Brown’s Berry Patch owners looking to simplify business
The upcoming local fruit season won’t be the same for many families who have made Brown’s Berry Patch a pick-your-own destination for 35 years – owners Bob and Deborah Brown have decided to retire and are closing their retail and pick-your-own business.
“We’re looking to simplify,” Bob Brown tells the Suburban News and Hamlin-Clarkson Herald, “to go back to what my grandfather and dad did.”
The Brown family has been growing fruit near the Lake Ontario shoreline north of Albion for more than two centuries and Brown says the farm operation itself will continue to grow. His brother, Eric, and son, Bobby, will be in charge of growing apples, cherries, peaches and berries.
“The wholesale part of the farm will be going on as it has in the past – you can look for our berries in chain stores and farm markets,” Brown says.
Brown’s Berry Patch has been a popular destination – in 2004 it received the I Love New York Governor’s Agri-Tourism Award.
The decision to bring an end to the popular wagon rides, ice-cream, retail and fruit/pumpkin you-pick side of the farm didn’t come easily, and Brown says there had always been hope that there would be someone ready at the helm to take over when he and his wife were ready to retire, but it just didn’t happen.
“Our daughter is in Washington, DC, and engaged to be married and our son is interested in the farm, but not interested in retail … my brother’s boys are too young,” Brown explains. “It’s hard to find people who want to do this for a living.”
He notes that running the retail operation could be a grind and that he is ready to go back to being a farmer. “There are certain things year after year that never seem to get done on the personal and home front,” he observes.
Brown says his customers and employees have been great and adds that he has been touched by the many customers who have thanked him for decades of happy memories.
“That’s the hardest part,” Brown says about the decision to retire, “It rips a little piece of your heart out.”
