Joe Schirmer, owner of Dirty Girl Produce, is a farmers-market veteran. He has sold goods around Northern California since the mid-1990s, and bought his own farm in 1999 in Watsonville, Calif., 90 miles from San Francisco. The 40-acre operation—named by the previous owners, two women whose nicknames were "Dirty Girls"—grows everything from beans and broccoli to strawberries and tomatoes. Multiple days a week, Mr. Schirmer and his crew load up the produce and truck it to five markets: two in Santa Cruz, two in San Francisco and one in Berkeley. The markets represent roughly two-thirds of the company's business, with the rest coming from wholesale
customers, restaurants and subscriptions. "People go to the farmers market to get the best produce, and our model is quality," he says, adding, "We know how to make everything look extra pretty and get it to the farmers market when it's fresh, when it's just picked."
Mr. Schirmer offers from 15 to 40 different items at any given market, which he says helps his operation stand out from other farm stands that may offer only a couple of products. Even though the farmers are all theoretically competing for customers, Mr. Schirmer says that some of his best friends are other growers he has met at the markets. "It's a pretty good vibe," he says, adding, "If you forget a scale or you forget bags or weights or a tent or an umbrella...people share and help you out."

In 2022, the farm did $74,000 in sales at the smallest market and $500,000 at the largest, according to Mr. Schirmer. In all, he took in roughly $1,000,000, 60% of which was direct off- the-table sales at the farmers markets, while the rest was wholesale and to restaurants and subscriptions, he says. But after expenses—the biggest of which is labor—the company posted a net loss of $60,000. There are many reasons for the losses, according to Mr. Schirmer, among them pandemic- related issues, a labor shortage and drought. (Mr. Schirmer pays himself $6,000 a month, "what it costs us to live.") "I love farming, I just wish the economic reality of it wasn't what it
is," he says. "To be honest, we're essentially on a sinking ship," Mr. Schirmer says. "But that doesn't mean that I'm not optimistic or can't turn that around. What do you do, just give up? do you take on debt and service debt and make sure everybody gets paid, take care of all your workers? That's what I chose to do. I will do this, tweak this plan, and ensure we have brighter days.

 

Read the above story and make recommendations for how to improve their business performance, particularly marketing. 

Describe the target market and use the marketing mix (product, price, place, and promotion) to make recommendations.

Answer rating: 100% (QA)

Based on the information provided about Joe Schirmers Dirty Girl Produce and its challenges there are several recommendations to improve the businesss performance particularly in terms of marketing Le... View the full answer