Farm Retailing: Motivations and Practice

Abstract

This paper investigates rural diversification strategies, specifically focusing on farm retailing. The study reveals farmers' different motivations and experiences of structural diversification through both farmers' markets and wholly-owned farm shops. Using a qualitative study of eight farm businesses, the authors find that diversification is not always motivated by entrepreneurial objectives. Necessity (push) factors (such as agri-food market inequality) act as the catalysts transforming nascent diversification tendencies. Once the need for diversification is unlocked, farmers face an entrepreneurial choice: those with push motivations (such as risk reduction) choose non-entrepreneurial diversification in the form of farmers' markets, while those with pull motivations (such as business growth) exhibit characteristics of entrepreneurship and engage in entrepreneurial diversification in the form of on-farm retailing.