I agree that people will drive to get great fruit. To me it is worth the trip to get something i enjoy eating. I look at the peaches in the store, like blueberrythrill said, and they are as hard as a rock. When they feel soft they are rotten. What a waste of money to buy them. I tried cooking them up in a cobbler and it was horrible too. No good use for them when picked unripened. No wonder peach consumption is down.
There is one company that has found its niche. They call themselves, The Peach Truck. It is a group of peach farmers that have gotten together to bring peaches all over the TN, KY, MI, OH, IN, PA area. They sell right off their refrigerated trucks. Going from certain parking lots of stores. They usually sell out every day. I think it is a great idea and it gets people wanting "goodā fresh peaches again. Not promoting them just think it is a great idea that has done well for the peach growers there in that area.
The Peach Truck folks do a great job selling peaches, but Iām not sure they do any of the peach growing.
I see they sell peaches in 25 pound boxes. Anyone know their price for the box?
EDIT: I found the price - $8 for 3 pounds or $40 for 25 pounds
I am not sure either. I just figured they had an agreement or they were part of the co-op type situation with them.
The peaches are pretty good. I have bought some boxes over the years. Now that I have my own trees I probably not be buying them unless mine do not produce any fruit that particular year. If I do not get any fruit usually none of the other fruit nurseries around me would have any peaches either.
Same here and we are set up for a freeze out this year with the warm weather. Most of the larger peach orchards south of me have wind machines which helps with the frost problem. I just take my chances and so far Iāve lost most of my peaches about 1 year out of 4.
I noticed the Peach Truck travels all the way to Pennsylvania and Michigan. Long way from Georgia!
Very true. Thank goodness for I-75 and I-70 to get to most if these places. They have this system down to a science. They have certain places they have arranged to go to, usually hardware stores, flower nurseries, etc. at certain hours of that particular day. They usually will call that store if they are running late or if they have sold out of peaches for the day. That brings people into their stores as the people show up to wait on āThe Peach Truckā.
They tell the people to put the peaches out on a warmer area for a few days and then when they start to get soft to put them in the fridge.
I put old bed sheets on my peach trees if there is a call for a freeze or a frost during the nights the peach trees are blooming. It had been every year they have bloomed the freeze/frost has come. Like clockwork. So far I have managed to get a lot of nice peaches each year,so far.
There is a small company in Nashville, TN that sells peaches for $42 for a box of 13 peaches. They also sell a tiny paper bag of peaches for $19.99 that they say is āabout 3 poundsā. That is over $6 per pound. Insane. But here is the insane part: people literally line up in huge lines to buy these peaches. I have to hand it to the company ownersā¦they are marketing geniuses. They send out notices and publish in local newspapers and web sites and social media telling the public all over TN, KY, OH, AND Indiana. They put the word out which city and which local business parking lot they will be in on a given weekend. They show up in old trucks just like those of @amadioranchās neat trucks and play it off like they are just small time, old fashioned farmers who are bringing a few peaches from their farm. In reality they donāt even grow the peaches and they are a very large, multi-state business. But people pay these insane prices and seem thrilled to do it. After all, the peaches are a lot better than grocery store peaches, so people love them so much they donāt care to pay these crazy prices.
Iād be scared to death to try to base a business plan for an orchard on getting these kinds of prices because I donāt think I or most others could get prices like this, but it certainly is possible and these people have done it very successfully.
Very pricey. I bet the box the peaches are in cost more than the peaches!
That was what I was discussing up above your posting. People line up and wait for hours.
Iām so sorry, Mike and @blueberrythrill ! Somehow I just completely missed your posts, but I enjoyed seeing them now because clearly you have exactly the same impressions I do of those guys! Itās a huge rip off but you have to admit they have some clever marketing, albeit a bit dishonest in my opinion! Also, either your prices are outdated or they sell them even higher in my area, because here they sell those little boxes like the ones I linked to for $40 on site or $42 by mail (not including shiping) and the little paper bags are $19. Insanely high, but on the other hand, when you think about the reaction people have when they taste a ārealā, tree ripened peach like we all get to eat from our trees and compare that to the store bought ones, I can somewhat understand why folks with some disposable income would buy those peaches.
Awesome marketing! Their web site indicates that their peach tour goes as far north as Michigan and Pennsylvania. Both of these states have a long history of growing excellent peaches especially Michigan. Why would a Michigan resident stand in line to buy Georgia peaches when excellent local peaches are available?
The idea of customers standing in line for long periods of time just to buy peaches surprises me. Part of the fascination may be the āmaniaā produced when many people show up at the same time to get the peaches. Kind of like standing in line overnight just to purchase the newest Apple phone.
I would like to understand their selling process better. Perhaps I could use it to sell more peaches from my farm stand.
Iāve definitely noticed that. If there are lots of folks standing in line, it seems to draw more people in. If I am at my stand by myself with no customers, more cars will just drive by. I think people somewhat naturally cue off others to measure if something is a good deal. The deal feels less risky that way, although itās not always an accurate measure of risk.
Paul Friday has written that he would have his employees park their vehicles in front of his store in the morning to draw more people in. Then after things got busy, he would have his employees move their vehicles around the back to allow for more customer parking.
Here they have a sort of peach truck. These trucks come in from CO and park in a parking lot and sell a load of peaches. They come throughout the summer. They get good reviews, so the peaches must be decent. The difference from the GA peach truck is that the peaches from CO are pretty cheap. If I remember right, last summer they were selling lug boxes for around 40 bucks. A lug of peaches weighs somewhere around 24 lbs.
Very interesting. When we sold blueberries at the farmerās market many years ago I had my son stand in front of the sales table acting like he was making a purchase when business was slow. Customers formed a line behind him and he moved to the other side of the table and helped sell. This small manipulation worked every single time.
Since our farm stand is only open 2 days a week for 5 hours each day we create a little bit of this type of āmob psychologyā where customers show up early in order to make sure they get what they want.
The price for the shipped peaches from the Peach Truck seems high, but their website list their price as $8 for a 3# bag or $40 for a 25 pound box which seems reasonable, but it may not be up to date.
I saw those prices on their web site but I am 100% sure that that those are not the prices they got here last year. Those āabout 3 poundā paper bags (think of a small brown paper bag like kids used to take lunch to school in) were $16 last year (that is still below the $19 I said earlier but still more than $5 per pound). Iām certain because I found a little leaflet in my desk drawer today from last year. And those were JUNE GOLD, which as you know is a fairly early freestone- not the best peach by any means but Iām sure later in the year they change to better ones. Now, the flyer I had was from when they were at the Nashville Farmers market, so I guess it is possible that they sell higher there than elsewhere, but I donāt think so.
But I sure agree with the fact that a line tends to draw a longer line. Each of the 4 summers I was getting my undergraduate degree in college I owned and operated a small road-side fireworks stand/tend. We always talked about how when one or two cars stopped, others quickly followed, but no one wanted to stop if no one else was there. The busier we got, the more people would stop. BTWā¦if you want a product with unbelievable margins, try fireworks! haha I still canāt believe the mark-up and profit on those darn things!
I think that is why I see on some fireworks signs I see " Buy 1 get 1" or at the best deal " Buy 1 get 2 free" or Iāve been up to " Buy 1 get 4 Free" at one place. I figured there was a LOT of markup there.
WOW! This is simply amazing! I created an account on here toady because I bought a house with a few fruit trees (one of which is a peach tree - and my favourite) and I hoped Iād be able to understand moreā¦ now I wish Iāll be able to absorb 0.5% of your peach tree knowledge and give love to my brittle one.
I can even smell your peaches through my computer screen! 
That is exactly why we started our own āPeach Trucksā. If these two posers can sell peaches at high prices they arent organic and they dont even grow, I figured us as actual peach farmers can sell them the same way.
Whatās up in Arizona?
Hey Mpigg
Thinning peaches and just finished planting sweet corn. We for the first time ever had a severe enough freeze about 3 weeks ago that it nuked all my early peaches. First time ive ever seen that happen in my part of az. Still going to have great june, july, and august peaches tho. But may not so much.
oh wow. Well thatās what itās like growing fruit in Texas.
