March 3, 2023
It might feel intimidating to price your products if you’re preparing to sell at farmers markets. Prices vary state-to-state, a google search might leave you with outdated info, or you might feel like your price is too high or too low when you look at other market vendors.
For years, the Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets has worked with the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service to collect pricing data from farmers markets across Vermont. The data collected is published for producers to help them accurately price their products, provide values to insurance providers, and help consumers make informed choices.
Up until recently, data has only been available one week at a time in the form of a PDF report highlighting the high, low, and average price for a variety of market crops and meat cuts. Now there is a new tool, the Local Food Pricing Dashboard, that lets you view three years of pricing data for more than 50 market items including fruits, vegetables, beef, poultry, pork, and eggs.
This dashboard can be a starting point for your business to get an idea of what prices look like in Vermont for specific crops, how they’ve changed over time, and what they might look like in the future.
The data is collected on a voluntary basis from farmers market managers across Vermont and represents only products that are not certified organic. A certified organic dashboard will be coming in Spring of 2023, and you can view some organic prices in the weekly PDF reports published by the Agency.
Bookmark the dashboard and use it to help you set competitive pricing throughout the 2023 season! If you have any questions about using the price dashboard, or if you are a market manager who would like to participate in collecting pricing data at your market, contact Drew Watson, Agriculture Development Specialist, at andrew.watson@vermont.gov.
Thanks for reading the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food, and Markets’ Marketing and Agritourism Blog! I’m your guest host this week, Drew Watson. I am an Agriculture Development Specialist at VAAFM working on data and metrics, communications, and the Fairs and Field Days Competitive Grants Program. I graduated with my Masters in Environmental Economics & Policy in May of 2022 and have spent time working in agriculture in New York, Connecticut, and Colorado. Stay tuned every other week for tips on marketing and incorporating agritourism practices on your farm.