ABOVE (from left) are Michael and Julie Purkiss
with their uncle, Bill Casier. At right, cherries
and peaches are offered for sale at the Casier’s stand.

Ask Betsy Price what she enjoys best about selling strawberries and cherries from a roadside stand next to their home, and she doesn’t hesitate.

“I really enjoy the people who tell us we have the best products. What Bruce (her husband) and I are putting out is just about the best,” she said.

Although Bruce Price is a long-time farmer in Leland Township, the Prices started their retail operation just seven years ago quietly enough with a card table and quarts of strawberries in their front yard. Now they have a permanent stand and parking area off M-204 just east of Lake Leelanau.

Business has been good, said Betsy, especially through repeat customers. One couple comes annually to Leelanau County from Vermont, and makes it a point to stop at the Price’s stand when arriving and before leaving for home.

“I enjoy meeting the people,” said Betsy, who adds that running the stand “is easier than working in the fields.”

The Prices grow their own strawberries that are picked by migrant workers, but buy sweet cherries from Gary Schaub.

They make sure to sort out spoiled fruit, and dutifully wash the sweet cherries before they are placed on the counter.

“We’re going to miss one once in awhile, but we get most of the bad ones out,” said price.

Bill Casier, whose stand location on the outskirts of heavily visited Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore attracts people from around the world, shares that satisfaction in selling fresh products.

“Fresh is head and shoulders above everything else,” he said.

Like the Prices, Casier runs a family operation. His home off M-22 just north of Empire overlooks the farm stand, which is often staffed by Casier’s niece, Julie, a landscaping design student at NMC. This is her first summer.

“Julie is here every day,” said Casier.

Casier’s nephew and Julie’s brother, Michael, works in orchards shaking cherries.

He chuckles when recalling the surprise shown by urban dwellers at fresh produce at the stand.

“They say to me, you GREW this?” Casier said with a laugh. “Their eyes just light up.”

Casier, again like the Prices, started small, selling vegetables and fruits grown on his farm. about all farm stands is the flavor in their products. “We started with the idea ‘let’s just see what happens,’” said Casier.

Business has expanded in the four years since he opened. Now he also sells dried cherries, salsas and jams that are all made locally with his farm’s fruit.

“What makes us different is the off-road parking, landscaping and attendant,” Casier said in reference to the slice of land that he has set up for business. Also offered: a “U-Pick” herb & bouquet garden.

Casier does his best to assure that products he sells are healthy.

“There are sanitation measures in the field,” said Casier, who also uses as few applications of pesticides as possible. “We use traps with pheromones that attract the insects,” said Casier.

The goal is to get rid of unwanted bugs, but to keep the ones that are important to the fruit’s well being.

Even fertilizers are natural. “We apply turkey litter,” he said. “We’re taking a step forward by taking a step back.”

One rule applies to all roadside stand operators as a simple precaution to make sure nothing harmful has gone into produce. “Wash everything,” he said.