The Hartford Courant
Wednesday, November 24, 1999
CALM AFTER THE STORMS
Tough Season Over, Farm Family Reaps A Modest Profit
KATHY HANLEY/THE HARTFORD COURANT
JOE FUTTNER, Honora and Jim Futtner's son, gets in position
to pull double-layered plastic sheeting across the roof of the main greenhouse
at the family's East Hartford farm. The greenhouse roofs are changed every three
to four years.
JOE FUTTNER, Honora and Jim Futtner's son, gets in position
to pull double-layered plastic sheeting across the roof of the main greenhouse
at the family's East Hartford farm. The greenhouse roofs are changed every three
to four years.
By FRAN SILVERMAN
Courant Consumer Affairs Writer
This is the seventh in a series of stories examining the experiences of one
Connecticut farm family, the Futtners, as they take their crops through the
growing season and the farm through the year.
In the end, after the drought, after the labor shortages, and after September's
damaging rains, Jim and Honora Futtner were able to turn a profit on the 40
acres they farmed this year.
It wasn't the best year the South Windsor couple ever had, but the bottom line
wasn't the worst, either.
As they sat in their home one recent day, the couple reviewed their revenue,
bills and coming expenses, and reflected on the season that ended abruptly with
a frost last month.
As reddish-brown leaves dropped from trees outside the kitchen window, Honora,
50, cut apples for pies to freeze for Thanksgiving. Jim, 51, still tan from the
summer sun, had just returned from the greenhouses, where he was taking cuttings
from the remaining baskets and potted plants, tending to the growing poinsettias
and repairing equipment.
Rested and relaxed, the Futtners were slowly shifting into their winter pace. As
the days get shorter, there still is plenty of work to do: fixing farm
machinery, planting Easter lilies, ordering seed and purchasing greenhouse
supplies. But the intense, frenetic pace of the 14-hour dawn-to-dusk summer days
has slowly given way to a reasonable 9-to-5 schedule.
After closing the farm stand in mid-October, Jim and Honora got organized at
home. It took them a few weeks to go through their bills, the checks they
receive from their wholesaler, and the expenses they still have outstanding.
When they tallied the bottom line, they were pleasantly surprised that it wasn't
as bad as they had expected.
The early spring sales of their retail flower business and the September
eggplant and pepper harvest saved their ledger from ending up in the red. Retail
vegetable sales were down almost $10,000 - from $70,000 to $60,000 - and profits
from pick-your-own produce dipped. But with flower sales from the greenhouses
and the wholesale vegetable sales, these lifelong farmers eked out a modest
profit this year - about $40,000.
"If we just had a veggie business, we'd definitely be in trouble this year,"
said Jim, whose family has been farming in Connecticut for three generations.
In 1972, Jim and his father, Raymond, decided to diversify the farm and build
greenhouses and a farm stand in East Hartford so they could sell their own
produce and perennials to supplement wholesale vegetable sales.
"He said, "We are going to do something else, not just farm.' He was tired of
the bull work," Jim said.
Now, 27 years later, 70 percent of the profits come from farm stand sales, 20
percent from wholesaling and 10 percent from pick-your-own. And it's the
diversification that has kept the family farm operating all these years, Jim
said.
But still, with four children to raise - one with college bills - a mortgage on
their four-bedroom colonial home and rent to pay on farmland in East Hartford
and South Windsor, $40,000 is a modest income.
Echoing the concerns of other farmers, Jim and Honora say government programs
often aren't beneficial to the family farmer.
"A lot of your government programs that are supposed to help us are hurting us,"
Jim said. "They are keeping food excessively cheap. I'd like to be making
$60,000 to $70,000. Our trucks are antiques. You can see to the ground through
the floor of our old Dodge truck. Maybe if we have a good year, we can get a
good new used truck."
The Futtners say many people don't understand a farmer's life. Often, people
think farmers are land-rich, that they can sell their farmland at any time for a
tidy profit. And Jim's relatives, indeed, sold much of what once was a 50-acre
spread to developers - leaving him to rent land to keep farming.
The profits from land sales were split five ways among Jim's father, aunts and
uncles, then split five ways again among him and his siblings. What was left
from the land sales went into college accounts for Jim and Honora's four
children.
"We didn't see a penny of it," Jim said.
Now, when they have a bad year, the couple borrow from their children's
education accounts to buy seed, fertilizer and greenhouse supplies to get
started in the spring.
This year, they've applied for a government loan for crops that failed during
the drought. They are also awaiting a water bill they expect will run into
thousands of dollars because of the weeks of irrigating. If it's as high as
$5,000 or more, they will have to dip into the children's' accounts. Last year,
the water bill was just about $250.
But the Futtners are grateful for all they do have, and what they've been able
to accomplish. They will be thankful, they say, come Thanksgiving Day.
In December, they will take a family vacation to Bermuda, paid for by profits
from last year, when the farm did well. And there are countless other reasons,
they say, to be optimistic and happy.
"We count our blessings more than we used to. We look around and see a lot of
people with a lot of problems. You hear stuff at the farm stand, what other
people go through," Honora said. "We have great children. We have a nice home on
a good street, a nice yard, good neighbors. And we have the wherewithal to do
the work we need to do."
"We are living a good life. We really are. We are so spoiled," Jim said "We made
it through, and we did OK. Is it how much money we make that matters?"
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