How this soft fruit grower diversified their business to sell their own soft fruits through a LockBlox vending machine.
Nick and Kathey Evens have been running a business farming fruit at Keymer Brook Farm in Chichester. A business that was first started over 20 years ago. They grew great strawberries, raspberries and blackberries for supermarkets and high-end restaurants – even supplying fruit to Didiers, the patisserie that creates soft fruit-adorned cakes served at royal garden parties. Eventually, they needed a break from the intensity of supermarket soft fruit growing.
After the supermarkets kept squeezing margins, which was putting extra stress on the family and staff, they decided to stop and pivot their business to selling their fruits directly to the consumer. In a quest to figure out how exactly they were going to sell their fruit to customers, Nick and Kathey’s son, Archie, came across our LockBlox vending machine. Archie had seen other soft fruit farmers use our LockBlox vending machine to sell their own berries directly to consumers and have great success with it. After presenting this idea to his parents, the family decided to go for it and in May, their LockBlox vending machine was installed and ready for business. Calling their stall ‘Berries on Tap’.
Fast forward 5 months and their sales are flying. Berries on tap are selling their own grown Strawberries, Raspberries, and Blackberries. They are selling such an impressive amount the only problem they are having is keeping stock inside the vending machine. Kathey informed me that she has all sorts of customers coming to her vending machine. Kids who bring their grandparents along to ask if they can buy them strawberries, teenagers cycling along on their bikes to get strawberries, families stopping in their cars and buying fruits for their family day out and everyone in between. What has surprised Kathey the most is the amount of customers who say thank you to her. Many customers have thanked Kathey for providing the community with a place where they can buy high-quality locally grown fresh fruits. Why has Berries on Tap been so popular since opening? Kathey believes that the novelty of buying fresh fruit from a vending machine brought in customers. Everyone likes and is interested in something different. Then the high-quality soft fruits the customer receives are what keeps them coming back.
Now Kathey and Nick, along with their son Archie and production manager Christea, are keeping their business as local and low carbon as they can. Offering the same top-quality fruit to their customers directly from their farm. If you want to check out what the team are doing at Berries on Tap, you can head over to their webpage here https://www.berriesontap.com/ and also check them out on social media.
