The Honey Farm, Tasmania

I have been a customer of The Honey Farm for a few years after I got tired of the supermarkets’ golden substance under “pure honey” labels and found thehoneyfarm.com.au online shop in the Internet. In September 2008 I was happy to visit the real shop in Chudleigh, Tasmania.

Having a very positive experience with online shopping on thehoneyfarm.com.au website for a few years, I expected to see a very nice place and nice people in Chudleigh. The Beerepoot family, the owners of The Honey Farm, met my best expectations.

In this little Australian village in Tasmania, in the middle of nowhere, basically, they created a piece of a fairytale and successfully run the honey business. The little shop looks amazing, very clean, cosy and offers a huge range of honey, skin care, bees wax and bee-related products. I met Henk, Lida and Fanny Beerepoot in the shop and they left an impression of people who love their job and doing it well. I hope to visit Chudleigh again when I am in Tasmania next time.

The shop, 39 Sorell Street, Chudleigh, Tasmania

A wide range of pure honey, Tasmanian manuka honey, fruit honey, floral infused honey, honey mixes with nuts, ginger, caramel, spices...

Honey skin care products

Souvenirs, toys and an interesting display for children

Honey tasting

Candles and bees wax products

While always beneficial for the heath, in the time of the Australian winter and the present situation of the swine flu “disaster”, honey can be an especially good precautionary measure and remedy. My favourite helper with any cold and flu is Ginger honey, while Raspberry, Apple and Lemon honey are my daily desert.

P.S. I have driven hundreds kilometers from Hobart to Chudleigh with only two reasons — to see Tasmania and to visit The Honey Farm shop. And, surprisingly, the shop was full of other customers who did exactly the same thing (I had to wait for a lucky moment to make each photo without a crowd). Good products worth going that far to shop, especially when there are also nice people and a place to see!

This is a little hint to some businesses that sit in the centre of Adelaide, a million people city, complaining that they do not have enough customers. Maybe a good website is all that is needed, or better service, or better quality of products? It should not be too difficult in the era of made-in-china domination, when almost everything is getting worse, less reliable and cheaper regardless of the actual price and promotional promises.

Personally, with me as a customer the common marketing approaches like “grab your details” with any purchase, aggressive advertising, “special” offers, etc never worked and had a adverse effect on me. The quality of goods and service are the main things that affect my choice.

26 June 2009

9 September 2009 update: I have been to Tasmania again and, of course, I visited The Honey Farm. Besides the traditional warm hospitality in the shop and a wonderful service, The Honey Farm offered a large amount of new honeys to taste and to choose from.