Fall/Winter Hitching Post 2023

YEAR-END FINANCIAL RECORD KEEPING

Gathering key items will help to prove expenses, verify income, and certify purchases.

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start heading to market, loaded with their own tulips, snapdragon, ranunculus, anemones, and stock.

By the end of April, the Kings and their employees have cut all the tulips from the 120,000 bulbs they planted. They also begin harvesting peonies in a variety of colors, which are popular with their customers.

At the same time “we’re trying to save flowers for the week of Mother’s Day,” says Marcus. “At that point, we’ll have about 200 buckets stored in the ice-chilled cooler, 80-100 stems in each bucket,” he states. “We store about 18,000 tulips in the cooler for Mother’s Day weekend, by far our biggest weekend.”

After Mother’s Day, they don’t have long before the zinnias, which were started under grow lights, are ready. Those are typically harvested around the end of May.

The family has also started creating dried wreaths, which they market from October through June, selling about 200-300 wreaths every year.

Summer annuals such as zinnias, ageratum, blue salvia, and sunflowers really start coming in at the end of June. Mid-summer also ushers in continued planting time when the Triple Tree crew puts 20,000 flowering cabbage plants in the soil. Mugwort, a Sweet Annie-type of

CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR 2023 JUMPSTART GRANT RECIPIENTS!

The Following 15 Applicants Were Selected To Receive $10,000 Each To Establish And Grow Their Farming Operations.

flower that is a nice filler, gets picked and moved up into the attic of the flower barn, where it is air dried. The space reaches 150 degrees during the summer, thanks to its black roof.

By the end of summer, Marcus, his children, and employees are typically spending about two and a half days each week cutting flowers to get ready for weekend bouquet sales.

Around mid-November, they will turn the heat on in the greenhouse for a bit of frost protection until Thanksgiving. They will create winter wreaths, bouquets, and arrangements that they will sell through Christmas, alongside the loose greens and small trees they offer.

The business has grown over the years, benefiting from Marcus’s creativity, hard work, customer service, and his willingness to seize new opportunities. As much as he enjoys the market in Philadelphia, Marcus would like to do more retail on the farm--possibly pick-yourown opportunities or even a sunflower maze. He dreams that his children will take over the operation one day. In the meantime, Marcus hopes to “keep growing flowers,” and making his customers smile.

Paul & Laura Congleton from Woodbine, MD

Carlene Curtis from Parkton, MD

Eric & Christy Donnelly from Rocky Ridge, MD

Benjamin & Sarah Goldberg from Clarksville, MD

Jon Hartzler & Erin Luley from Pennsylvania Furnace, PA

Lulav Lieberman from Newark, DE

Matthew & Brittany Miller from York Haven, PA

John Orlowski from Knoxville, MD

Andrew Porter & Rebecca Robertson from Spring Mills, PA

Matthew & Jessica Schnupp from Harrisburg, PA

Richard Talbott from Gerrardstown, WV

Katelynn Troy from Parkton, MD

Timothy & Edna Yoder from Salisbury, PA

Titus & Anna Yoder from Salisbury, PA

Blake & Sarah Ziegler from Lebanon, PA

JumpStart is a competitive grant program for farmers in the start-up phase of business. More than 100 applications were received for the 2023 JumpStart grant program, all of which were carefully evaluated by a diverse panel of agriculture professionals and industry experts. Those named here were selected on the merits of their submissions, which included an application, business plan, and completion of the Ag Biz Basics educational course.

The annual JumpStart program is available to agriculturalists who are at least 18 years of age, have two years or less of farming experience or be planning to begin farming within the next two years, and reside in Horizon Farm Credit’s territory. The program is open to both full and part-time farmers and does not require applicants to be Farm Credit customers.

KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR INFORMATION ON THE 2024 JUMPSTART PROGRAM!

By Chad Rugh, Farm Credit Accounting Officer

As we look ahead to the end of the year and plan for the next, it may be beneficial to start gathering 2023 financial documents, for use in personal record keeping, business analysis, tax preparation, and even documenting income for future financing needs.

The checklist below may be helpful in determining what information is needed to prove expenses, verify income, and certify purchases.

Items to Gather:

Names, Date of Birth, and Social Security numbers for all members of the household

Income Records:

Sale of any livestock, produce, grains, or other products that you raised

Patronage payments

Payments that you received for work that you did outside of your operation (Custom Hire)

Any other income that you made from your operation

Any W2 for work done through an employer

Expense Records:

Feed

Crop Expense

Supplies used in your operation

Labor fees paid to others

Loan interest

Trucking costs from your operation

Rent payments

Repair costs

Veterinarian bills

Equipment:

Bill of sale for any equipment purchased

Should include the date of sale, type and name of equipment, and if the equipment is new or used

Bill of sale for any equipment sold

Should include the date of sale, type and name of equipment, and if the equipment is new or used

Purchases or Sale of Real Estate:

Provide a settlement statement

Forms:

Any new 4029 exemption certifications (Application for Exemption from Social Security and Medicare Taxes and Waiver of Benefits)

Compiling all of the applicable items above will be beneficial in analyzing business profitability, help to facilitate the proper completion of any tax filings that may be necessary, and ensure that any refunds or payments are accurate. These items should be kept for a minimum of three years, as tax filings can be amended within that period.

Please contact Farm Credit’s Business Services team with any questions at 888.339.3334.

The King Family Brings Flowers and Joy to a Metropolitan Market

“There is a niche market out there, you just have to find it,” says Marcus King, owner-operator of Triple Tree Flowers, a cut flower business in Coatesville, Pennsylvania. The family and employees market their flowers at the Rittenhouse Farmers’ Market in center city Philadelphia.

“Twenty years ago, we would never have thought that Philadelphia would even need flowers like this, but by getting out there and doing it as a hobby to begin with, years later we were able to turn it into two full-time operations,” he says.

“We started small,” adds Marcus. “By starting small, we were able to find our market, and then grow our market.” He points out that “consistency is the key. We’ve been there in snowstorms, temperature drops of 40 degrees, or when it was six degrees out. A lot of our customers came out for fruits and produce and bought flowers too, and if you tell the customers you are going to be there, then be there.”

The King family has a dairy background; in fact, Marcus grew up dairying and has older brothers who branched off and began their own dairies. However, as his parents neared retirement, they began a small cut flower business as a hobby in two Philadelphia markets.

Those markets grew and eventually two sons took over the operation, each taking a separate market. Marcus took over the Rittenhouse Farmers’ Market stand in 2013 when the business had five to eight workers. He’s continued to expand the business and now employs up to 15 part-time and two full-time workers.

“I was helping with the cut flowers in the evening when it was just a hobby,” recalls Marcus. Around the same time, he purchased a three-acre lot adjacent to his parents’ cut flower garden.

“The work drew me in,” he says. “Starting seeds, watching them

germinate - it’s amazing what can come out of them,” he explains. “I’m an outside guy,” Marcus says. “I just love working with the soil.”

He appreciates the customer service aspect of the business as well. “Taking cut flowers to the farmer’s markets where I can make everybody smile” is a highlight, he said. “We sell to about 700-800 customers most Saturdays, and I come back Saturday evening and think about how many people have their flowers now and are enjoying them.”

On his 30-acre farm in Coatesville, Marcus and his crew plant about eight acres in flowers, an effort that is “continuously evolving,” he says. “About two of those acres plant twice in a year,” for example moving sunflowers in when the spring tulips are done. The cheery and popular sunflower works well as a double crop since it matures in 60 days, so Triple Tree workers plant them from the beginning of April until the end of August.

Learning the rhythm of cut flowers took some time and he points out that he’s still learning. “It was really new in our area when I started; it wasn’t something that people were making a living off of,” he said. “A lot of the things simply learned by doing or read it in magazines and tried it myself.” The Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers’ publications and conferences were particularly helpful as he was learning the ins and outs of growing and marketing cut flowers.

Navigating the urban market was another challenge that the Kings embraced. When the opportunity arose to change their location to the edge of the farmers’ market, at a street corner, the family took a chance and shifted their location. “The farmers market wanted to expand so they put us in the corner, to draw people in, and we saw sales jump 40 percent,” he says.

On market day, Marcus, along with two of his children and two employees, work together to open up their box truck and trailer, setting flowers out on the sidewalk on benches with more behind the trailer in reserve. A cooler on top of the trailer stores even more flowers, as they usually bring about triple what they display at any time, he says. About 40 percent of their sales are impulse buys, according to Marcus.

The cut flower business is a year-round endeavor at Triple Tree farm. The work doesn’t wait until the weather warms up. By the first week of January, the Kings are working in the wood-heated greenhouses, planting early spring crops such as snapdragons and stock.

Toward the end of February, they move eucalyptus plugs into four-inch pots; then they’ll plant lily bulbs for Mother’s Day into potting soil crates in the greenhouse.

In March, they transplant annuals into bigger pots, getting them ready for their outdoor homes once the soil is warm enough. Also in March, they

Story and photos by Michelle Kunjappu