How do farmers know what to price each fruit/vegetable.

The sad thing about farmers is that they don’t usually get a chance to price their fruits and vegetables, unless you mean the ones at the Farmer’s Market. The distributors, who have a wide variety of farmers from which to choose, often set the prices, and the farmer can either take it (sometimes earning less than the cost of production), or leave it (and end up holding a perishable commodity that they’ll get absolutely nothing for). If they have the nerve to ask even a couple cents more for their produce, the distributor will just pass on by and go to the next farmer.

As far as the ones at the Farmer’s Market (or who sell more directly to consumers), I’m sure it’s a combination of seeing what the other farmers are asking, what they think the market can bear (especially if it’s out of season or otherwise a novelty), and how much it cost to produce (plus enough profit to keep going).

True,i meant the market,and is there a website which would make things so much easier.

Just like any other business….consideration of overhead costs and current market demand.

I don’t think there’s enough of a standardized pricing at Farmer’s Markets to make a website that is relevant to more than the local area of any given farmer. What something costs in one area where’s it’s plentiful or easy to grow or in season might vary wildly where it’s hard to get, impossible to grow, or not currently available.

That said, have you checked out Local Harvest? It’s a big network of farmer’s markets and other local producers. They’re pretty useful sometimes.

There’s also this: Market Manager Resource Center, although it sounds more wholesale oriented. Retail will naturally be somewhat higher.

yes, the farmer’s who take their produce to the farmets market or sell out of a booth on their farm, can check out the prices from all over by looking on the internet, and then price accordingly. If the food doesn’t sell in the morning, the prices will go lower by afternoon.