[FMC] Visitor Counts

[Stacy Miller]

Kim:

Great question! I'm sure there will be a lot of varied feedback on this, but
I'll happily be one of the first to respond based on my (limited) experience
with customer counts.

Lev, Brewer and Stephenson, researchers at Oregon State, have a system which
they use as one important leg in what they call Rapid Market Assessment,
which you may be familiar with? It goes roughly as follows:
- Count only adults
- Count only shoppers ENTERING the market during the counting period. If you
recognize someone coming back from their car after dropping off purchases,
do not count them again.
- Determine lines of sight in the market between and among all entrances.
This will determine how many counters you need.
- You may be in a situation where defined entries are not feasible, in which
case you will need as many volunteers as you can in order to "cover" all
possible entry points. You may need to even mark spots on the ground  about
30 or 40 feet apart and simply "assign" zones of responsibility to each
volunteer.
- For markets that open on the hour (i.e 9:00), the count should take place
every hour from :25 to :35. I have found that doing this in the middle of
every hour is important, as the large influx of people right at the
beginning bell can grossly overestimate that's hour's count when
extrapolated for the full hour.
- Multiply each 10 minute count by 6 to estimate the number for the total
hour. Then add each hour's estimates together. If your market is open for,
say 4 and a half hours, from 8 to 12:30, then you may want to do a count
from 12:10 to 12:20 and multiply by three.
- Make it clear to whoever reads your numbers that your daily total
represents only THAT SPECIFIC DAY.  Every day is different due to season,
weather, existence of other competing or complementary events, and other
factors.

You may wonder why simply counting the people presently IN the market at
similar intervals wouldn't work just as well.  I've done counts at a market
where entries were poorly defined and we tried this method.  I came to
realize that the average customer "staying time" was much more than ten
minutes, so assuming that every ten minutes there would be turnover in an
equivalent amount meant that we were grossly overestimating.  In that case,
I felt that counting everyone saw in the market in the middle of each hour
and multiplying by a factor of three was much more representative of
reality.  But that's just a personal observation and others may feel
differently. The bottom line is that consistency in methodology is key.

In any case, here is a link to the portion of FMC's resource library (in
progress!) where you can find this document from Oregon State, as well as a
link to marketumbrella's Sticky Economic Evaluation Device (SEED), which has
some nice forms and tools for collecting customer counts, sales numbers, and
vendor and customer perception data.  Using an economic multiplier, you can
plug in your numbers and get an idea of the economic impact.
http://www.farmersmarketcoalition.org/resources/resources-for-managers-and-sponsors/

Good luck!

Stacy
-------------------------------------
Stacy M. Miller
Executive Secretary
Farmers Market Coalition
stacy at farmersmarketcoalition.org
304-685-2669
www.farmersmarketcoalition.org

Farmers markets are good for everyone. Join us to make them even better.

On Mon, Jun 9, 2008 at 9:31 PM, Kimberly Rush Lynch <
krushlynch at greenbeltfarmersmarket.org> wrote:

> Greetings!
>
> First, I just wanted to thank all of you who responded to my IRS question.
> Many, many thanks!  I have one more question to ask regarding counting
> visitors.  How often and for how long do you count folks, and then what do
> you do with that info (as far as extrapolation goes)?  I just want to make
> sure we're capturing our visitor info correctly.  I look forward to hearing
> about your experiences.
>
> With much appreciation,
> Kim
>
> --
> Kimberly Rush Lynch
> kim.rush.lynch at gmail.com
> 301.356.4731
>
>
> www.Cultivating-Health.com
> www.GreenbeltFarmersMarket.org
> www.provencaljourney.blogspot.com
>
>
>
>
>
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