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Why Market With Maris Farms and the Cornfield Maze Group?
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Maris Farms is the first corn maze to open in Pierce County (2000), drawing close to 10,000 people that season. We've attracted no less than 15,000 and close to 20,000 in 2003. The Cornfield Maze group has averaged more than 1.5 million visitors per season for the past three seasons.
Maris Farms receives extensive media attention, with articles appearing annually in the Tacoma News Tribune (daily circulation of 137,000), Enumclaw Courier-Herald (weekly circulation of 13,000) and other local publications. The Cornfield Maze group receives national coverage from all major media each season.
Maris Farms attracts television coverage like KOMO 4 News, Q13 Morning News and Evening Magazine with John Curly, which airs on Seattle's #1 rated television station (KING 5).
KMPS, Western Washington's largest country music station, does an annual live remote from the farm and mentions the farm on air each day throughout the month of October. Their average listenership is 130,000 in the mornings, 137,000 mid-day and 156,000 in the evening.
The Cornfield Maze group, which now represents more than 100 such venues across the country, is the largest corn maze organization in the world.
On average, Maris Farms sends out 5-10 press releases per week to the media (with our sponsors listed on the releases) and receives 2-3 "appearances" per week in some sort of media outlet.
More than 70% of those attending our venues are between the ages of 13-55, which are of "product-buying" age.
In 2003, close to 3,000 students attended Maris Farms through school field trips, an area we anticipate growing considerably in 2004. We expect to send out close to 500 "postcard" reminders to schools in Pierce County and King County (30-50 kids per postcard) for field trip opportunities. The Cornfield Maze group attracts an average of 1,500 field trip students to each of its venues.
We had 14 sponsors/cross-marketing partners in 2003, with some of the more familiar ones being Darigold, AM/PM, Home Depot, cars.com, apartments.com and the Spookshop at the Commons in Federal Way (formerly SeaTac Mall). In 2004, we've added some others like Safeway, Car Toys, rentnomore.net and Best Buy.
Of the 15,000 AM/PM "Send Back" coupons distributed to our customers in 2003, more than 3% responded to the special promotional offer of a free hot dog or free coffee just for showing their ticket stub to participating stores and it also gave them an opportunity to win a $25 gas card.
Of the 50,000 coffee sleeves we distributed at 20 cafes in Pierce/King counties, we received close to 1.5% back. Each sleeve had a $1 discount for entry and listed our four coffee sleeve sponsors on the back.
The Spookshop at the Commons in Federal Way (formerly SeaTac Mall) received close to 200 mentions on our radio ads - along with RAM Restaurant and Blackstone Limousine - as our "Tour of Terror" sponsors. The Spookshop at the Commons in Federal Way (formerly SeaTac Mall), in turn, distributed close to 10,000 of our fliers to their patrons and provided $200 worth of costumes for the Tour of Terror contest winner(s). The RAM provided dinner for four, and Blackstone provided the limo services for the evening. Maris Farms received close to 300 phone calls or e-mails from the Spookshop fliers.
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