Honey Recipe Books

[Countryboy]

This past spring, I attended a Small Farms Conference the Ohio State University held. One of the sessions was on marketing. One of the examples they shared was about a small farmer's website - during the CSA (community supported agriculture) season, the 3rd most visited webpage on the farmer's site was the recipe page.

When I am at farmers markets talking to people, it is remarkable how people do not know how to use honey. They put it in their tea or on their toast and that's about it. The real honey connoisseurs will drizzle honey on their ham...

So that got me thinking. If I could offer a small honey recipe book at farmers markets alongside my honey, I could use that to help drive sales. It would give people more ideas for how to use honey.

Does anyone have any good suggestions for a cheap honey recipe book? I don't want a cookbook geared towards a master chef using honey. I just want a simple, cheap honey cookbook that is designed to get the average cook to use honey in a recipe...an introductory cookbook to using honey. I am looking for a cookbook that I can sell for $10 or less. There are a few honey cookbooks out there, but they are usually $15-$25. I imagine that price point will be too high for the casual farm market customer who is looking at $9 or $10 honey.

Or am I better off trying to compile my own cookbook? I have some of my own recipes, and I can go through Grandma's old recipe boxes for handwritten recipes with honey in them. If I ask around, I know I can get people to volunteer some recipes.

I've recently been doing some research on growing and marketing gourmet garlic. I read about one guy who will send people a free sample of his gourmet garlic if they send him a recipe using garlic in it. I don't have to be a rocket scientist to see the guy is planning on making a cookbook to help him promote his gourmet garlic.

A local Mennonite church put together a cookbook of Mennonite recipes, had it printed up and sell it for $15. It's a wirebound cookbook that is almost an inch and a half thick. So I know it's possible to get cookbooks printed up that I could sell for a reasonable cost.

Does anyone have any suggestions for a honey recipe book? Or any honey recipes they would like to share? By posting honey recipes you are giving me permission to use them in a cookbook.

I'll start.
Drizzle honey and chopped nuts on your cottage cheese. I'd never thought of trying that. A Ukrainian girl told me about it. It's excellent.

[Countryboy]

The National Honey Board has a bunch of recipes on their website.

From the NHB website:
Recipes are not copyrighted and may be used freely in print and on the Web. We do ask that you credit the National Honey Board and link to http://www.honey.com when using a recipe. Credit example phrase: “Recipe provided courtesy of the National Honey Board.”

Is this one of my better options? Obtain a bunch of recipes, and then have my own recipe book printed up?

Could http://www.honey.com/recipes also be part of the reason there aren't a lot of honey cookbooks out there? A lot of recipes are easily accessible online for free, so no one wants to risk investing in creating a paper cookbook with the same info? (But most cooks I know still have paper cookbooks in their kitchens, even though they have computer access.)

[Allen Dick]

We used to have a newsletter and recipe leaflets for our farmers markets and honey mail order business, but that was back in the eighties and nineties.

Times have changed, though. I have a shelf of recipe books, but if I want ideas, I never open them. I go to the web or the Big Oven app, and actually, Big Oven is getting to be so yesterday.

I'd recommend that you print off a few recipes and have them as handouts rather than dealing with entire recipe books. A few business cards with your info and web recipe URLs make good handouts, too. Have bookmarks on your phone or tab to show people.

I would not get into recipe books unless you are sure you can sell at profit. Maybe have a few on the table for reference and marked "not for Sale' as conversation pieces for the dinosaurs walking by.

[Countryboy]

I have a shelf of recipe books, but if I want ideas, I never open them. I go to the web or the Big Oven app,

I think you're missing the point. My goal is not to give the customers ideas of what to cook when they get home. I'm interested in giving them ideas of why to buy a bottle of my honey when they are in front of my table. My job as a salesman is to show them how buying my product will make their life better. If that means putting a honey cookbook in front of them, so be it...but selling cookbooks is not my primary goal.

I'd recommend that you print off a few recipes and have them as handouts rather than dealing with entire recipe books.

From what I have seen at farmers markets, a LOT of vendors have handouts. Folks walk 20 feet to the nearest trashcan and toss it in. I see it all the time. I doubt the other vendors realize it, because they are so busy trying to give more handouts to the next person they see.

A few business cards with your info and web recipe URLs make good handouts, too. Have bookmarks on your phone or tab to show people.

Customer reactions to business cards are interesting at markets. I keep a stack of business cards on the table. It's obvious the cards are there for the taking. It is VERY rare for a person to grab a card. If the want a card, almost all the people see the stack of cards, and then ask if they can have a card. (I still haven't figured that one out.) And then they usually put the card in their wallet or purse. I haven't seen anyone get a business card, and then toss it in the trash.

I take off my phone when I am at a market. I don't want the interruptions.
I also have a dumb phone. (It's not a smart phone, so it must be dumb.) I can make phone calls from it, and send text messages. I can even take pictures with it. It's a Motorola Barrage that is several years old. I think it has some kind of internet capability, but I have never bought a data plan for it.

I bought a laptop....never use it. I have a cheap tablet....never use it.
If I want to use a computer, I go home and use my desktop, running the best OS ever...good old XP.

I would not get into recipe books unless you are sure you can sell at profit.

Good advice....but...

While it would be great to make money on cookbooks, making a profit on the cookbooks is not necessary for me. Breaking even on them would be fine. (But I do think I could make money on them - the real question is how much will I have to invest, and how long will it take to get my money back?)
My focus is on honey sales. I don't have a problem 'losing' $500 or $1000 getting some cookbooks printed up if they boost my honey sales a couple thousand. I think they have potential to work as a loss leader if I end up losing a little on them.

I sent an email to the publisher who printed the Mennonite cookbook, to get some idea of printing costs, but haven't heard back from them yet.

I went to a market this afternoon. There was a lady in the booth beside me who is an author, selling her books. (yuppie, urban farmers market. It's mostly craft stuff, real farmers and producers are a minority there.) The lady had some 8 by 10 inch paperback books over an inch thick that she was selling for $10.

I sell a paper book on eBay written by someone else. I buy cases directly from the author. I can get them at $12.34 for a book that retails for $25.

From what I am seeing, I suspect the biggest cost in producing cookbooks will be in the labor to compile them.

[Allen Dick]

I think you're missing the point.

Probably, but I think you are missing mine, and that is, stick to the knitting. Sell honey.

One recipe is all you need. A cookbook offers too many options and, frankly, I don't think they sell much honey.

All you really need is a little card that explains how to substitute honey for sugar and why. That way people use all their existing recipes and use honey instead of sugar. Simple.

Maybe a sign at the table saying to cook and bake with honey and here is how. One sentence. Maybe two if you want to be detailed.

We did seven farmers markets a week and ran a nation-wide mail order business. Mind you that was decades back. We sold our mail order business back in the 90's when I saw that the internet was going to devalue our biggest asset, our mailing list, by making anybody with a clue able to approach our clientèle at almost zero cost and diminish the profitability. We also foresaw that the Post Office, our principal delivery system, was going to have profitability issues and hike the rates.

I've sold cookbooks and seen bee clubs go off-focus and become cookbook writers and publishers. It never made any sense to me. It is one of those good ideas that turns out to be a distraction.

If I had to choose one recipe, it would be a mead recipe. People can drink a lot more honey than they can ever eat.

[TWall]

B,

Giving people recipes will help increase honey use which should result in increased sales. Creating customer loyalty should result in you capturing most of those sales.

Options include hang tags on bottles, fliers, pamphlets and recipe cards. Of course your contact info will be on all. You can also guide people to trying different varietal honeys for different uses. I have some customers who want to use the honey to bake bread, I recommend stronger flavored honey. For PB and honey sandwiches I usually recommend clover/basswood honey. I usually recommend lighter honey for dessert uses.

This can become as involved as you want it to be. I think the biggest benefit comes with building customer loyalty and continued sales.

Tom

[Charlie]

Countryboy
I'm interested in giving them ideas of why to buy a bottle of my honey when they are in front of my table.

I understand what you want to do and at the same time I do agree with Allen if people want a recipe they use Internet. However I have a suggestion in that give them that list is a bunch of health benefits for buying natural honey. It will require a little research on your part. You of course would want to quote any sources that you put in writing. You may also wish to point out that lots of honey is Imported from China and they have found a high percentage of high fructose corn syrup which has zero health benefits. While people have dozens of cookbooks that they never open, I'm willing to bet they don't have anything on the shelf that describes the health benefits of honey. I'm also assuming that everybody is interested in better health Just a thought.

[Countryboy]

If I had to choose one recipe, it would be a mead recipe. People can drink a lot more honey than they can ever eat.

If I had to choose one recipe that I would NEVER share at a farmer's market, it would be a recipe for mead.

For me, the whole point of being at a farmer's market selling honey is to cash in on retail sales. I offer 12 oz, 16 oz, and 32 oz bottles.

Meadmakers want large volumes of honey, as in several gallons at once, and they want bulk prices. I'm at a farmers market to get retail prices, not to sell honey in bulk or at wholesale prices.

It might be fine to put a mead recipe in a cookbook, but those are not the honey sales that I am pursuing.

I understand what you want to do and at the same time I do agree with Allen if people want a recipe they use Internet.

I have never had a customer stand at my table and look up a honey recipe on the internet. They might look up recipes once they are home and in their kitchen, but I'm not trying to sell them honey while they are in their kitchen. Which means it is irrelevant if they look up recipes on the internet, and I could care less about how they choose to consume the honey they bought. I'm trying to focus on how to better drive sales to customers who are standing in front of my table sampling my honey.

I don't think you guys get it. You are thinking about people actually cooking and baking with honey. I'm not. You are thinking about actual recipes for specific foods with honey in it. I'm not.

My goal is to give people IDEAS of what to do with the honey. Giving them recipes using honey is just a means to an end.

Introverted intuition versus extraverted intuition, and using deduction versus induction.

80% of people are object oriented, and 20% are idea oriented. I'm trying to look at the cognitive functions of people, and trying to adapt marketing techniques that use them to the maximum advantage.

This is just one step past giving free samples. Why do we give free samples? Because 80% of people are object oriented. They are grounded in the physical world, and use their 5 senses to help them process information. When they taste the honey, it gives them a connection.

However I have a suggestion in that give them that list is a bunch of health benefits for buying natural honey. It will require a little research on your part.

No, it will require a LOT of research. I may even have to make up research.

The research out there on health benefits of raw or natural honey is pretty much non-existant.
Research doesn't support the theory of local honey helping people with pollen allergies. The pollens folks are allergic to are wind transferred, and the pollens bees collect are insect transferred. So it's not even the same pollens.
Pollen grains have a hard outer coating. Bees have to ferment the pollen to crack that outer coating before they can digest it. Humans can't digest pollen grains. The pollen grains pass right through us.
The enzymes in honey start breaking down if honey is heated past 125 degrees F. But research has never found that honey heated past 125 is any more of less healthy for you than unheated honey.

I do believe that raw, local honey tastes better than store bought honey. And I would always encourage folks to buy honey from a local beekeeper because that puts money in the beekeeper's pocket and it helps the local economy.

But as for health benefits of local, raw honey.....I'm not aware of any that extend beyond the placebo effect.

You may also wish to point out that lots of honey is Imported from China and they have found a high percentage of high fructose corn syrup which has zero health benefits.

Supposedly, we don't have Chinese honey coming into the US. What we do have is honey that is suspected of being trans-shipped through other countries, such as Vietnam, which never had honey exports until Chinese honey was banned.

The last I knew it was rice syrup that was being blended with honey, since rice syrup is supposed to be more difficult to detect than corn syrup. Chinese honey has also had problems with being contaminated with chloramphenicol.

I'm also assuming that everybody is interested in better health Just a thought.

Very few people are interested in better health. They like the idea of better health, but that is as far as it goes. I get very few people at my booth who are health conscious. I get TONS of overweight and obese people who don't care about being healthy.

Don't get me wrong. I see very few morbidly obese people at farmer's markets. I see a lot of overweight and obese people. Physically fit people are a minority.

To be honest, morbidly obese and [welfare] trash are the two groups of people I don't see at farmer's markets.

Yes, I pay attention to the classes of people I am marketing to. And I wear Levi's and a button up shirt when I do my markets too.

Giving people recipes will help increase honey use which should result in increased sales. Creating customer loyalty should result in you capturing most of those sales.

This can become as involved as you want it to be. I think the biggest benefit comes with building customer loyalty and continued sales.

Let me throw out an example for you. I sell honey at the Easton Farmers Market. For folks not familiar with Easton, it is billionaire Les Wexner's "village" of stores. It's kind of like a huge shopping mall. 50,000 people visit Easton every day.

People come to Easton to go shopping. Most folks never knew there was a farm market going on until they walk by. Even though the market is every Thursday, odds are, I'll never see those customers again.

The only customer loyalty I can build is referring them to the Celebrate Local store at Easton which carries my honey.

The customers at another market I do are the most price sensitive of any market I have ever done. I will be the only honey vendor giving samples. They will taste my honey and then go buy honey from the guy who is $1 cheaper. (His is $8 a pound, and mine is $9) When that guy goes on vacation for a few weeks and isn't there, those customers brand loyalty flies out the window and I have great sales.

And it's not just honey...sweet corn, green beans, etc. If someone is a little cheaper, they get the business.

[TWall]

B.,

Customer loyalty comes in all shapes and colors. It may be measurable and it may not be. Maybe people are seeking out your honey at the 'Local' store. Your marketing efforts can sometimes be realized by someone as you mentioned.

I have 'loyal' honey customers that buy honey once a year. They just show up every fall sometime. I have other customers that want honey at least once a month.

Without asking you can never tell why someone is buying your honey. The best market is often unplanned. Thirty+ years ago I had two acres of pick-your-own strawberries. One of the ways I advertised was to donate strawberries to a local radio station that would auction them off on the air on Saturday mornings. The idea was to get products below market value for the buyers. One week two woman got in a bidding war. The woman who 'won' the strawberries ended up paying retail price. I didn't hear this on the radio. But, I usually asked new customer how the heard about the farm. That year a number of new customers mention hearing about us on the radio and the fact that the one woman paid retail must have been because the berries were so good!

You never know what will work. But, anything you can do to help increase consumption will increase sales. Keeping your business name in front of the consumer will also help you capture repeat sales.

Tom