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• If you are just starting, consider inviting a Sunday school group out at no charge, explaining that you would like them to be your guest at the farm and you will be taking pictures to be used on your new website.

• To reduce the cost of website development start by hiring a high school student who can build a basic website with pictures for you. A good website can save you the cost of an expensive full-colour brochure.

Paid newspaper ads are a diffcult and expensive way to hit your target market. A more cost effective way to utilize the media is to put out a press release to local newspapers, radio and TV stations. Hopefully you can get a reporter to do an article on your new venture.

School tours require work. Assess your family’s existing workload and see if anyone can take on the new venture. If not, you need to hire staff. It is important that the people performing the different tasks are trained. Not just anyone can take a group of school children and keep their interest for 90 minutes or more. You aren’t just looking for bodies to plug into jobs – you need the right people.

You’ll need someone to schedule tours. Teachers work from 9:00 a.m. until 3:30 p.m., and may only be able to answer the phone during a spare or recess. If you miss their call, ask

One instructor is required for every 30 students. If it is an older group, you might want to cut that back to 1 for 35. If you are having the students do an activity, you may need some extra help during that activity. Good sources of instructors are:

• Homemakers. Not all moms/dads are good at this job. Consider advertising for parents who have had volunteer experience at school as they probably enjoy working with children. Ask for references. Call the references to fnd out how the prospect interacts with children.

• Retired school teachers. Not all teachers are good with children. Be sure to gauge their attitude during your interview.

If you offer tractor tours of the farm, you will need well trained, careful tractor drivers. The tour instructor goes on the tractor tour to give any commentary that is part of the tour. The driver needs to have their full attention on the safe transportation of the children.

Farm grounds must be maintained at a higher level for school tours. This means keeping the grass trimmed, pulling weeds, building curb appeal and making sure the tour area is safe and childproof.

Live animal exhibits add variety to your farm tour but require someone to look after them. Animals create manure that hosts fies and bacteria. Clean manure up daily and move it to a more remote area of the farm to reduce fies and odour. This isn’t a part of farming that teachers and parents want the children to experience.

With the public coming onto your farm you need public washrooms. They can be portable toilets but they need to be kept clean and odours controlled.

The tour programs and workshops have to be written. Usually, the farm family retains control of this job. The frst time you design a program it might take two or three days to decide what you can cover that ties to the school curriculum. With experience, a tour program for Kindergarten through Grade 2 might take fve hours, and an all day workshop 20 hours, to prepare and train the staff.

Training staff is very important. Staff members need to know the farm story and the tour content to give a good tour. They also need to know about all your tour packages so they can talk about them to tour participants and potential tour guests. The best place to start is to create a manual. The manual should cover:

• Safety concerns (where children can go, what they can do, and the importance of washing their hands).

• Emergency procedures (if a child is hurt, lost, or becomes ill). • Rules of conduct for your tour guide staff, teachers, parents and students. Remind everyone that yours is a working farm with inherent dangers. Children can not wander off. They must always be with an adult.

• Background information on the farm plus information on the farm’s crops and livestock.

• Complete tour script for each tour package with samples of any handouts (colouring sheets,