To sample or not to sample?

12 years ago

Last night I went to a meeting at the local extension office that covered the sanitation/inspection/permit process for farmers markets in Oregon. Cut lettuce and cut tomatoes are considered potentially hazardous food now. In order to provide samples of tomatoes or other vegetables I would need a temporary restaurant license permit at a cost of $100 every 90 days (so 2 for the market season). Plus the hand washing center and gloves.

I'm planning on selling heirloom tomatoes and their biggest attraction is taste. Can you sell without sampling or is it worth the $200 cost per market season to be able to provide samples? I know the laws are different in every state but as experienced market growers would you just sell without sampling or put up the $200?

Next related question...if you've got the restaurant permit would you make the best use of it and sell other food products made with your produce? I'm thinking cucumber and tomato salads, soups or pickled veggies.

Thanks in advance for your input.

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Comments (3)

myfamilysfarm
12 years ago
If you have to buy the permit, definitely use it to the best of your ability. Indiana/Tippecanoe County also have that type of rules, but our cost is $25 per year, and they have to see you process some of the items the first few times (just to make sure that you're doing it correctly).

Here, if you don't CUT it, you can sample it. I usually use the smallest tomatoes for samples. Otherwise, my family is forever eating some of the less perfect and we give tastes to some of our friends. Not exactly sampling, since they are our friends/family. When we do this, we explain to the other people that we can't give out samples unless we have all these rules and we have to adhere to them.

the hand washing station can be as simple as a large water cooler with a toggle handle (not push in) with super warm water, and a dish pan to collect the waste water. Then a roll of paper towels (keep them in a ziploc bag until you need them). You will need to wash the knife EVERY time you need to use it and AIR DRY it (don't towel it).

If you only wanting to sell tomatoes, around here you would only need 1 90-day permit, we don't have that long of season.

Good luck with your decision, I've thought about it for years.

Marla
little_minnie
12 years ago
The guy next to me at market gives samples but never calls them that to get around the permit stuff. They talk to the customer about the item and say 'would you like to try some?' They never use the word sample and don't let anyone else say they are sampling. They are simply letting people try watermelon or whatever.
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I usually avoid the samples too. I just don't like them usually and no offense, all present company is excepted, but don't they seem to attract a lot of a, well, certain type? There's always one or two who are sitting there dining. Grab 2 or 3 samples, chomp away, talk to the demo person and grab more and more. Few of the demo people around here will do anything about it. They don't care. The "rules" make some good points about why I dislike the sampling. The blocked aisles for one. I despise shopping. It's not fun and not something I want to spend excess time doing. So for me I usually make a wide circle around and move on. I will say though that Rainbow did have some samples of bratwurst that were very good. So good in fact that I did buy some. That doesn't happen often. With samplers or me. Good rules. There should be a rule though to move them to a corner or a back room. The samplers will hunt them down no matter where they're at! :) Oh, another rule, Don't ask the person when they'll be ready! They'll be ready when they're ready and they don't know when. And no, you don't have to give the chicken nugget samples to your toddler in the cart. It won't shut them up and won't keep them from grabbing impulse items at the register! Oops... now I'm starting to obsess a bit aren't I??? :D
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myfamilysfarm
12 years ago
Some places don't have the restrictions that other places do. My old market did, but the places that we're set up now, don't.

One thing I have found out over my years of sampling, make sure to wash the exterior off with some type of disinfecting wipe before cutting (or good clean/clear water). I have a chemo patient that asked about disinfecting the outside, and at that time, I had only been wiping it off with a wet wipe. She told me that with her chemo, she needed to disinfect anything before cutting. After that, instead of buying the cheap wet wipes, I spent a little more to buy the disinfecting ones for my samples. No sense in getting someone possibly sick from cutting the samples. Never had a problem, all this was before the health department decided to enforce the sanitation rules. Then I stopped, didn't want the hassle, plus I already had my customers trained that MY stuff was good (basically sold itself, by being in my stand, boasting no, true).

Marla

To sample or not to sample?

Comments (3)

myfamilysfarm

little_minnie

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