A team from The Lakes Free Range Egg Company (The Lakes) travelled to one of their producers in Lincolnshire to take part in a LEAF (Linking Environment And Farming) Open Farm Sunday event.
20 years of Open Farm Sunday
This is the 20th year of Open Farm Sunday, and it is estimated that so far, over 3.25 million people attended. At this year’s Lincolnshire event over 2,400 visitors had the opportunity to visit the farm and understand about the different areas that make up the farming business
Travelling to the event were members of The Lakes’ agricultural team – Jo Lawrence, Group Agricultural Director and Louise Summerson, who is on her placement with The Lakes as part of the McDonald’s Progressive Young Farmer (PYF) Programme. Whilst this farming enterprise has only been supplying The Lakes for a relatively short period, they have been taking part in Open Farm Sunday since 2007, inviting customers to be part of the event. In addition to The Lakes, visitors were able to see butchery demonstrations, take tractor rides and learn about how food gets from farm to the fork.
PYF Louise Summerson said “We love chatting to families at events like this because it helps them understand and appreciate where food comes from. We have boards with lots of useful information and pictures which work well – they are an effective way to demonstrate what we do – both in terms of sustainability and the environment, and how eggs are produced and sent to our customers.
We thought the audience would mainly be families with children, but it was great to see people of all ages coming along too. Our boards acted as a platform that encouraged people ask questions – of which there were many.”
Commenting on the feedback from the public, Jo Lawrence said “there were broad questions about eggs, but the most asked questions were surrounding white eggs.
“Sainsbury’s announced their news about aiming for 100% white eggs in the week prior to the event – so we did expect questions. We supply brown and white eggs to Sainsbury’s and are continuing to expand our white egg production to meet demand. It is the right thing for us to do. Whilst there is no difference in taste, we see better welfare outcomes with hens producing white eggs.”
Alongside their information boards, The Lakes ran a competition – The egg collecting challenge. The aim was to pack a tray of eggs in the fastest time, simulating packing eggs on farms.
Louise said, “Our egg collecting challenge went down a treat, with the winner of the adult competition packing a tray of eggs in an astonishing 12.41 seconds!”
Statistics, past event reports show that up to 92% of visitors leave with a greater trust in British food and farming. It aims to act as an educational tool to showcase how modern farmers work with nature, manage soils, and conserve wildlife and hopefully encourages a more conscious buying habit.
