DeMeritt Hill Farm
Marketing a diversified agritourism farm
Loading up visitors for a hayride at DeMeritt Hill Farm in Lee, NH. Photo: DeMeritt Hill Farm
Choosing effective marketing tactics for your farm's needs
DeMeritt Hill Farm is a 120-acre family farm in Lee, New Hampshire. Since the Wilson family purchased the farm in 1992, they’ve built it into a multi-enterprise agritourism operation offering PYO apples, peaches, blueberries, and Christmas trees as well as hayrides, school tours, special events, Cross Country running, hiking trails, and a full commercial kitchen.
Co-owner Ryan Wilson is thoughtful about how he chooses marketing tactics for the farm. He takes advantage of free social media and supplements it with paid ads.
“We run paid search ads at the beginning of the season to get people into the mindset for PYO,” says Wilson. “It’s been effective for us.” He also pays to boost Facebook posts or run occasional ads.
It would be costly to send snail mail to his entire customer base, so Wilson uses email and social media to update them about PYO, events, and other news. But when he’s trying to book Farm to School tours, he mails postcards to all the teachers and school personnel on his list, because he feels that sending a hard copy about the tours is more effective than an email. It’s obviously working, because DeMeritt Hill Farm welcomes 5,000 school children to the farm each fall.
"Every apple farm needs an antique pick-up truck"
This antique pickup truck serves as an advertising and marketing vehicle when DeMeritt Hill Farm makes deliveries or holds events. Photo: DeMeritt Hill Farm.
“Every apple farm needs an antique pickup truck,” Wilson says. “The pickup truck is a great advertising and marketing vehicle, but also serves other purposes.”
The farm logo on the truck doors is a magnet that can be removed when needed. “This enables us to rent out the truck for events, photo shoots, weddings, and other events,” Wilson adds.
Attracting visitors through events
The Haunted Overload, an internationally famous haunted attraction located on DeMeritt Hill Farm, attracts thousands of visitors each fall. Photo: Artifact Images.
DeMeritt Hill Farm attracts new customers by hosting diverse activities and events. For example, the farm plays host to Torey Roderick Performance Horses and every October, the world-famous Haunted Overload. It also hosts cross-country meets that attract youth and their families from all over New England.
“If you want your farm to stand out, your mindset needs to shift from selling produce to offering a unique experience,” Wilson says. “A positive experience leads to repeat business.”
Using marketing analytics to increase sales
DeMeritt Hill Farm staffer Talbert Edwards prepares apples for shipping. Photo: DeMeritt Hill Farm.
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, DeMeritt Hill Farm wanted to offer curbside delivery and ship products across the US. Wilson had already been using the Square app to accept digital payments at the farm and decided to use Square’s website platform to create an online store.
DeMeritt Hill Farm now operates its online store each summer and fall. “We get orders from customers who’ve moved away, but still receive our enewsletter, as well as from total strangers who find the farm online or through social media,” Wilson says.
Wilson likes the fact that the online store is integrated with Square’s digital payment systems, Mailchimp and QuickBooks, which streamlines marketing, inventory, and bookkeeping. “I do a lot of marketing with Square,” he says. “We use their customer loyalty program to send out discount coupons and we also offer Square’s digital and plastic gift cards.”
Square also lets him track previous orders, so if customers opt-in for his email list, he can send personalized emails suggesting other products or activities that they might like. He segments his 30,000 person email list by the types of products customers purchased, events attended, how long they’ve been a customer, and other characteristics.
“Analytics are a great tool,” Wilson says. “They help you reach your customers more effectively.”