Agribusiness Basics Workshop Series

Summary

My background is in Agribusiness and where I tend to gravitate towards, so for my first real program I wanted to create somewhat of a virtual "business plan" series for agribusinesses and those that wanted to learn more on the topics discussed. It was an overall success beating out my expectations entirely having 97 total registrants spanning all the way to California, and hit home the message and overall theme of the program.

Situation

Now more than ever businesses are having to change what they do and how they do it to get their products and services out to their clients or potential customers. That does not exclude the Agriculture sector. I believe our sector faces even more challenges than other due to the perishable nature of the products being sold. I thought of how many smaller operations there are in my county that barely have their feet under them and now are having to face not only the hurdles of a new business venture, but also a changing business climate. I talked with many smaller operations in my county and realized they needed some basic business planning tips and helpful resources to use to better their business and help overcome some of those newer hurdles as well. What alarmed me the most was how almost all the operations had no idea how to even set a price on their products correctly or tell if they covered all their costs effectively. That was the straw that broke the camels back, so to speak, in terms of seeing this as a real issue that probably not just my growers and business owners face. Others have done agribusiness classes and things of that nature, but the solution to the issues are not teaching a set way of doing a business plan because every operation is different. The way to jump these hurdles is giving businesses the tools to then apply them to their own business. Without these basic tools new agribusinesses could fail before they start and even established ones could be less profitable in the long run.

Response

After careful consideration, surveying local producers, and getting advice from a specialist, Dr. Ben Campbell, the way to help address this issue would be to have a program centered on how an agribusiness/someone wanting start one or those that have agribusiness clients could approach building some key portions of their business plan up, as well as being exposed to contacts that could help them grow. The program started out being just locally based, then with the transfer to mainly virtual programming it allowed me to broaden the geographic range of the class. The classes were put on via Zoom for free, on Tuesday evenings throughout the month of July. (The 7th, 14th, and 21st) Each week focused an emphasis on different areas of an agribusiness. To register, participants would follow a zoom link sent out that lead them to a pre-program survey. This survey had questions centered on the topics the program was set to cover. The responses to that survey were sent to the speakers at least one week prior to their portion of the classes. Week one featured UGA Extension Specialists, Ben Campbell and Vanessa Shonkwiler, and covered basics of marketing and sales all the while answering questions that the registrants had such as "how to set a price of a product?" or "what avenues can I go down now to reach a new market since COVID changed my original target market?". Week two featured a Georgia Department of Agriculture representative from their food safety division speaking on licensing requirements, FoodPIC presented on how they can help producers, and to finish the evening we had a representative from Georgia Grown speak on the benefits that a business could have by being apart of Georgia Grown. Week three closed on Extension Specialist Cesar Escalante speaking on enterprise budgets and financial topics related to an agribusiness, and a representative from the Small Business Development Center also shared what they do and some great resources to further educate the registrants. All the classes were recorded and were roughly an hour and a half in length. Those recordings, along with handouts were sent to each registrant via email. A post-workshop survey was sent out to access the overall success of the program and it's impacts. I was assisted with this program by Scout Carter in Ware County and Laura Ney in Athens-Clarke County. They both gave me excellent advice for my first program and also attended every class.

Impact

Based on the responses from the post-workshop survey and personal emails, texts, and calls from registrants, the registrants found the class broad in information not extremely specific for their agribusiness venture, but also said that they could use the information and resources discussed and apply it to their specific business. I had one registrant message me via phone call and say, "I now can use that price setting formula that was discussed in the workshop to price my soap to cover all my costs and make a small margin of profit. I never realized it, but I was losing money, a small amount though .10-.15 cents, per bar of soap I sold. That small amount did not look like much until I multiplied it by all the bars I have sold. That alone will save me hundreds of dollars in the near future, and much more down the road." Another registrant that ran a farmers market said, "The class helped me understand some of the struggles my vendors face. I have been hesitant to reach out to growers and others vendors at other markets because I thought they were too busy and would not be interested. Now I know that they rely on as many markets as they can get to, to even put bread on the table. I plan to help market these vendors even more now that I understand how critical the market is to my vendors." Other common responses were that they could not make the time slot, or they could not focus on the zoom due to having to watch kids. They did make mention that having the recordings and the handouts of the presentations were greatly appreciated and allowed them to watch and read whenever they had free time. One question on the survey I sent out asked whether the class answered the questions they had coming into the workshop. 100% of respondents to the survey said yes. From all the responses gathered it is safe to say this Agribusiness Basics Workshop Series helped some registrants understand their clients better, some save money, while also showing others different avenues they can take their products down to sell them.

State Issue

Other Programming

Details

• Year: 2020
• Geographic Scope: National
• County: Liberty
• Location: College Station, Athens
• Program Areas:
  • Agriculture & Natural Resources