My family drove about an hour to Evan’s for the first time this October. We had heard great things. Overall, we liked the grounds and the pumpkin patch had a big selection. We planned to get lunch there and enjoy ourselves. We knew the pumpkins would be pricy, but that was ok because it was the experience. What we didn’t anticipate though was that the play area would charge the adults the $16 entry just to supervise our children. Granted, that included the hay ride, but we would have rather had the option to pay just for that separately as adults. Instead, not only did we spend $20+ for two pumpkins, but then we spent another $65+ on the play area which was just ok. Our kids enjoyed it but it was nothing spectacular. Had we not been charged that amount we likely would have done the U-pick apples AND also spent money on lunch and the inside the store. But that really put a bad taste in our mouths to be charged as adults to go in with our kids. It just felt like a greedy money grab. And having driven an hour to get there we couldn’t disappoint our kids. I may have even splurged and bought the kids the highest level tickets to include the apple cannon and such for $25 each but not after I found out adults were also being charged no matter what. I heard a lot of other guests voice their distaste with this as well.

As a small business owner myself, I completely understand the need to make a profit. You cannot work for free and farming is a ton of work year round—and has a lot of expenses to boot year round. But I strongly encourage you to rethink this element of your business going forward. It really doesn’t feel right. Perhaps there is another way to make up the difference. But again, I will say, as adults who had no choice but to supervise our kids, my husband and I would have loved to have bought some drinks and snacks to enjoy while our kids played. We just couldn’t justify spending more after feeling like we were taken advantage of. The logic is you and your kids wait in a long line, the kids are so excited to play, then you are stuck paying as adults because who wants to disappoint their kids like that? Money is very tight for a lot of folks right now, including us.