As full time Rvers and workampers we have had a number of jobs one of which was managing a Pumpkin Patch in Palo Alto, Ca. The first year's set up is this segments content but it went pretty much the same for the second year, so telling of the first year you get the picture of the second year.
The first year we arrived in at the Elks Club around September 25. We were a few days early but we wanted to get a lay of the land so to speak. We would want to find the post office, the Wal-Mart, laundry mat, restaurant, and a user-friendly bank. We knew that we would need the bank because we would take in a ton of twenty-dollar bills and give out a ton of singles. We would need the restaurant because we would be too tired some nights to cook.
The parking lot upon which our pumpkin patch would reside is very large. In the Elks Club's heyday it had a membership of over 5000 now there are only approximately 500. Our use of the parking lot for a month is a positive thing for the Elks. They get a $5000 income for a parking lot that they are basically no longer using. Even with our traffic I don't think it was ever full.
We were also on site to receive and provide security for materials that would be delivered from outside venders. We took delivery of 2 portable potties, a forklift, and as I remember about 200 bales of hay. We now were anxiously awaiting the truck with the pumpkins and crew to assemble our lot.
As the semi truck from the farm arrives we got a frantic call from the boss telling us that he would be an hour or so late and could we tell the driver to sit tight. By the way, his calls informing us he would be late or not coming until the next day would be the norm for the entire month. Turns out the driver didn't speak all that much English but we decided to go ahead and unloaded the truck. It's a good thing we did because the boss and his crew didn't show until nearly dark. They dropped two flatbed trailers of stuff and hit the motel.
The three days it took them to set up went smoothly. The lot was completely surrounded by hay bales with a hay entrance door at one end. Our fifth wheel was centered along the side away from the street with one of the slides on either side of us. There was a large open tent in front of our fifth wheel that would serve as display for items such as Indian corn, little pumpkins, and a check out area. In the center area they made tables of 6 hay bales put together and put different pumpkins on each. They grew and sold probably 6 different types of pumpkins not to mention some pretty wild gourds. The remaining ground (asphalt) was covered with scattered hay and the larger to huge pumpkins were arranged in small groups with walkways between.
After they had finished setting up the lot for us the boss picked out several pumpkins of different sizes and marked the price on each one. With a short dissertation on his pricing he gave us $300 seed money, $500 expense money said run this lot as it were your lot
Just to retract a bit, during these three days we interviewed several potential employees. We had decided our hiring policy would be rather simple: 1.Have the ability to stand for some period of time. 2. Not appear to be too timid. 3. Have a positive attitude. 4. Want to work as few or as many hours as it might require for the next 30 days. We realized that some would not work out and also that there would not be an abundance of people that were just sitting around doing nothing for the next 30 days. That being said we pretty much hired everyone we interviewed. I must tell ya that the employees that we had for each year were totally different. Meet them and the rest of the story next week.
