Lancashire farm earned £50,000 ($68,000) since the start of the pandemic last year by offering customers Zoom calls with its goats.
In the Cronkshaw Fold Farm, you can pay £5 ($7.00) and book your own Zoom session with one of seven goats.
While people are now well-accustomed to Zoom meetings, the farm offers the opportunity to ‘spice up’ your next call.
“For the bargain price of £5 (all currencies and countries accepted), you can choose one of our goats to join you for 5 minutes of your video meeting. All proceeds go towards bulk buying loo roll. The goats are savvy in Zoom, Microsoft teams, Webex, BlueJeans, Skype, Google Hangouts, Jitsi, Go To Meeting, and Ring Central,” the farm website reads.
The farm had been struggling since the lockdown meant much of their wedding and accommodations bookings had been canceled.
Dot McCarthy —who has been running the farm since 2016 — told Farming UK that she came up with the idea as a joke, and shared it with her colleague. At the time, they both agreed it was ‘completely whacky and they should prioritize other means of income’.
“I put it on the website that evening anyway along with Emma’s email address for bookings.point 203 |
I woke up, I had loads of missed calls from Emma saying she’d been inundated with emails and couldn’t keep up with the demand for goat calls,” McCarthy said.point 135 | “We’ve had everyone from the European management team of Facebook, to NHS staff in need of a cheer up, to virtual church services – the vicars always seem to choose Mary the goat and I am pleased to say we have made over 50k so far.point 330 |
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On February 1, the farm said on a Facebook post that the money made from the booking fee has meant it can keep its staff in paid work, as well as provide a coronavirus-safe work environment.
“Any extra funds raised are all going towards installing equipment to make renewable power on-site at the farm, switching farm machinery from diesel to electric, and switching up our farming practices to the lowest carbon models possible to help us do all we can to help tackle climate change,” the farm said.