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Favorite FAN Feature: Grass Fed Cattle Co
198 Plays4 years ago
Description:
In this episode of the Direct Farm Podcast, Valarie Luhman of Grass Fed Cattle Co will share with Rory, their favorite Barn2Door feature and tips that have helped her business profit.
Show Notes:
https://grassfedcattleco.com
https://barn2door.com/resources
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to The Direct Farm Podcast
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to the direct farm podcast, the weekly listen for farm selling direct. We'll talk about the four levers for farm success, which are quality, brand, price, and convenience.
Meet Valerie Lumen from Grassfed Cattle Co.
00:00:14
Speaker
We'll hear from outside industry experts and producers like you to delight your customers save time and to increase your direct farm sales and business. We're glad you're here.
00:00:26
Speaker
Welcome to the direct farm podcast. I'm Rory, your host for today's podcast.
Farm Location and Products Overview
00:00:31
Speaker
We've got a great conversation for you today with one of our farm market development experts, Valerie Lumen of grass fed catacope. Welcome Valerie. It's, it's good to have you back here on the podcast. Thanks. It's good to be with you, Rory. It's been a while since you've been on. I think I was looking at it's been since like last June that you've been on the podcast here with us.
Switching from Shopify to Barnador
00:00:49
Speaker
Yeah. Could you maybe start by just telling us a little bit about your farm and what you produce and kind of the origins of grass-fed cattle co?
00:00:58
Speaker
Sure. My husband, Jared and I farm with his dad, John in Southeastern Minnesota, not too far from the twin cities. And we raise grass fed and grass finished beef. We sell pastured pork from another farm. And then we raise pastured chickens as well. We own the grass fed cattle company and direct market, some of the meat from our farm to customers. We do just a little bit of wholesale right now, but mostly direct cut
00:01:24
Speaker
to consumer.
Onboarding Experience with Barnador
00:01:25
Speaker
And then we have our son, Colton, who's seven months old that has added a lot of fun to the farm. And yeah, our big focus is selling meat and then also selling our bowls through Farrow cattle company. Awesome. Well, you guys have, you signed up originally with Barnador all the way back in 2019, which here that feels like forever ago, but what were kind of some of the primary reasons you chose to use Barnador at that time?
00:01:52
Speaker
Yeah, I forget who it was, but one of the sales team members called and it was kind of perfect timing because we were working with Shopify at the time. We actually purchased Grasshoek cattle company from another couple who started it eight years prior to that.
Farm Market Development and Support for Farmers
00:02:05
Speaker
And they had a website all set up and everything. So that was nice. But when we wanted to start adding some different features, such as shipping and delivery and subscriptions, we found that Shopify added a charge to each feature we wanted to add. And it was getting super expensive.
00:02:22
Speaker
I didn't know how to set up any of that. And so the sales member from bartender called and was telling us about all the features you guys had coming up and we're like, yeah, we'll hear about this. And anyway, after a few different conversations and talking to James, some, we decided to jump on board with barn to door and started our, um, onboarding and all of that. So it was kind of perfect timing and you guys had the features we were looking for and.
00:02:47
Speaker
the support that we needed to be able to put everything into our website and just the behind the scenes of everything. We really needed that because we were both working and trying to grow this business at the same time. That's awesome to hear. What was kind of that initial onboarding and getting set up?
Barnador Academy and Skill Development for Farmers
00:03:05
Speaker
What was that process like for you guys?
00:03:07
Speaker
It was great. We had the weekly onboarding calls that were really helpful. Had just a few things that we did in between every week, getting, you know, some inventory set up and all of that. And it was more of a transfer over from our old website to the barn to door one. So that wasn't.
00:03:23
Speaker
a whole lot of work, but just learning the system. I thought that the onboarding process was really smooth. So that was really nice to have kind of somebody to actually talk to. And like I said, when we were trying to get ahold of the customer service prior, it was like hours spend on the phone, whereas we could reach out anytime to the barge door team. So that's always been something that I've loved about working with you guys.
00:03:44
Speaker
That's great to hear. Waiting around on customer service is like the worst experience ever. So I'm glad to hear that that onboarding team is awesome. Glad to hear that they're helpful for you guys. So kind of after some time with Barnador, you actually came on and kind of joined the team as one of our market development experts, as well as kind of participating in our farm advisor network and some of that program as well. Could you maybe talk a little bit about what those roles entail and what are some of your favorite parts about it?
Value of Barnador’s Fulfillment Features
00:04:11
Speaker
Yeah, I really love that I get to help other farmers just share my experience and what I've learned along the way. But it's been fun to share what I have learned through the academies and some of the other roles I've had. The academy is one of my favorite. We get to, I guess, got to help design a program that teaches farmers some of the basics about MailChimp and social media.
00:04:32
Speaker
And how you can use those to grow your customer list and your sales. So that's been a lot of fun. I have learned a lot from other farmers through that as well, just sharing ideas and asking questions. And that's been a great time connecting with farmers that use Marchador. And then otherwise I've been able to help some with the Connect office hours, kind of doing the same thing, giving feedback to other farmers and helping
00:04:54
Speaker
talk through ideas and then working with the FFA partnership as well. It's been a lot of fun getting to go to National Convention and just help to make that partnership grow and come into fruition. That's awesome and yeah I know the FFA conference was a really a huge highlight for us here especially being
Delivery and Pickup Options for Convenience
00:05:11
Speaker
able to go there our team with you and your husband. Both you guys are former FFA officers so being able to bring you guys there and talk with us to the students about kind of growing and setting up their farm business was a super cool opportunity.
00:05:23
Speaker
You touched on academies a little bit. You're kind of one of the professors, I guess, of the academy. What would kind of be your pitch to other farmers for why they should sign up and try an academy?
00:05:33
Speaker
I think so many people are intimidated to just start with MailChimp or with social media. They just are unsure of where to even begin or how to grow. Maybe they're getting tired out of doing the same things and not seeing a lot of results.
Balancing Convenience with Efficiency and Profitability
00:05:49
Speaker
I just think being surrounded with other farmers that are sharing their ideas, their problems, their successes, it's just a great way to be encouraged and to grow in your skills and your knowledge.
00:06:00
Speaker
Um, of how to brand your farm and reach new customers and all of those great things. So when we developed the academy curriculum and it's changed a lot since we did just based on farmer feedback, we really wanted it to be something that farmers could share ideas. They kind of take the clocks in whatever direction they needed to be able to grow and to gain the.
00:06:23
Speaker
skills they needed to feel confident marketing their products to their customers. So I would say if you're at all interested, definitely join. It's always really fun for us as facilitators of the Academy. It's a lot of fun and you learn a lot.
00:06:39
Speaker
Definitely a very like collaborative experience too, which is always great. I know farmers always appreciate that part too. Well, I guess kind of shifting gears, the main point of this episode and why you're here with us today is to dive into what your favorite feature is on Barn to Door.
00:06:54
Speaker
And so Barnadore, you know, we offer a really wide range of software features that are built specifically for the needs of farmers, but you've been using the platform for some time now and you're certainly pretty familiar with a lot of those software capabilities. So what is your favorite feature on Barnadore that helps Grassfed Cattleco either save you guys time or help you guys increase your sales?
00:07:14
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I think there's a lot of great features. Obviously we use a whole bunch of them, but one of our favorite, as we thought about that question is the fulfillment options and just the simplicity of them, but also the options that it gives us using the delivery options and we.
00:07:31
Speaker
had previously used the shipping and then the pickup options as well. So I think it's saved us a lot of time just in how easy it is for us to use, how easy it is for customers to select what works best for them. I feel like I could go on and on about the different options, but I think it's just worked really well for our farm and what we want to offer our customers.
00:07:52
Speaker
And it's kind of funny because I feel like fulfillments isn't necessarily like one of the most flashy features out there, but it's so important and, and it's really kind of what your business eventually runs on is how are you going to get with the products you're producing to the customers? How do you kind of choose your fulfillment options to, to make those products more convenient for your customers?
Evolution of Fulfillment Options
00:08:11
Speaker
Yeah, when we purchased Grasso Cata Company from the couple that owned it previously, they just had a pickup location in Edina. And a lot of their customers are actually like really close to that neighborhood, some within walking distance. And so a lot of them are used to that option and we've kept that pickup option at our freezer space. It's in a really popular area called 50th and France in the Twin Cities. And so that's worked well. We have always had that, we have two pickups.
00:08:39
Speaker
times per week, either one and like a one hour slot or a two hour slot, people can choose from to come pick up their product. That's free, pretty easy for us and for customers to just pick the time that works best. Come there. They call us when they get there. We bring the box to our car, say hi. And then.
00:08:56
Speaker
That's that the other option that we added shortly after joining with Marchador was the delivery option. And we started with one just big range all over the twin cities. And I've kind of changed that since, but the other option we had was shipping at one
Enhancing Order Processing with Barnador
00:09:11
Speaker
point. And I think we had that for about six months. Well, and you had mentioned earlier that you guys had been using, I think you said Shopify before. How does kind of this feature and how you're using it now compared to what you were doing before Barnador?
00:09:25
Speaker
Ooh, I'm gonna have to think back. I know we had to use an outside kind of app for the scheduling. And so after someone placed an order on our website, they would get an email asking them to schedule and they were going to pick that up. And so that was kind of an additional step customers had to take after placing the order was actually scheduling that. Whereas now Archer has a built in, you know, after they add it to their cart, they select delivery or pickup and they can actually select.
00:09:51
Speaker
our farm as a pickup location as well. It's nice to have that as an option too. I just think they make it really easy for our end to be able to sort through those orders, put them together and get them delivered. There's nothing complicated. I can easily tell a family member who might be doing the deliveries or pickups for us, especially when Colton was born, you know, we were pretty hands on here with him. And so we had to rely on some other people to help us
00:10:19
Speaker
get customers their orders. And so I thought it was simple teaching someone else how to use it or giving them that pick and pack list to use to put those orders together and get those out to customers. So I think it definitely saved time just in how user friendly it is.
00:10:33
Speaker
Well, and there's also definitely a balance between
Gathering Customer Feedback
00:10:36
Speaker
making it an easy system for your customers, but also you, because you definitely don't want to get too overwhelmed or over-committed with just fulfilling orders or doing deliveries and things like that. So what's kind of your thinking or your logic behind the way that you've structured your schedules to make that system work for you especially, but also your customers?
00:10:56
Speaker
Yeah, I think you're exactly right. It has to be a balance between getting our product to our customers in a convenient way that meets their needs, but also doesn't add too much chaos or complication to our lives or cut into our profit. Because obviously at the end of the day, that's important to our business as well. So I think it's all about, you know, offering enough options that customers feel it's convenient. Actually, last night we had a pickup
00:11:25
Speaker
time and then some deliveries as well. And a customer who was, she just seemed a little new to the process. And so I asked her if she had ordered before, which a lot of times I know, but sometimes I, I just like to ask to, to find out how they found us and all of that. She said, no, this is my first order. So I'm not really sure, you know, what to expect, but I'm really happy I found you guys. And so I asked how she found our farm and she said, well, I was.
00:11:49
Speaker
looking through Instagram stories. And I saw this other person I just started following talking about how important it is to buy local meat. And I thought, well, I can do better than mine from Target. So I went on Google and I found you guys because you have
00:12:05
Speaker
such a convenient location to pick up at here. And I just thought, hey, this is a good place to start. And so I handed her her beef sample box and talked to her a little bit longer and away she went. And I just thought, wow, what good timing for the podcast tomorrow. But truly, I think she did choose our farm because we have that convenient location because we offer some times that were, you know, pretty close to when she ordered. I think if she would have had to wait
00:12:32
Speaker
you know, a month or two months to get her meat, she maybe wouldn't have been interested anymore. She watched that story. She decided, yes, that's something that I can support and get behind. And she found us and was able to pick up that order soon after. So I think just having that convenient option for our customer and then having it also work for us, having that pickup location about an hour from our farm and then being able to put those together, meet customers and then go home again is super important. So.
00:12:59
Speaker
I thought that was a really great example of someone who we gained as a customer because we have that convenient option. What a great story too, perfectly timed for the podcast. Like the fact that she could go Instagram story, website, store, pick it up from you the next day is really great that you can kind of see that direct timeline. What were kind of the reasons you've chosen to offer delivery and pickup? Why are those kind of the two options that you guys have found most successful?
00:13:27
Speaker
We added delivery. I can't remember how long after joining bartender, but pretty quickly after. And like I said, we had one big delivery zone, but we changed that to two different zones. And we have two different, um, charges within 15 miles of our Idina freezer location is $15 and then within 20. So essentially that extra five miles is $20 for a delivery. And we found that a lot of, especially moms.
00:13:53
Speaker
Busy families will choose that just so that they don't
Balancing Convenience with Sustainability
00:13:56
Speaker
have to make the trip to Edina. And we try to make it convenient with a Wednesday pickup from four to six. And then Saturdays, we kind of do every other week from nine to 10 in the morning. But some people just have busy schedules and we found that they choose that delivery. We're happy to do it as long as we're getting paid for our time and our mileage doing that. And customers seem to really appreciate that. So those are kind of the two options that we have stuck with.
00:14:21
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. For farmers who are maybe think that setting up a delivery fulfillment option would be too much of a time commitment or just kind of in general too big of an undertaking. Maybe what would be your response to that or even just your advice to them if they are thinking about just getting started with delivery?
00:14:38
Speaker
I said it earlier, but I think a balance between those is so important, making sure that you're able to get your customer, their product in a timely manner and in a convenient way. Like I said, we send them a quick text after we deliver it. Customers are able to go grab it off their step and put it in their freezer. It's pretty easy for them after they have placed that order.
00:15:02
Speaker
But I think for us, it's important to think about, you know, what's worth your time. Are you getting paid for that time you're spending delivering those boxes and putting the, the box together itself and labeling it all of those things. I would say start simple, set up a small zone that you deliver in and just give it a try. It never hurts to go back and edit that delivery zone or to change the delivery charge. If you're finding that maybe it doesn't take as much money as you thought to deliver those boxes.
Discontinuing Shipping for Local Focus
00:15:30
Speaker
Once we got started, we realized, oh, this is actually really simple and easy to do. So I would say just get started, try something out, don't be afraid to change it if it's not working for you or your customers. And then also ask your customers, how did this work for you? What can we do to make this better? We often send out surveys or even just ask customers if we're talking to them on the phone or if they're there for a pickup. Hey, how did this work for you? Do you have any feedback for us? What can we do to make this easier?
00:15:58
Speaker
I think customers love to be part of the process. They know they're supporting a small business and a local farm, so they're always happy to give that feedback and help make it a smoother process for others. Yeah, that's awesome to hear, especially because I feel like that definitely kind of helps with that customer loyalty too, that they feel like they're kind of contributing to the farm as well. And also, I mean, obviously you don't have to take all of that advice, but if you kind of can maybe implement partially what they're asking for and things like that is always a good way to meet their needs as well.
00:16:27
Speaker
And I think the other thing that you touched on that I really like is there's no such thing as free food delivery anymore. Even Amazon charges for food delivery. And so making sure that you're getting paid for that time and that effort. And like you said, then maybe if you need to scale it back, if you find out that it's easier than you had thought it was to get those products delivered right to people's doorstep, then yeah, great scale it back. Maybe make it even more accessible for people, but definitely want to make sure that the time is worth it. And you can kind of guarantee that with a delivery fee.
00:16:54
Speaker
When people don't seem to mind at all paying us to deliver their box of meat, even if it's a couple of steaks and they have a $15 delivery, it seems like they are willing to pay that and sometimes tip us on top of that. So that's really nice that they don't mind and that we can offer that feature for them and save them a little time if they have a busy schedule. So grass fed cattle code, you guys started or offered shipping on your products for, for quite a while. And what would you say were kind of the benefits of offering shipping?
00:17:22
Speaker
We did see some new customers that are from rural areas in North Dakota, South Dakota, some in Wisconsin. That's kind of the area that we offered the shipping in and then other areas in Minnesota as well. And it was nice to be able to ship boxes to them. We've had some customers say, you know, I used it when our family went up to the cabin, we'd ship.
00:17:43
Speaker
some bacon, some brats, some steaks up there so that we had things to grill and we didn't have to worry about bringing it with us, which is super nice to be able to offer and be part of their family vacation. And that was really nice. We used FedEx and we used some insulated boxes. For the most part, the boxes arrived just fine. The shipping charges were a little higher than what we had expected when we talked to a rep.
00:18:05
Speaker
When we started doing the shipping, but yeah, for the most part, it was smooth sailing for the customers after they placed their order. We let them know when it would be delivered. And for the most part, they got there on time and, and everything was okay. Could you maybe talk about the reasoning behind that and why you guys chose to not ship your products anymore?
00:18:24
Speaker
We did decide, I want to say last year around this time to stop doing a shipping we had offered that as another option for customers. And we just found that it took so much extra time getting the dry ice and
00:18:39
Speaker
packaging those boxes, we had to take them to FedEx just because their pickup times were so big and we were up there for that much time to have them come pick up the boxes. And so that was all a bit of an extra hassle for us that we weren't sure was worth our time. And then beyond that, they stopped guaranteeing the delivery times for the ground shipping.
00:19:01
Speaker
Or the today that we were using and that just made it a little extra complicated for us. We had some customers, probably a handful of them that got boxes that had sat at one of their locations for too long and and the meat was thought out and we had to.
00:19:16
Speaker
Not only refund them for their order, and then we were out the meat and we were also out that shipping charge and the dry ice and the, you know, insulated box and everything like that. So that's kind of our reasoning behind why we stopped shipping and we stuck with those two options, the pickup and the delivery, but.
00:19:35
Speaker
I definitely know farmers that it's working great for to have the shipping option, but just for us, we were feeling a bit stretched thin, had a couple of customers that are sad. Um, we don't offer any more, but for the most part, people are really understanding that we're people too. And we have to have a life outside of getting boxes of meat to them. So yeah, we just decided.
00:19:55
Speaker
for our farm and the amount of boxes we were shipping, it wasn't quite worth our time. And we didn't have a ton of customers using it anyway. I think if we had more, we probably would have tried harder to simplify the shipping and figure out how to make it more economical as well. But we just had a handful of boxes that we would ship every week. And after talking to some of our customers, we realized there are
00:20:20
Speaker
So many customers in the Twin Cities that we aren't reaching yet. We don't necessarily need to reach people in five different states. After some thought and consideration, we decided to stop shipping. I think it definitely can work for different farms. I think it could have worked for us. We just chose to simplify a little bit and really focus in on the local customers that we are serving and the ones that we haven't yet met and that we can serve in the Twin Cities.
00:20:47
Speaker
And that's a great point too is like when you, when you do decide to ship, there's a little bit of that process then that you're handing over to somebody else where they can then influence the quality of your products, which can be a bit of a risk. As you said, customers can end up with products that are not frozen, which is not good, especially in the case of beef. And so that's, that definitely is a risk with shipping.
00:21:07
Speaker
I think a lot of farms do have a market of maybe not as big as the Twin Cities, but a very decent sized city or town nearby where ideally if you started selling and supplying all those people with their food, then you'd have a really good customer base right there in your backyard.
Adjustments in Delivery Zones and Strategies
00:21:23
Speaker
So what are some of the changes you've made to your fulfillments over time as you've kind of figured things out that have made life easier for you?
00:21:29
Speaker
One that I mentioned was creating some different delivery zones, just giving customers that are close by a bit of a smaller fee for that delivery. And then ones that are further out, charging them accordingly, and they don't seem to mind knowing where we're coming from. But also giving more pickup times with a shorter pickup window. We still offer the two hour window on Wednesday evenings, just because we know people get off work at different times.
00:21:56
Speaker
As you get closer to five o'clock, it gets a little busy in the area. We have our pickup back and then just adjusting, offering the farm pickup, but that work has worked really well for our more local customers to the farm. Besides that, I don't think we made a ton of adjustments. Just.
00:22:12
Speaker
I'm sure we have just making small adjustments along the way as customers tell us different things or we realize, Hey, there's this different feature that we didn't know about on varsity door. Sometimes during the academies or office hours, I hear someone talking to us and they like, I should really look into that for us. So I learned something all the time. And.
00:22:30
Speaker
I found that making those adjustments are pretty simple. One other one I thought of is for our subscription boxes, we have a meat club, that's beef, pork and chicken, a beef club box, and then a ground beef club as well. I switched those to delivery just once a month, but I did change that a little bit, just so we weren't having those spread out across the entire month. And that has made it a lot more efficient on our end as well.
00:22:56
Speaker
Awesome. Well, I guess kind of looking ahead, what are some of the ways you see yourself either like taking even more advantage of the fulfillment feature or even just kind of expanding what you already
Future Plans for Delivery Services
00:23:06
Speaker
have? We're hoping at some point to have a walk-in freezer here at the farm where we can package all of our boxes whenever it works for us, especially knowing that we have a little one here on the farm and lots going on. It'll be nice to have on-farm storage at some point.
00:23:22
Speaker
And then hoping to be able to offer deliveries at a bit more of a discounted rate and still do that pickup location, but probably not rent that space long-term. We're not sure when that'll all happen, but we'd love to have a delivery van with our logo and maybe some nice photos of the farm or our meat on it, just for that extra marketing as well. And then when we do that, we'd hope to utilize the Rotific feature as well.
00:23:48
Speaker
To finish things off, what would be your three things that you think any farmer should keep in mind when they're either setting up or even just kind of reassessing how they're going about their fulfillments on Barnadore? What would be those top three? Well, I'm not sure this is three things. It's more like two, but I just think it's so important that you figure out how you're going to meet the customer needs and how you're going to meet your needs as a business owner and find out where those two things meet.
00:24:17
Speaker
For the customer needs, I think making sure that you have a quality product, first of all, and that you can get that to them in a convenient way, whether that's doing a pickup in their local area, maybe offering a couple of different pickup locations so they don't have to drive so far, and then offering some different times throughout the week for families, considering people who might work nighttime or work just in the morning.
00:24:43
Speaker
Just thinking through some of the different lifestyles that people have and then just making sure again that it's convenient. If you are doing the delivery, maybe not doing that at a time of people aren't home. If you're in a really warm area and delivering something frozen or or whatnot. So just making sure you consider the customers needs and like I said earlier.
00:25:01
Speaker
Sending out a survey or asking them, maybe giving them a discount if they answer some of your questions is always a great thing to do. And then figuring out how that can balance it out with your needs as a business owner, wanting to be efficient, getting paid for your time and still making a profit, I think is so important. So make, maybe sitting down and putting those two things on two separate lists, listing out some of the different things to consider. And then at the end of the day, trying to figure out where's the balance in that between meeting those customers needs.
00:25:31
Speaker
Being able to run my business in an efficient way that still, again, helps those customers get my quality product in a convenient way. Awesome. Well, that definitely was two things, but we'll let it go.
00:25:44
Speaker
Thanks. Thanks. Appreciate it. They were good too. Awesome. Well, Valerie, thanks so much for joining us this week and coming on the podcast to talk about fulfillments. Like we said, not necessarily the flashiest or coolest feature, but definitely an essential one for a farm business that is looking to make it convenient to not only get their products to customers, but for customers to be able to order as well.
00:26:06
Speaker
Wait, I have a third one. Oh, what is it? Talk about those fulfillment options often in your emails, in your social media, spoken like a true Academy facilitator.
Promoting Fulfillment Options Regularly
00:26:17
Speaker
It is different than buying in a grocery store. So don't be afraid to share with your customers that you have options often after we post about a new product or something that we have. We say pick up available at our convenient Edina location or delivery within the Twin Cities and just.
00:26:32
Speaker
Continuing to repeat that to customers, what some of our options are and how they work is always great. So that's my third one. Awesome. Love it. That's a great third. That's a great third one. I want to extend my thanks to Valerie for joining us on this week's podcast episode. Here at Barnador, we're humbled to support thousands of farms across the country, including farmers like Valerie, who implement sustainable agricultural practices and support their local communities.
00:26:56
Speaker
If you would like to ask Valerie any questions directly, you can meet her and other farm advisors in Barn to Door Connect. To learn more and register to attend, go to barntador.com slash connect. Sessions occur weekly.
00:27:09
Speaker
For more information on grass-fed cattle co, visit grassfedcattleco.com. And lastly, to learn more about barn to door, including access to numerous free resources and best practices for your farm, go to barn to door.com slash resources. Thank you for tuning in. We'll see you next week.