Selling Sweet Indian Corn?

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Does anyone have experience selling sweet
Indian corns as Decorative Cobs?

How well are they received by the market?

Thanks,
Joseph

[grunt]

Joseph: I have no experience selling anything, so take this for what it's worth: I think when people buy the decorative corn, they want to see those bright round kernels gleaming out at them in all different colors, and might think that there was something wrong with crinkle kerneled cobs, or be worried they might be harder to keep dust free due to the crinkles. That said, you might make inroads if you made it understood that it was a sweet corn, and they could use the seed to grow their own the following year. You'd also have to make sure they knew to harvest it before the color change to get the sweet corn effect. It probably wouldn't cut into the following years sales, because I'd bet a dollar to a dime, any that intended to grow it out would forget about it before planting time. (also known as the "best of intentions" syndrome)

[blueadzuki]

Unfortunely the chances arent all that great. as Joseph pointed out the average consumer is used to the smooth shine of a flint/pop corn on the door and making inroads in that would be tricky. You can sometimes get away with flour or a really colorful dent but even these usually don't sell as well as a staight flint. Fact is that to most people mature sweetcron kernels look withered and diseased. It true you might get some sales if if you explained that the corn could be planted to make sweetcorn next year, but the very fact that to eat it they have to harvest it before the pretty colors show up isnt going to transalte out to a lot of repeat business (it's the curse of colored corn on the cob, since they almost all no matter thier ultimate color are pretty much white or yellow when you eat them, a lot of people say "why bother?"