Labeling multiple varieties?

[Suze]

I'm considering selling some of my excess tomatoes at market next year.

One problem I am thinking I might run into is how to label all the varieties in an appropriate way. When I pick, I label with a sharpie on the top in some way that makes sense to me - eg, CP for Cherokee Purple, GG for Green Giant, and so on.

And, a complicating factor is that I usually grow over 100 different varieties a year. Now, the abbreviated lettering I do on the tops of the tomatoes is meaningful to me because I know what I am growing, but that abbreviation may not make any sense to the buyer. It has also been pointed out to me that some buyers may not care for my sharpie writing on the shoulders of the tomatoes, either.

One option is to just rub it off before I go to market and offer a mix of various "heirlooms" for sale, but I figure at least some might like to know what they are buying.

Of course, one easy way for me to solve this is to stop growing so many varieties and only offer a few at market, but I would rather not do that.

Any thoughts on how to handle this?

[Wi-sunflower]

I would have to concur that marking ON the tomato is a NO-NO. But I would also say that having the varieties labeled does increase sales a lot.

What we do is to have separate buckets when picking. Sometimes we will mark on the side of the bucket, but better is to have a card IN the bucket with the name. Wal-mart and some of the "dollar" stores will have decent 3 gal buckets used for car washes that you can usually find for about $1. Not as sturdy as the 5 gal buckets but since they don't hold as much you don't get as many bruised tomatoes. If you really don't have many tomatoes of any 1 variety at a time, the 5 qt ice cream buckets might work out.

That card gets transfered with the tomatoes as they are washed and put in boxes for the market. I use 4x6 index cards marked with a Sharpie. If I was really efficient I would print them out on my laser printer and then laminate them so they would go all the way from field to market and be used over and over.

One other tip -- when picking for market, try to get the stem OFF as you pick. Seems like a little thing but if you leave the stem on in the buckets and boxes, the stems will poke holes in their neighbor and that tomato won't be sellable.

Carol

[feraltomatoes]

Maybe growing a dozen of your favorites in larger numbers that you can label with a sighn in the box at market.
The other varieties that you only have small amounts of throw in a box as mixed heirlooms.
You will take all the fun and profit away if you try to label a small amount of 100 varieties.

[kygreg]

I grow approximately 100 varieties and only one plant of the great majority of them. The method that has worked best for me for labeling in the garden is to use an index card, write with a lead pencil, and hot laminate the card. I tried Sharpie last year on index cards that were cold laminated; they did not last the season. Instead of using initials I have a grid with row and place numbers.

[David52]

For the market, I use a Sharpie on those peel and stick address labels, the 2" x 4" size, and then either stick that to the table and put tomatoes around it, or slap it a tray / basket or what not.

[Suze]

Thanks for all the input, folks.

Originally Posted by feraltomatoes

You will take all the fun and profit away if you try to label a small amount of 100 varieties.

Yep, I think you're right Brad. I need to be realistic and practical about this. Oh well. Planning on growing more of favorites and/or ones I think will sell well at market, then selling those I have smaller amounts of for any particular week as "mixed" seems to make the most sense.

[travis]

Since the idea is to sell them all, I wouldn't label them because that might lead to folks coming in and taking the most recognizable named ones or taking ones on their second visit based upon the results of their first visit and thereby leaving you with the ones they perceive as less desirable.

Or they'll come in and say "do you have anymore of those Cherokee Purple like you had last week?" And when you say "no, they've all been bought," they'll wander off looking for someone else who has some.

Just lay them all out there as "Heirloom Tomatoes" and let them pick over and select them randomly just like they do at H.E.B.

[Wi-sunflower]

Travis, you have most likely never sold at a farmers market. That is absolutely 180* the opposite of what I find. Naming the varieties makes a big difference in how much I sell.

Sure some will be disappointed when you don't have the same variety they got last time. But the beauty of a farmers market is the fact that you have face to face personal contact with each other.

When someone asks for something you don't have right now, that is your chance to tell them about the good points of those that you do have and why they would probably like one of them just as well as the variety you don't now have.

Sure it's a lot of talking and "educating", but that's what makes a farmers market so attractive to the buyers. They can make a "connection" with the grower and what they are eating. You would be surprised how strong it can become to. Customers will keep coming back to the same stand after they get good stuff and good info.

JMO,
Carol

[huntsman]

This is a fascinating thread, and I would love to try this in my city, though I think I will battle to find a Farmers' Market...

Anyhoo, I'm certainly learning a bunch!

[carolyn137]

It's been a very long time since I sold fruits and it wasn't at a Farmer's Market, it was at a large farm stand that had a lot of traffic. And the other situation was when I was selling to chef's which I described in another thread here.

At the farm stand I'd offer mixed pints of cherry tomatoes and not ID the varieties but when it came to the larger fruits I Ided every one by using those small round stickers and using an abbreviation that was coupled to a hand out sheet I made available to everyone that had information and histories, where known, about the specific varieties.

And Suze, at the time I was growing many more than 100 varieties but of course took a limited number of those to the stand at any one time. And it's also different in that I wasn't personally selling them and there was an 80/20 split on the money and they were responsible for removing any fruits that went bad.

I guess the reason I wanted to label them was b'c in the beginning I didn't and I'd get calls, I had my phone number on the hand out sheet, asking what the big one was that was red and tasted so great b'c some wanted to start growing their own.

And there have been several threads here and elsewhere where someone got unnamed fruits at a Farmer's Market, or similar, and then tried to describe it in words to find out what it was or showed a picture of it, and there's simply no way of IDing a variety, or 99.8% of them, from words or a picture.

I can't remember where is was that I suggested to one person to go back to the Farmer's Market and ask the same vendor what the possibilities were and I think that turned out to be productive as to ID.

But the other problem I've noted in such cases is that some of the vendors didn't even know what they were selling as to variety. They just raised lots of varieties and sold them.

I also think it depends a lot on the folks buying the fruits. Most of us here are, shall I say, rather variety minded, but for those who buy the fruits that may not be the case.

[dave]

we display our tomatoes in shallow plastic tubs by variety with a 4 by 6 index card attached to the tub listing the name of the tomato. We sell by the pound as most people seem to like to mix their purchase by color, size and variety. We sell cherry tomatoes, mixed colors by the pint and salad tomatoes, "Jaune Flammee" and "Pink Ice" 4 in a box. Our customers seem to be really interested in what they are buying, where it was grown and if chemicals were used. Carylons book is always on our tomato table and draws great interest. dave

[ShowmeDseeds]

I don't know if this would work for 100 varieties, but with the dozen or so varieties that I plant I paint variety names with enamel paint onto either paint stirring sticks or 4 inch craft sticks. I "plant" several labeled sticks into each bed, and then when I harvest the tomatoes I just take out one of the sticks and place it in the harvest bucket with the tomatoes.

The various permanent markers that I have tried sometimes faded, but I've had very good results with the enamel paint lasting a whole growing season.

Stuart