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How Shari 7X’d Her Dahlia Tuber Sales in the Dahlia Capital of the U.S. — In Only 4 Months

Shari Kruyswijk of Flowerly Farm in Lynden, Washington grows over 600 dahlias on a one-third acre property five minutes from the Canadian border — in an area widely known as the dahlia capital of the United States. After losing half her dahlia stock to Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus (TSV) in 2024 and watching new dahlia farms open all around her, Shari joined Charlotte Smith’s farm marketing program in October 2025.

Four months later, her January 2026 tuber launch did seven times her previous year’s sales.

In this conversation, Shari walks through the exact mindset shifts, marketing decisions, and time management changes that made the difference.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• How a small flower farmer 7X’d her tuber sales in a saturated dahlia market
• Why focusing on one product line (instead of weddings, classes, subscriptions, and bouquets) is the fastest path to farm profitability
• How email marketing built around relationship, not features, converts cold customers into repeat buyers
• The role mindset work and calendaring play in farm income, even for farmers who don’t think they need it
• How to overcome the “there are too many farms around me” story most direct-to-consumer farmers tell themselves
• What changed for Shari and her husband Dave’s marriage as her farm stress decreased

Topics Covered

• Meet Shari from Flowerly Farm in Lynden, WA
• The 2024 TSV virus loss and starting over with clean stock
• Why Sherry joined the program in October 2025
• How time management coaching changed her daily life
• The shift from to-do lists to a calendared week
• Learning to write emails that serve, not sell
• The grocery store conversation that turned into a customer
• Shari’s January 2026 launch — the goal vs. the 7X result
• Why “too much competition” is the wrong story for direct-to-consumer farmers
• Mindset, meditation, and the phrases Shari and Dave now use daily
• Why her husband says she’s “a less stressful wife”
• Future plans: open garden tours and golden hour photo events
• Her advice to farmers hesitant to invest in themselves

Notable Quotes from Shari

“We had a goal of tripling last year’s sales. We exceeded that goal – it was a good 7X.”

“I didn’t realize I needed the mindset coaching. I didn’t realize I needed the calendaring. And now I crave those morning mindset shifts – they change how I think all day long.”

“You said, let’s just focus on one thing. I have a list of things I’d like to do someday — but it’s just someday. I’m not as overwhelmed.”

About Shari Kruyswijk

Shari and her husband Dave run Flowerly Farm in Lynden, Washington. They specialize in dahlia tubers, fresh-cut dahlias, and dahlia hybridizing — growing 900 dahlias from seed in 2025 alone. Dave is a landscaper and partner in Whatcom Landscapes. The farm sits on one-third of an acre near the Canadian border in the Pacific Northwest’s prime dahlia-growing climate.

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

• Farm Marketing Week — Seven Days of Free Marketing Expertise: charlottemsmith.com/masterclass

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How did Shari from Flowerly Farm 7X her dahlia sales?

A: Sherry joined Charlotte Smith’s farm marketing coaching program in October 2025, learned email marketing, time management, and mindset skills, and applied them to a January 2026 tuber launch. Her sales came in at seven times her previous year’s total.

Q: What is TSV and why does it matter for dahlia growers?

A: Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus is a plant virus that can be transmitted between dahlias by un-sanitized snips. Sherry lost half her dahlia stock to TSV in 2024 and now follows strict sanitation practices with clean stock.

Q: Can a flower farm be profitable in a saturated local market?

A: Yes. As Shari’s story demonstrates, profitability in direct-to-consumer flower farming is driven by relationship-based marketing skills, not by being the only farm in your area. Shari 7X’d her sales while surrounded by other dahlia farms.

Q: How long does it take to see results from farm marketing coaching?

A: Shari saw a 7X sales result within four months of joining the program. On average, farmers in Charlotte Smith’s program recoup their investment within the first 90 days.

Q: What is Farm Marketing Week?

A: Farm Marketing Week is a free annual masterclass hosted by Charlotte Smith. It’s an opportunity to learn the core marketing strategies that have helped farmers like Julie triple their sales and to meet the community of farmers in The Profitable Farmer program. Sign up at charlottemsmith.com/masterclass.

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Connect with Charlotte

Sign up for Farm Marketing Week at charlottemsmith.com/masterclass.

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Chat with us to see if The Profitable Farmer Marketing Coaching Program can break you out of marketing misery.

Hi, everyone. I have such a special treat for you today. I have one of my clients on the podcast.

I love to do this every once in a while regularly so you can hear the successes they’re having on

their farm and they will inspire you. And today is no different. Today,

you’re going to be inspired by my client, Sherry Kruyswijk from Flowerly Farm.

And we’re going to talk about… she has gone from struggling to so much more success in her months

working with me. And so let’s dive in. Sherry, I would love for you to tell us who you are,

where you’re located, what you farm, and also give us your website so people listening can look you

up too. So thanks for being here, Sherry. Yes, thank you for having me, Charlotte. This is really a

pleasure. My name is Sherry Kreisweg, and with my husband Dave, we have about 600 plus dahlias on

our one-third acre property in the Pacific Northwest. So we’re located in Linden,

Washington. We’re five minutes from the Canadian border, and yeah,

we’ve been here for a good 10 years. We’re looking for more property someday, but Right now,

we are thrilled that we can grow beautiful dahlias, sell the tubers,

share the beauty with our community. And it’s been really a joy.

That’s wonderful. And tell us your website address. Our website is flowerlyfarm.com.

So take the word flower, F-L-O-W-E-R. And then add L-Y.

We made… an adjective out of a noun. So it’s flowerlyfarm.com.

Wonderful. And are you on social media? Can they find you on Facebook or Instagram? I’m on

Facebook. Yep. You can find us on Facebook and Instagram at flowerly farm as well.

Wonderful. Okay. Great. Well, so you’ve, I met you probably,

it was October ish of 2025 and we’re now in spring of 2026 and.

I wanted to have you share on the podcast because you’re an example of someone who just implemented

what I teach right away and had success right away. And we’re going to get to the success, but tell

us what were you struggling with before we met in October? When you started listening to the

podcast, what were you struggling with or what encouraged you to sign up for the program?

What did you, what were you hoping it would help you with? Yeah, we had a lot of tubers that were

in the ground. So we had a lot of money in the ground and we wanted to sell them.

And we had been selling them for a good six years. But in 2024,

about half of our dahlias we threw out due to a virus.

They had TSV and we had unknowingly been transmitting virus. because we had not been sanitizing our

SNPs. So we wanted to start with a clean stock. So in 2025,

we started with all clean stock. We used all sanitation practices,

but we felt like we had lost a lot of our customer base. And then on top of that,

there have been many, many Dahlia farms. And there are so many Dahlia farms,

which is lovely. Lots of people love the beauty. And it’s so understandable.

And yet, I thought and my husband thought, how are we ever going to sell these tubers and I had

wanted to learn about email marketing. And I knew it would be helpful to have an expert.

I knew I could look a lot of things up on Google and do it badly for a year,

but I didn’t feel like we had that time to figure things out slowly.

I wanted to ask an expert, dive right in. I had the time.

Well, and that’s what I… That’s what I so appreciate about you is you joined the program and you

started raising your hand right away for coaching. Anyone can raise their hand, but some people are

more timid than others. And you were probably scared, but you did it anyway. At least that’s what

most people tell me too. And I think that’s such a great example for anyone listening that.

you can learn these things and then just start implementing them right away. And you got immediate

feedback. You tell us about, well, take us through that journey and then we’ll get to your, you

know, seven X-ing your sales in the first few months. But how was it to start?

You joined the program and then what went on for you in your head?

I would listen quite a, I would listen. um continuously to your coaching other people and um to

give a little background my husband and i both had some health concerns for a good year and we went

to a specialist and she said you can address these concerns with a change of diet so we were very

excited and um I ended up doing a lot of cooking.

So as I’m at home doing batches of food, chopping onions and chopping carrots,

I’m listening to your coaching calls. I’m hearing how you helped other people. And then when I had

questions come up in my mind, I’m like, oh, I can flounder. Or I could just ask Charlotte.

And you came up with an immediate answer versus I would have. not come up with that same answer for

years. So I’m very grateful. That’s wonderful. And so tell us, I want to start with the time

management program because I mentioned to everyone, that’s where I have farmers start. And you even

mentioned that you didn’t think you needed it, which most of us who are efficient and organized

don’t think we need it. But I know when I…

took the time management class in the way I now teach it. It changed my life forever.

It just changed how I think about time and manage my time. So how was that for you?

Yeah, it was exciting. I was very open to learning. Kept on thinking Charlotte knows,

she knows, she’s the expert on what works. I’m going to change my way of doing these things.

I used to be a person of lists and every day at breakfast, I would write out all the things that I

had hoped or that I would hope to accomplish that day. And nine times out of 10,

I would never get it done, which of course led to overwhelm. So I’m super grateful how you teach,

make your list. Put it on your calendar and then throw your list away and then have time for fun

within the day, which I’m so grateful. It’s so much. Yeah,

I would say it’s so much of a happier way to live. Yeah, that’s really nice. And it’s,

you know, there are several steps involved in it, but the freedom when you learn how to calendar

your to-dos the way I teach. The freedom of being able to throw away,

check everything off and throw away the list because you know it is calendared, it’s set,

you have your own back. Yeah, it gives farmers so much freedom. So I’m glad. my planner is always

floating around with me in the house or in the garage. And then it’s not all these ideas floating

around in the brain. It’s just on my planner. I mean, have to think about it. Yeah, I love it.

Wonderful. I’m so glad we touched on that. And then tell us about the marketing program. You dove

into that. You had some wonderful success. How did that go for you?

Yeah, with the writing of the emails, It was super helpful.

I didn’t know how to write to the customer. I didn’t know how to address the customer’s needs.

And your program of talking to the customer’s husband, absolutely fabulous.

You coached me also on talking to people, which I didn’t think I needed. But I run into a fair

amount of people in the grocery store and the cashiers. And I have a lovely story of which I was.

at a store about 30 minutes away south um from me and lovely lady helped me and i’m like i’m gonna

chat with her i’m not gonna just figure you know treat her like a computer i’m glad to talk to a

real person and um it turns out that she lives two minutes away from me so i’m like oh you have to

come to my farm in the summertime i’m going to have a whole bunch of people and enjoy the beauty

it’s really spectacular so I have her email and I’m going to have her over.

And she was so excited and it just brought joy to both of us on that day.

So I love what you teach about talking to people, telling people about how I can bring beauty into

their day. I remember that coaching call. And I just want everyone listening to know that we coach

on whatever is in the way of you making sales. And so it’s not just you got to learn how to do a

great Instagram reel to make sales. Sometimes what’s in the way is I’m afraid to talk to people to

make sales. And so I remember that coaching call and then you. I think you posted in the Facebook

group a week later, like how you were really, really scared, but you still did it. And then you got

this feedback of people love to, when you reach out, you know, they’re just as receptive as,

uh, as you would be if someone said that gave you a compliment or something. So I remember that

coaching really well. Oh, that’s wonderful. Okay. So you started learning to how to word emails in

a way that, that sells, but also I think one of the things that is important to me about teaching

marketing and sales, and you mentioned it, you know, most people love is the way I teach you that

selling and marketing is serving. It’s helping. And so it makes email writing so much easier when

we shift that mindset. So talk to me more about that. How was that for you?

How did that shift things for you? Oh, I actually love writing emails.

It’s still hard. I haven’t arrived, but I feel like I have the blueprint of how I want to make

emails interesting for people. And I enjoy the creative practice of it.

I’ve also written an email for Dave and John’s business for Whatcom Landscapes.

They have a landscape business together. And one day Dave said, oh, we want to do landscape

lighting. We don’t have many projects for landscape lighting. And I said, oh, I would love to write

an email for that. And I’m still definitely a newbie. It takes me literally hours.

to craft it and recraft it. But I know that’s going to get better with time.

And I’m just really right now enjoying the process of learning and becoming more efficient.

Right. And when you become aware that, yes, I think you’re shortchanging yourself because you’re

still learning, but look at the results you’re getting. So we can get amazing sales without being

expert. And just so you know, I sent out an email today and it took me about two hours.

So it still takes time. But when you know that the results you get are a profitable farm,

it makes the two hours you might invest. And it’s not all emails take that long to write. But if I

have a, you know. really specific purpose or something I want to get just right. It does take

longer, but let’s jump to your success with email marketing.

Tell us, because again, you haven’t even been in here six months and you’re just doing so many

wonderful things. So tell me about the launch. that resulted in so many more sales.

Yes, we did our launch in January, the end of January. It was a Saturday.

And prior to the launch, I had gotten a whole bunch of emails prepped.

So that took a considerable amount of time. And then along with… those emails we had to do some

big tweaks to our website and so in our emails we would have links to certain beautiful flowers and

i could see in the emails after i sent them out that people loved them they clicked on these webs

on these flowers and later when they became available they purchased them so people Loved it.

People read these emails and purchased our flowers. And then during the launch,

they would go back and purchase more. And then we did a relaunch later and people would purchase

more, which they’re so gorgeous. How can you not? Right. I know.

Dahlia addiction. I, my yard I’m taking. parts of my lawn away so I can keep planting more and

more. And I think, I think I’m not the only one who does that. So gardening is alive and well,

and it’s so good for it. Mental health. It’s so good to share the beauty. It’s yeah.

Dahlia fever is not going away. And I want to point out that through all of this,

joining the program, raising your hand on how to even talk to people. And then we cut you.

what you get to do in the program is show up on a coaching call and share your emails with me,

share your marketing plan with me on screen. And I think that’s, what’s important is that you were

willing to be vulnerable and come on screen and, and have my eyes on your email or let,

you know, any, any one of our coaches coach you and offer you feedback. And you were open to that.

And the results are get get to the results. That’s fun. I want everyone to hear that. How how did

that launch end up? Oh, the launch was fantastic. We had a goal of tripling our goal or our success

from the previous year. And we exceeded that goal.

It was a good seven X of our. of of last year’s goal so i was really really really super surprised

and um we couldn’t be happier yes and then how does that shift your thinking about oh my goodness

there’s so many flower farmers selling dahlia tubers that you know you were you had that scarcity

mindset before you signed up for the program how did that shift now that you had this launch yeah

it It makes us want to grow more. Yeah. There,

there isn’t a shortage. People love our flowers. Yeah. And the way I teach you,

you have just like, you have so much evidence that what I teach is what works.

And that is when you build a relationship with people, and this applies to all farmers,

there can be a competing dairy farm. meat, you know,

chicken, pork, beef, lamb, vegetables, winery, dog training, whatever, all around you.

And they will flock to you because of this connection that we help guide you to build with them.

Yeah. And then that’s where I’m able to say there is no competition when you market based on

relationship. Right. And we live in an area which some people will call the Dahlia capital of the

United States. We live in an area where dahlias do really, really well with the cooler nights in

the summer. And there’s no shortage of Dahlia farms near us, but there’s room for everyone.

Yeah. Yep. And they will succeed if they learn how to market in a way that works in today’s world,

which is what you’re here learning. So I just want everyone. listening to really let that sink in,

that it’s not about living in the right place or having just the right website.

It is about your thoughts. And then are your thoughts leading you to be open to learning things

like email marketing and building relationship and, oh, I can figure this out. I can learn

something new.

Well, what other stories? You have so many success stories. What else do you want to share?

I was surprised when I joined your class. Doesn’t be surprised of how holistic it is.

I signed up with just the mentality of I need help with email marketing.

And I thought it was interesting that you did calendaring and mindset coaching,

but I really didn’t think I needed it. But I dove right in thinking it’s.

going to help me somehow. And I’m so glad I didn’t realize I needed the mindset coaching.

I didn’t realize I needed the calendaring and how helpful it would be. And about the mindset

coaching, it’s been really, really lovely. I’ve been a teacher for 25 years of little ones.

And this is the first year I’m taking a break. I don’t know if I’ll be back someday. But I keep

thinking, oh, I wish I had known. A lot of this while I was teaching it would have impacted even

how I taught with the little ones. But as for me, I crave those morning meditations and it changes

how I think all day long. Some of the phrases that you say come up in daily conversation with my

husband. We’ll say, notice what your brain is telling you.

And we have some of your phrases on repeat. And it’s been a blessing to us because we’re noticing

what our brain is saying. And we want to think positive and optimistic.

And it really makes a difference. Um, I’m so grateful you’re sharing that because this,

this part of it comes from the neuroscience. Like there’s evidence, there’s research that shows

your thoughts create your results in your life. So if your thoughts are unuseful,

which most of us default to, you’re going to struggle on your farm. And,

uh, but most farmers don’t realize that. So I love that you’re saying so to have not just me,

you know, preaching it in an ad or something, but to have an actual farmer on camera saying,

yes, I, I too wondered how important it was. And now it is changing so much.

I really appreciate it. So thanks for sharing that. It’ll help other people know that their

marketing won’t work if their mindset isn’t useful. So, yeah. How has it you?

Because number one, thanks for using. I’m so glad to hear the word holistic. Again, a lot of

farmers will use that like, oh, I have no idea. But holistic is how we live.

That’s human. Like I think of our humanity is holistic. So if we try to pull some part of our

humanity out of our marketing, it just won’t be as successful. So I’m glad you mentioned that.

You mentioned. the phrases that you and your husband use,

how has it changed your marriage or what have you noticed there?

Oh, that’s an interesting question.

Yeah, we’ve always had a really good marriage. We’ve been married for 10 years.

We came to marriage later in life. We found each other online.

He’s such a wonderful man. He’s so helpful. It’s, there’s never been a struggle there.

Oh, that is wonderful. That’s wonderful. And let’s just pause right there.

A farming couple who running a farm, Andy has a different business and you’re not struggling.

I love that. Tell us, tell us your secret. This is so good. Let me back up a little bit.

So I was single for many, many, many years.

I always wanted to grow things. And as a child, we lived basically in a forest.

So I couldn’t grow tomatoes or anything. My mother loved flowers, but of course she grew all the

shade flowers, the impatience and everything that grows the hostas, right? Everything that grows in

the shade and living in the woods, I would play all the time outside. And then as a single gal,

I had a condo, I had a porch. So I filled it up with plants, but there was always a yearning for me

to grow things. And then when I met Dave, he’s a landscaper. So it was a perfect,

it was a perfect match. Yes. And we came back from our honeymoon and he tilled up the grass and we

planted this huge garden. And it was horrible because we started it in August or September when

you’re not supposed to start it. But then the next year. We planted everything and it was an

experiment. So we absolutely love gardening.

He comes home from work and he goes outside and we love growing things together.

It’s really a lot of fun. That is a really inspirational story. I love it.

And so many listeners will love that too. And having the mindset work.

to help sustain that is wonderful. Cause I know a lot of farm families do struggle.

They’ve heard about the podcast. And one of the things they say on the podcast is our marriage has

improved so much, but it’s wonderful that you’ve never had a struggle. I admire that. Oh, I can

tell you this. We really loved the year end goals or it was in January or so that we did.

We always do have a marriage retreat every year and then we go somewhere and we do a whole bunch of

questions and we set goals for the future. And then this year we included the flower leaf farm

goals, which we used your plans or yes, it’s called the year end business marketing plan training.

It’s about a two hour training that all every one of you. has access to inside the program. And

you’re not the only farm couple who’s like made it a retreat. Like let’s do this together as year

end or beginning of the year. It can actually be done any time of year, but good. Tell me more

about that. Yeah, we, we made this big calendar. It’s hanging up in the hallway and we have,

you know, what our blog posts want to be about and when we’re going to send out our emails,

when we’re going to take our vacations. Um, when we’re going to do another launch, um,

I can’t say we’ve arrived, but we have a beginning of, um, a better plan than what we’ve ever had

before. Yeah. And doing it every year, it’ll just get better and better. And the fact that you have

it together. So he, he can look at it and go, Oh, she’s going to be, Sherry’s going to be extra

busy that week or vice versa. It’s really nice. And what I can tell you too,

Charlotte is, um, I feel like Dave has a less stressful wife.

A less stressful wife. Wonderful.

So our marriage is good, but I think he enjoys Sherry’s not as stressed.

I used to be, I would say I used to have all these ideas of things I wanted to do.

I wanted to do weddings and I wanted to do CSAs and I wanted to teach. I wanted to cook all healthy

foods and I wanted to do art and play music and a whole host of things,

which are all wonderful and interesting. But when I joined your program, you said, let’s just focus

on one thing. And I have a list of things I’d like to do someday, but it’s just someday.

So yes, it’s yeah. The power man. I’m not as overwhelmed. I’m like,

okay. I can just do two verbs. Yeah. I love what you said.

You said you thought that I was going to help you fulfill all the dreams at once, like sell seeds,

do the wedding, sell the subscriptions, sell bouquets, host farm tours. And I helped you become,

I teach this the very first week in class. You have to focus on one thing to become profitable,

to learn the skills of becoming profitable. And one of the biggest… Mistakes farmers make is

trying to sell all the things and you just, you just can’t learn the skills. So backing off,

focusing on the one thing is scary for a lot of farmers, but that’s how you get seven times your

sales in one week, you know, so. and we coach you through it.

It’s so the contrary to what most farmers think is the way to become successful.

So I think it’s why coaching is especially helpful to say, okay, Sherry,

I know you want to do all these things and you can, and you will, but right now we got to start

here. And then having the, every being in the Facebook group and seeing others support you too.

Like, yes, when I focused on one thing, we finally got to profit, you know, so. That’s wonderful.

All right. What else have we missed that you would like to share about that has shifted in your

life because of any of these mindset coaching, marketing, time management?

New as of this year, we have made the goal to share the beauty of our farm.

with our community. So we love that we can ship our tubers all over the US.

And yet there seems to be a missing link like, oh, we’d like to see people.

So we don’t have a huge property. But in August and September, the rows that we have around our

house are absolutely gloriously beautiful. We have an interest in hybridizing as well.

So not only are there, you know, the the lovely blooms that the florists and all gardeners love.

But we’re growing dahlias from seed. Last year we did 900. And then the percentage of the ones that

we keep is a little bit lower than that. It’s quite a bit lower than that. But there are new

varieties that nobody has ever seen before. And it’s quite tall.

Like we do compost and we do compost tea. We don’t have raised beds,

but they are mounded quite a bit. And the dahlias that we have grow quite tall.

So they’re at eye level or higher. So walking through our rows, it’s like a garden forest.

It sounds private. It’s beautiful. And the photos that we take are just gorgeous.

I’m going to need coaching on that because our parking is not conducive to a whole lot of people.

People are going to have to park at the fire station if I can get that allowed or the church.

And then people can maybe walk over the street and and raise your hand. We’re here.

And the beauty of coaching will help you with that. But also the Facebook group, there’s 250

farmers in there that will are so helpful. They will dive in and help you,

too. So you get. my support and our coaches support and your colleagues support,

even if they’re not flower farmers, you know, so many, there’s every type of farmer in there and

they’ll have feedback for you, but what’s your event going to look like? So when they come to your

farm tour, is there, is it just walk yourself through on your own or is it going to be an organized

tour or is it just an open garden? What will that look like? Yeah.

Dave is open to doing a tour. I would be as well, but he is the specialist in soil.

He loves soil health and can talk to anybody and let them learn about the magnificent nematodes and

all the inner workings of the soil more than I can. And if people are interested in that, he’s the

guy to talk to. It would be a quick tour, but I think what people would really love is…

to take photos of their loved ones or of the flowers during golden hour,

which is when the sun is just setting.

And yeah, as far as that, maybe we’d have some water and kombucha. And I don’t think it would be a

long day. It’d just be a couple hours. And then people have leave.

Yeah, that’s wonderful. I love, you know, I’m a gardener. I live on a flower farm and yet I still

go to other open gardens all the time because it’s just like, it’s,

it’s, it’s in our blood and craving that peace and connection. And sometimes living on my own farm,

I don’t feel the peace and connection as much because it’s, you know, there’s more of the to do’s,

but then going. to another open garden up the road or,

you know, in Portland or something like that is so inspirational. So that’s going to help so much

with people’s. What I’ve really loved in the past when I was teaching as well as I would give kids

a free flower and then sometimes, or my nieces and nephews, we have many,

many nieces and nephews. And then we’ve done flower events for family in which I give the kids.

a flower and sometimes these flowers are you know the dinner place 12 inches they’re as big as

their head or bigger and it’s just so darling it’s so cute and they are so surprised are as well to

you know they everybody has to take a picture of a kid with a flower that’s um bigger than

themselves right you can’t go wrong with a flower garden tour any any farm tour really yeah

wonderful well so as we get toward the end here I love asking well two things number one is there

anything else we miss that you really want to share about how The,

the coaching program has helped you. It’s, you know, you’re here for a year, you’re like halfway

through your year. And of course you can renew at a, you know, really low price,

cheap price, but you, and you’ve made so much progress in the six months or so you’re here because

you’ve been open to being vulnerable and just trying, you know, we’re going to do it messy. Not

that yours is messy whatsoever, but it’s kind of the thing we all have to get used to is, okay,

it’s not going to look perfect at first, but I’m going to raise my hand and get some feedback on

this. And you’ve been so open to that. Is there anything else you want to share?

I’m really grateful that the program is a good year.

Initially, it seemed like, wow, that’s a long time, but I’ve been four months in and I’m still

learning. I definitely feel like I could go on for years and keep learning and keep receiving the

support. So I’m glad it was a good year in which I know I’m like,

okay, I’m going to get, I’m going to get coached and help. So I’m very grateful. Marketing and

mindset growth is iterative. You, you learn how to write the email and you go write it and it’s not

going to be. what you could do if you had feedback on it and rewrote it five times or even twice.

So you just keep getting better. I’m glad you mentioned that because when I first started teaching

12 years ago, 13 years ago, it was a six week program. And then I slowly realized that,

oh, we need to get better. Since you’re a teacher, it would be like teaching. language arts or

math, you know, for six weeks. No, in order to get the end result of being skilled,

it takes time and iterations. And so continuing to raise your hand and learning how to improve your

marketing, but also your mindset, you know, we’re all wired biologically to go negative. So it

takes months. of listening to coaching calls to start to notice that it’s rewiring your brain

toward useful thinking instead of the default thinking, which is negative for all human beings.

It’s not just you or me or women or something like that. It’s how we’re wired biologically.

So I’m glad you mentioned that. Also, the year allows for life,

for us to have life challenges, maybe have a baby, take maternity leave,

or help with ailing partners or kids or spouse or parents or something so I just found a year was

kind of the sweet spot where most people are like oh do I really need a year and then they say what

you said like oh I really it’s really valuable so good plus it allows us to get to know you because

every farmer it’s not cookie cutter marketing it’s relationship-based marketing.

You’re building a relationship with you, Sherry, the farmer. And so it allows us to get to know you

and give feedback that’s personal to you too, even though you will learn from everyone else’s

feedback.

And then, so the last question I love to ask is if there’s someone listening who thinks they would

love to try this program, but they’re hesitant for whatever reason, maybe A lot of times we just

aren’t used to in our world, we aren’t used to investing money in ourselves,

for instance. We think, you know, maybe this money should go toward the farm or toward a tractor or

toward the kids or toward something for someone else, not me. So they’re hesitant to invest in

themselves, but they really connect with what you’re saying. What advice would you have?

Like, what would you tell them? What would you share if you were sitting there having coffee and

they shared that? Oh, I have an analogy which fits this perfectly.

A couple of years ago, I was trying to make applesauce,

canned applesauce for the first time. And I had a couple of questions, even though I was following

something on the Internet. And I ended up.

googling a lot of things and of all things I found out there were thousands of different ways

people canned applesauce and so Dave’s like let’s just call my mom she’s been doing it for 40 years

so we ended up calling Dave’s mom and she just said you have to do this this this this and this and

um I did it and it worked out perfectly and it saved me so much time and frustration and probably

apples gone badly. So, um, I treat it.

I, um, I think of your program as kind of like my mother-in-law’s answer.

Like it was so easy. I, we just called her and she told us what to do.

And, um, likewise, when I had all those questions initially before, um,

taking your program, to figure out email marketing, I could have Googled a lot of things,

wasted a lot of time and done things that weren’t efficient.

And so I would say your program, Charlotte, has been a blessing in which it has saved me a lot of

time, a lot of time doing things badly. And the support of talking to live people and…

People that have done it in the past, receiving the benefit of you coaching others and being able,

being able to hear it has, has also been really a tool.

It’s like a tool. It’s like buying a tool, not a tractor or not a tool in which it helps me make

wise decisions, which is. It truly is. And I do want to mention what I hear so often is,

for instance, the cash flow, like 7x your sales got cash flowing that you wouldn’t have otherwise.

And on average, most farmers pay for their investment in about the first 90 days with events like

that. So that’s wonderful. Thank you. Yeah, you go straight to the horse’s mouth with mother-in

-law giving you advice or. marketing advice yeah it was the same with kombucha people yes my cousin

taught me how to make kombucha and then I’m surprised how many other people come to me and ask me

as the kombucha expert how to do it I mean they could look on the internet but we crave talking to

people yes and also The fact that you’ve done it makes you an expert. You make successful kombucha.

I’m the same way with yogurt. There’s thousands of ways to make yogurt, raw milk yogurt, but I have

a way that is so simple and it works and people come to me and it saves them money and time and all

that. So yeah, go straight to the expert. It’s worth the investment. You pay yourself back.

And now not only do you pay yourself back, you, you. have the skill of making money on your farm,

which so many farmers go out of business because they can just never quite get ahead. So this

helped you, you know, within two, two months, two and a half months in the program,

you had huge success and it’ll just keep building from there. Well,

thank you. Thank you, Charlotte, so much. Yes. Thanks so much for being here.

I really, really appreciate it.