AgWired

Teresa Hinrichs is a country living cheerleader (pictured on the right). She even says so in an interview I did with her right before the Country Living Olympics.

Teresa works on a lot of projects related to agriculture one of which is the Country Living Association. She says that just about any group of people who have some kind of interest related to rural life or agriculture has an association but there wasn’t one for people that share a passion for country living. She says that besides members, sponsor companies were looking for this. There may be lots of places to advertise but the Association creates member engagement which really builds relationships and a sense of community.

She says that growth has been great here in the first year and they’re on track for where they want to be.

I think you’ll enjoy my interview with Teresa here: cla-07-hinrichs.mp3

If you want to know what people who live the country life think then just ask them. That’s what we did at the Country Living Outlook Conference. I can assure you that these folks are passionate about where they live.

Take Alan Brend who was on the panel of rural lifestyle practitioners. He says that he does not view how he lives as a lifestyle but rather a way of life. Alan says that he will live no other way and the country way of life is good for kids. He says that having them raise animals and do chores teaches them self confidence and responsibility.

Alan says that when it comes to buying stuff he does all his research on the internet and then buys local. He thinks the Country Living Association has a great deal of potential, especially if it can provide him with resources on its website that would save him time. When I asked him if he thinks the marketers attending understood his needs he says that he could see the light in their eyes as they would nod like they finally understood.

I think you’ll enjoy my interview with Alan here: cla-07-brend.mp3

At the Country Living Outlook Conference one of the speakers on our program was country lifestyler, Kelly Loganbill. Kelly works in town and makes an 80 plus mile round trip each day from her home.

She wants companies servicing the rural lifestyle market to know that they separate their work and personal lives and that they need information and supplies to complete their home projects. She says that the marketers in attendance at the conference asked a lot of questions about the kind of research they do, how/where/why they make purchases and how they use mail. She says that although she doesn’t have high speed internet access on at their home that she and her husband use it a lot where they can like at work.

Kelly says that she thinks there’s a real need for companies to train their employees to work with rural lifestyle people. She says that often they’ll be trained to work with large scale farmers but her needs are very different.

You can listen to my interview with Kelly here: cla-07-loganbill.mp3