I’ve interviewed hundreds of farmers over the years and when it comes to marketing I’ve found that women are better at it than men for the simple reason that most men hate doing it. Meantime, more and more niche market farmers are being dragged kicking and screaming into the world of marketing their products because it has to be done.

They flinch at the thought of big budget strategies. Don’t we all. But sometimes, the smallest remedies reap the biggest rewards. That’s the theme of a small book called Broken Windows, Broken Business, written by American consultant Michael Levine. The book is based on the theory that if a broken window on a building is not repaired, eventually all the other windows will get broken. This occurs because the initial broken window sends out the message that the owner doesn’t care.

In business, when the owner doesn’t care, eventually neither do the customers. Are there broken windows in your business? Here are the most common ones I have seen in direct sale farm operations. All of them are simple to repair and should be done as quickly as possible.

1. Lack of clear signage

Usually, the sign has faded, giving the impression that the operation is going out of business or has already closed down and no one bothered to pull down the sign. Or the sign is broken, or is too small or too far from the road to read. Sometimes the "open" sign always seems to be there. Without the hours of operation listed, a potential customer can be left thinking that if he drops in now, he’ll be an unwelcome interruption. Some signs don’t bother to list the farm phone number.

While courtesy is often the most memorable experience about buying from farmers, I am amazed at how many employees still need a lesson in the importance of saying "hello", "thank you" and "you’re welcome". Two of the biggest words to avoid a broken window, according to Levine, are these: "I’m sorry." You don’t have to be friendly, says Levine, but you have to be polite.

Since farmers are busy and sometimes can’t answer the phone, their message machine needs to include all the relevant information. I once drove 45 minutes to a rural butcher shop to pick up my 4-H lamb. I was told to drop in between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. Even the business answering machine said they were open between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. I got there at 12:10 p.m. and no one was working. I noticed a room with about six workers eating their lunch at a table and inquired about picking up my meat. I was brow-beaten by an angry man who yelled at me for disturbing their lunch. Perhaps the owner was around, I asked. Surprisingly, this bear was the owner and he made me wait 20 minutes until he was finished eating. Is it that difficult to tell people you are closed between noon and 12:30? Is it that difficult to designate one person to serve a customer who mistakenly turns up at lunch time? As you can imagine, I will never go back.

The worst thing about a bad experience is people will tell 10 others. I have told more than 10 people about my surreal experience with the angry butcher.

If you advertised it you better have it. At a maple sugar bush eat-in restaurant, the menu item my wife and I chose listed sausages, which the waitress didn’t want to give us because "it’s not supposed to include sausages."

How difficult would it be to either change the menu or just give us the sausages with a smile and maybe we’ll come back?

Other issues include advertising items that are out-of-stock. It can happen once but when it happens twice, customers go looking elsewhere.

The marketing consultants say you should pay particular attention to your parking lot and washroom.

For years, farmers have been their own worst enemies, pricing their produce too low. In some cases now, farmers have gone too far the other way. For the first time I hear people complain about prices they pay at farmers markets. The strategy is that since you’re at the market, you’ll buy something in spite of the price. But people will stop coming for the experience if they think they’re paying too much. Pricing a product is difficult. Always consider whether the customer will come back. Would you come back at that price?

Except for a few bad experiences, I have found that farmers tend to make your problem their problem and rightly provide prompt service. Remember, says Levine, "customer service is more important than anything else your business does."