Jan 17, 2012

SNAP transactions can make growers more money

If you’re a retail farmer you should consider accepting SNAP purchases. It’s a simple, inexpensive way to potentially increase your sales.

That sentence pretty much sums up Gordie Moeller’s mission. The retired social worker has spent the last couple of years convincing retail growers to accept sales from the federal government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP – the contemporary term for food stamps). The way he sees it, there’s no downside to doing so. Low-income families eat more healthful produce, the local economy is stimulated and growers get access to millions of additional dollars.

Moeller, who lives in western Michigan’s Kent County, has numbers to back up his message. His focus is his home state, but growers all over the country can accept SNAP purchases.

About 60,000 families receive SNAP benefits in Kent County, benefits worth about $200 million. In 2010, only $52,000 of that total went directly to farmers, Moeller said. The rest was spent at grocery stores and other retail outlets.

In 2010, Moeller could identify only two retail farmers in a six-county region in western Michigan who accepted SNAP purchases. By 2011, he had convinced 22 more retail farmers – those who sell through farm markets, farmers’ markets or similar outlets – to accept SNAP transactions.

Thanks to his efforts, the number of regional farmers’ markets that accepted SNAP sales went from four in 2010 to eight in 2011. SNAP-related sales in Kent County went from $52,000 to $360,000 in the same period – a big increase, but still a minuscule chunk of the $200 million available. The potential for growth is huge, Moeller said.

In Michigan as a whole, nearly 2 million people (about one-fifth of the state population) use SNAP benefits, which are worth about $3.1 billion. Moeller thinks it’s a realistic goal to get 1 percent of that money to go directly to the state’s farmers in the next couple of years. That would mean at least $30 million in increased sales, he said.

The opportunities aren’t limited to Michigan. In the entire United States, an average of 44.7 million people used SNAP benefits in fiscal year 2011, benefits worth roughly $71.8 billion. Of that money, $11.7 million was spent at farm markets and farmers’ markets (2,445 direct-marketing farmers and farmers’ markets accepted SNAP benefits in fiscal year 2011), according to USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service (FNS).

With such huge numbers, why aren’t more growers taking advantage of the SNAP program? Moeller listed a few reasons: Some don’t know about it, most are busy growing crops and running their business, and some like cash sales only.

In Michigan, SNAP purchases are made via Electronic Benefits Transfer cards called Bridge Cards. Retail farmers who accept debit and credit cards already have machines that can read Bridge Cards, but if they don’t have those machines they can’t participate in the program, Moeller said.

However, USDA can provide a free card-reading machine if you don’t already have one, he said.

The free equipment can only be used for SNAP purchases, however, and a farmer must have access to electricity and a phone line to use it. Since most farmers want to have the ability to process credit and debit purchases as well as SNAP purchases, they generally choose to purchase or lease a wireless POS device from a third-party processor. If they are unable to have a POS device on-site, they can use manual vouchers, according to FNS.

To apply to accept SNAP transactions, visit the website and follow the instructions, or call 877-823-4369.

If you live in Michigan, the Michigan Farmers Market Association plans to hold three training sessions and one online webinar to help educate farmers and vendors on how to accept SNAP benefits. The webinar will take place Feb. 20 at 10 a.m., and is open to all specialty crop producers.

Registration for the webinar and information about in-person training sessions is available here.

By Matt Milkovich, Managing Editor