The Rural Voice, 2003-07, Page 18or
DIRECT SALE
Young Bagfield couple aims to sell
their farm's products direct to
customers
Story and photos
by Keith Roulston
FRESH PRODUCE
DESSERTS -ICE CREAM
BAKED GOODS
/Umber
Huron Twin
Association
Now in its second year, Bayfield Berry Farm is the product of Mike and
Marlene O'Briens' imagination and hard work. Below, Marlene shows some
of the baked goods that are the products of the farm's kitchen.
ressed by diminishing margins,
some farm families have begun
taking their farm products
beyond the farm gate to add value.
For Mike and Marlene O'Brien,
however, their farm has been planned
from its conception for value-added
production.
The O'Briens are in their second
year of opening Bayfield Berry Farm
to the public, growing products and
either selling their fresh fruits and
vegetables directly to the public, or
processing them and then selling the
jams, jellies, fruit toppings or fresh-
baked pies. In some cases they even
serve meals using their own products
in a restaurant in the spacious
building they constructed on their
Bayfield -area farm.
Having grown up on a cash -crop
farm near Benmiller, Marlene said
her family had come to the
conclusion that commodity
agriculture didn't work economically
and there had to be a way to get more
of the consumer dollar. When she and
Mike, both graduates of the forestry
management programs at Sir
Sandford Fleming College, decided
they wanted to farm, they chose a