Many Vermont farmers plan to expand their agritourism offerings according to new survey data from the Vermont Tourism Research Center at UVM.
Researchers surveyed more than 1,800 farmers with existing agritourism businesses between November 2019 and February 2020. The survey, which had respondents from all 50 states, included 222 Vermont farms.
Agritourism, as a term, can encompass many things, but in this study included on-site sales and farm stands, overnight farm stays and events such as tastings and tours. It generally includes any activity that attracts visitors to a working farm.
Nearly 60% of the Vermont farms said they plan to expand their agritourism offerings.
Many farms, both in Vermont and the southeast region of the United States, said lack of broadband access was a barrier to expanding their online presence and reaching new consumers.
Lisa Chase, a UVM Extension researcher who led the study, said the data provides “a good snapshot of what agritourism looked like before the pandemic.” She is currently studying the pandemic’s impact on the industry.
Eighty-six percent of Vermont respondents offered on-site, direct-to-consumer sales, making it the most common form of agritourism in the state. Chase said these businesses boomed during the pandemic’s peak.
In Brattleboro, Ashlyn Bristle and her husband own Rebop Farm, which she describes as a diversified livestock farm anchored around their on-site raw milk sales. Bristle said at the onset of the pandemic, their sales grew sevenfold in about four weeks.
“We just got down to the point where in our personal household, we weren’t even eating any meat for about six months, because we were so afraid we weren’t going to have enough to fulfill our CSA,” Bristle said.
Last year their farm store stocked goods from about 10 other local suppliers, as well as their own. Now they sell products from nearly 75 local food producers.
Bristle attributes their success to their short supply chain, which remained stable while some grocery stores experienced meat shortages last spring.
And in Charlotte, entrepreneur Will Raap announced in June that he planned to transform Nordic Farms in Charlotte into an agritourism hub featuring walking and skiing trails, an agricultural museum, and places to eat and drink.
But Chase said Vermont farms that depended on other kinds of agritourism revenue really struggled during the past year.
“If you run an overnight farm stay, and you don’t have products that you’re selling directly to your community, the pandemic was a very tough time,” Chase said.
Twenty percent of the Vermont farms, and 26% of total respondents, reported their agritourism operations turned no profit, even before the pandemic.
Chase said this is “concerning,” but many farms have multiple parts to their business and may operate tourism programs as an educational nonprofit. Some also consider it part of their marketing budget, as a way to build name recognition and community goodwill.
Chase also noted that while the term “agritourism” is fairly new, the practice isn’t.
“Harvest festivals, planting festivals and gathering around maple syrup time, those sorts of gatherings around farms probably go back as long as farming existed,” she said. “What’s different is the way the public understands agriculture.”
Chase said just a few generations ago, most people either had experience working on a farm, or knew someone who farmed. But now that less than 2% of U.S. jobs are in agriculture, food production has gained a new novelty, which can be commercialized.
Market pressures also forced many smaller farms to diversify their business and insulate it from global commodity prices, Chase said. Agritourism returns them some control to set their own prices.
Beth Kennett and her husband Bob bought Liberty Hill Farm in Rochester in 1979, and “by 1984, we needed to diversify our income in order to survive,” she said. They started by lodging skiers visiting nearby slopes, and have operated an inn there ever since.
“The agritourism component of our farm is absolutely critical to the survival of our dairy farm,” Kennett said.
Liberty Hill Farm is part of the Cabot cooperative. Kennett says Cabot has also begun promoting its farmers’ agritourism operations because “Cabot has recognized that dairy farmers need to diversify their income and cannot rely on the commodity pricing of milk.”
