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8 saturday july 13 2002 economist sun stouffville tribune business time not always ripe for seasonal operations by jeff mitchell staff writer to everything there is a season but what if the season does nt unfold as it should imagine the thoughts of jonathan hall 32 a first generation farmer earlier this summer when the 12 acres of strawberries on his newmarket- area farm refused to ripen while he grows other cash crops at his 40acre strawberry creek farms market strawberries pick your own and prepicked are the anchor a failed crop means a failed season and that means disaster for a fledgling busi ness theres not much you can do about the timing mr hall said it comes when it comes to his relief the strawberry season finally did come albeit two weeks late this past week the parking lot of the davis drive business was busy with berry lovers that element of risk is wellknown to farmers but is also familiar to other sea sonal business operators landscap es fishing outfitters resort operators and others who make hay while the sun shines if it shines we rely heavily on the income from the strawberries said mr hall who lives with his wife and three young chil dren in keswick other farmers land of spread out the risk a bit more i tend to put my eggs in the one basket mr hall works in the winter as a car penter to supplement his income as a farmer but dreams of farming full time although it occupies him just half the year the farming operation is an all- consuming pursuit he said you may work just six months of the year but the sacrifice is incredible he said its seven days a week 14 hours a day it is that heavy workload and an increasingly uncertain guarantee of rea sonable return that is pushing people out of farming according to don fieldhouse secretarytreasurer with the york region federation of agriculture farming traditionally a business perpetuated by generation after genera tion is becoming less viable especially for small operators faced with diminish- staff photojeff mitchell jonathan hall depends on business smarts mother nature and a bit of oldfash ioned luck to make his seasonal operation profitable ing crop prices and fluctuating markets by virtue of the sheer volume can make for meat animals a go of it amid unstable markets farmers for the most part dont tell there are fewer farms but theyre their sons to take up farming anymore bigger mr fieldhouse said they mr fieldhouse said why beat your increase their volume to make more head against the wall the trend has been for family farm- ers to sell out to large operations which see last page 9 staff photojeff mitchell josh duncan front left brendan shorter and evan lloyd show off xtreme kebobs the product their holland landing public school class marketed and sold theyre joined by classmates kaitlin gay jenna wallace justine turl and jessica robinson along with teacher carolyn butterworth business is hard but its also sweet by jeff mitchell staff writer the sweet taste of entre preneurial success is being savoured by a group of ele mentary school students from holland landing carolyn butterworths grade 78 class at holland landing public school raised 3000 during the past school year with a product they conceived designed manufactured promoted and sold the money helped pay for a class trip to ottawa and other activities and the handson business experi ence gained by the budding business people is invalu able ms butterworth said i think it really improved their communi cation skills and their team skills to have everyone work together ms butterworth said i think it brought them closer together as a class because they had a com mon goal that goal was the suc cessful marketing of the class product xtreme kebobs a tasty concoction of candy on a skewer but there was much more to making and marketing the sweet commodities than the children realized at first its harder than you think said kaitlin gay i think it brought them closer together as a class because they had a common goal the project which teamed the class with busi ness mentors through the bank of montreals learning partnership saw the young people researching the kinds of candy potential customers would like on see sweet page 9 strata tour professional gol balls free dozen pine 9 cart bag yg 1499 find it mens ladies wedges gr 1999 individual woods i rh lh mens ladies from 1999 1 jay lor made 300 ti series drivers reg 49901 floor models xl2000 irons 3pw mm mrm mlm steel greg norman golf shirts 1999 reg 10999 from datrek gols bags up to so off choose from callaway nike greg norman titleist caps reclaimed gols balls dz for 2499 bulk grade a mens ladies golf shoes from 55999 save 6080 kg7 3 dimarcoj 5221 hwy 7 east golf clearance centre 9054795077 wwwdimarcogolfcom