaper market ($5.00/wk) at least once a month during June, July, August, and possibly October (if the weather is nice). 

May: $200.00 net profit
September: $200.00 net profit
Other months: $200.00 net profit

This $600.00 should easily cover the cost of my goats and poultry, especially now that I have bought all of the expensive kidding supplies. Therefore, I deem farmers markets a sustainable way to support a hobby farm. If your hobby farm is fully supported, it means that your family can eat the surplus completely for free. Which is pretty awesome.

Other Forms of Income

Out-the-door customers: are a lot less work than market customers. Some day I would love to have the customers coming to me instead of doing markets. However, at this point in time my OTD sales provide less than half of the funds needed to support the farm.

Craigslist baby animals: my baby goats brought in $325.00, which is enough to support mama and daddy goat for a whole year, plus some. I hope to sell more baby animals in the future, especially now that I have access to an incubator.

Writing books: This year I am starting to see some money trickle in each month from my Amazon books. In the future I would like to write a series about frugal/sustainable hobby farming and put the proceeds right back into my own hobby farm.

Etsy store: So far my Etsy store hasn't sold anything farm-related. But it is something I'd like to put a little more effort into before I call it quits. As mentioned before, I would love to move away from the market model so I have fewer customers to deal with.

Til next time,
Bethany

*Oh yes- I did not count the cost of the ducks in this month's P&L because Hubs' business bought them. A 4-H auction is not really a place to find bargain animals. Our ducks cost over $100.00 each. The going rate for non-4-H full grown ducks is about $10.00-$20.00 each, but you can also buy ducklings during the spring for $5.00 or so each.
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Frugal Accomplishments Last Week

9/7/2016

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Hi everyone! This week's updates are a little late, as we've been gone camping. We'll be super busy again this weekend, and will NOT be doing anything frugal, so really I am just popping in here to let you know I'm still alive until probably late next week.

1. Sold one dozen eggs.

2. Harvested peppers, beans, tomatoes, broccoli, and chili peppers from the garden. We are also eating green grapes from the orchard/vineyard, which are WONDERFUL!

3. Printed out some free music theory games for my piano students.

4. Made cheese with a bunch of milk from the neighbor's cow.

5. Bought a large candle on sale for $1.50. It is a wonderful scent, and now I'm sorry I didn't buy another one. I'm a sucker for candles.

6. Canned some beans and peas that were frozen. I am trying to clean out the freezer for this year's produce and probably more meat this fall. Instead of just dumping the aged produce, I decided to can it. Honestly, we will probably eat the canned stuff before the frozen. I find it hard to remember to defrost vegetables.

7. Earned $71.55 at the farmers market this week. This is actually the most money I have netted per week during the entire season. Fall is a great time to sell at a farmers market.  I sold almost all of the perishable bakery and produce items, as well as some of the non-perishables (jams, books, soap, etc.). It was a very good week and I was happy that I had the opportunity to go.
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Some new things I started selling for autumn: duck eggs, peach cobbler, pear tart, and selective produce (any extra from the garden). The pear tart received a lot of positive comments, but nobody bought it. Farmers market customers usually like buying familiar items, so that was not a surprise to me. The produce sold reasonably well; I came home with two out of eight bags. The duck eggs sold, but only after all of my chicken eggs were gone.

One lady came up and asked how much my eggs cost. I gave her the price of my chicken eggs, which had sold out, and said that I also had duck eggs available. "Duck eggs!" she whined, with a disgusted scowl. "I don't want no [expletive] duck eggs," she grumbled, and walked away.

A couple years ago, this kind of thing probably would have ruined my morning. I don't understand why anyone would speak to a complete stranger that way. However, I've learned that some people don't realize how nasty or rude they are. Others can just make things weird. Earlier this year I had an older man try to barter down something to half price. I didn't budge. Last week another lady bought some grapes and started to eat them. "Oh," she said, disappointed. "They have seeds." Well duh- they are not from the store! I thought. She spit out the seeds, one by one, in front of my booth. I thought about giving her a refund and offering to take the grapes back, but decided not to. She had already gotten into them and I didn't want to re-sell them like that. 

That being said, I enjoyed talking to the other customers and making a lot of sales. One man and his mother stopped by and asked for danishes- "those triangle things". "Aw man," he said, "They were amazing! Crunchy, but soft, and perfectly buttery. You should make those again." I love comments like that!

8. Canned peaches. Someone told my mother-in-law that they had seen peaches for $15.00 per bushel, which is a great deal. I told her I would take some, as our peach tree didn't do well this year. When she got to the orchard, she realized that the neighbor had misspoke or misunderstood the price, and it was actually $15.00 per half bushel. I still took a quarter bushel, though, because I really like peaches.

Now here's the frugal part- instead of just canning them all, I used about half of the peaches to make peach cobbler for the farmers market. I sold two cobblers at a profit of $4.50 each. The profit from peach cobbler was enough to cover my cost of ALL of the peaches ($7.50). Therefore, I was able to can seven pints of peach slices for a cost of $0.00. 

That is it for now! 

-Bethany
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Tips for Giving Piano Lessons

9/1/2016

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Good morning everyone! Today I thought I'd share a few things I've learned in the past year giving piano lessons. You can apply the concepts to any music lesson, really.

Why Give Piano Lessons?

For those of you who have children, the reason to give your child piano lessons is quite obvious. To better their future, of course! While music may not be a lucrative career for everyone, it will provide more opportunities  to make friends. It will give your teenagers something to do in their free time. Music can also be used more creatively. When I was 15 or 16, my sister and I got into writing parodies. She would write the words, and I would provide the music. We used parodies for everything from memorizing information to selling 4-H cattle to giving reports in college. Later on, I played in several bands and doors opened in that way. I actually met my husband through a music group I was involved in. !!!

Free pianos are everywhere, if you are willing to move them. This is a good deal, financially speaking, except that acoustic pianos (the kind you don't plug in) will require tuning once a year, more or less, for a cost of $75.00-$150.00 depending on your area. It might be more frugal to buy a $50.00 used keyboard for your beginning students, and maybe upgrade to the real thing if they still show interest in a few years. 

For those of you who don't have children, but still have some musical ability, giving lessons will allow you to pass on your love for music, and make a few bucks on the side. To be honest, giving beginner lessons is quite easy for the money you make. In our area, you could make $20.00-$30.00 per hour giving beginner lessons, without any sort of degree or training. If you don't have a nice piano at home, you can always do lessons at the student's home, using their instrument.

Understand What Motivates Students (and Parents)

When you are giving piano lessons, it's important to realize that you are in the motivation business, not necessarily the teaching business. Of course you will do some teaching sometimes, but the lesson book will do most of the actual teaching. You are there to reinforce the teaching, answer questions, and provide motivation and encouragement for the student. Different aged students require different forms of motivation:

1. Young Beginners (ages 3-8): teaching young beginners will be a slow process. Unless you are working with a prodigy, this is the hardest age group to teach. You will spend the lesson trying to 1) keep their attention, 2) entertain them, and 3) reinforce whatever you taught them last week. I try to keep lessons very short for this age group- 10-20 minutes- because they have a short attention span. If the parent insists on more time, you can fill it up with games or fun things. It is really useless to try and have a five-year-old sight read for 20 minutes straight. 

Most children are coming to lessons because their parent made them or convinced them to. This makes it harder because you have to please the child by making the lesson fun, but you also have to please the parent with decent progress in learning. Sometimes parents don't understand that you can't force a child to learn, but even if your student is not learning as much as Mom would like, she will probably not make him quit (or change teachers) if he enjoys coming to see you every week. So you need to focus on pleasing the child first.

2. Older Beginners (ages 8-13): this age group is easier to teach because they will pick up musical concepts quicker and be more apt to practice. However, like the younger group, their motivation is not necessarily to get better at their instrument. Some good motivators for this group are 1) competition and 2) prizes. Though a 10-year-old may feel good after completing a piece, adding a real tangible reward will help reinforce that feeling of accomplishment.

3. Teenagers: I would say that teenagers are the easiest group of beginner students. They understand rhythm, harmony, melody, and note reading very easy. Oftentimes they have their own motivations for taking the lesson (especially if they are paying for it themselves) which include 1) learning a new skill, 2) being able to play with their peers, or 3) impressing the opposite sex. Number three is a real motivator for boys, especially. A teenager should not really need a prize after finishing the piece, because that will be reward enough in itself. It is a good idea to let teenagers pick their own song. If they need help deciding, suggest a piece from their favorite movie. What is cooler than playing a song that all of your friends can recognize?

Tips & Resources

Below are some things I have been using to help motivate my students, and some things I've done to keep them on track. 

1. Play a new piece every week. Sometimes a student doesn't practice at all and really needs to do the piece two weeks in a row, but try hard to get them on a new piece every week. I can remember as a student being very bored and discouraged playing the same piece week after week. 

If the piece is too big for your student to play well in one week, you can 1) break the piece into lines or pages, or 2) lower your standards of completion. Try to focus on one element of a song (rhythm, correct notes, dynamics, etc.) instead of insisting that everything be perfect. Remember, the five-year-old can't even comprehend what a perfect piece is, let alone perform one.

If you want your students to learn how to sight read well, it is very important that they play a new piece every week, regardless of how well they played it. The point is quantity, not quality. 

2. Have a game at the end of the lesson. There are a million gazillion music games out there for free on the internet. Sometimes I feel cheated because, as a student, I NEVER had games during my lessons. Some of the games I've picked for my students are "the high/low game" (i.e. aural training) where they close their eyes and guess if a note I played is higher or lower than the first; flash cards; matching printed keyboard sections to the piano keys, sight-reading crossword puzzles, and note-matching games. Like I said, there are a million out there. Find an area your student needs to work on, and then find a game that fits.

3. Have a "prize box". This is just a small plastic crate full of odds and ends that I picked up at the Dollar Tree or garage sales. Fake jewelry, stickers, notebooks, candy, or whatever else I think will be interesting to my students. At first, I would randomly have "prize box day" every other month or so. On prize box day, the students got a prize for how many songs they could play me, how many flashcards they could memorize, etc. Now I have a sticker chart, and when they reach a certain amount of stickers, they get a prize. This works better because it keeps them motivated every week (getting to put a sticker on their chart after every task) and still keeps the prize box idea going.

Getting prizes and stickers and a new song every week will help keep your student interested, which is really the most important thing when you are teaching someone under 10 years old. If you are looking to make money, young beginner students are the easiest to get because every parent wants little Johny or Sally to take music lessons. Therefore, knowing how to motivate young children is essential. A slow, but excited learner is better than an overwhelmed learner who quits altogether.

Starting a Music Studio

If you are thinking about giving lessons to earn money, there are some things you need to decide. I am not a "kid person", so I have chosen to keep my student number relatively low. I don't give lessons to kids that I know will misbehave or be difficult. Life is too short to dread giving a music lesson every week, even for $30.00 an hour. So...

1. Select your students carefully. Don't forget that when you select a student, you are also selecting a parent. Your student may be brilliant, but if they are late every week or don't pay, that can become an issue. And the issue is probably with the parent, not the child.

2. Set a price. As a student, I remember paying between $12.00 and $15.00 for a half hour lesson. As a teacher, I would decide a price based on what people are willing to pay and how bad you want the client. I would rather give a $5.00 lesson to a good student than a $15.00 lesson to a bad one.

3. Decide if you host lessons at your home or do house calls. I figure that if someone wants lessons bad enough, they will be able to come to my house. It is less time and gas money for me that way. Plus the students will be less distracted and better behaved. 

4. Invest back into your students. I like to take a portion of my earnings and buy nice things for the prize box and/or make up birthday gifts. If you see a piece of music that you think your student would like, buy that as a gift. $60.00 per month for one or two students is a lot of money. Don't you think $5.00 spent on prizes every month would be worth keeping your clientele? I certainly think so.

Resources:

Most of the information I shared today was gleaned or pilfered from other fantastic resources. Isn't it a beautiful thing that work has been done for you? Here are some ideas:

​Teach Piano Today Podcast
Color In My Piano (fun worksheets and games) colorinmypiano.com/printables/?dl_cat=4
Hoffman Academy (free online piano lessons)

Good luck and happy teaching!
-Bethany
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    Bethany

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