Libby's Patch

About Libby's Patch

Libby's Patch is a working family farm in Gawsworth, tucked into the Cheshire countryside between Macclesfield and Congleton, run by Daniel and Bethan Thornicroft. Families, couples and groups come from across Macclesfield, South Manchester and the wider North West for pick your own strawberries in summer, a sunflower maze and cut flower field, pumpkin picking in autumn and Christmas trees in December.

The farm has been with Fruitcake for a long time, and the website has grown as the business has.

The Challenge

The farm used to be called Libby's Pumpkin Patch, and for a while that was an accurate name.

It stopped being accurate as the farm added seasons. Strawberries, sunflowers, cut flowers and Christmas trees turned a six week autumn attraction into a business that opens across most of the year, and the name was still telling everybody it was about pumpkins. A brand that describes one season of four is not a small marketing problem. It sets expectations before anybody reads a word, and it means the other three seasons start every year from a standing position, having to explain themselves to people who assumed the farm was shut.

There was a practical problem sitting underneath it too. A seasonal attraction lives or dies on current information. Opening dates move with the weather, picking depends on what is actually ripe, and a family deciding on Friday night where to go on Saturday will not be persuaded by a page that still refers to last year. On a working farm, the people who know when the strawberries are ready are in a field, not at a computer.

What We Built

We rebranded Libby's Pumpkin Patch to Libby's Patch. Dropping one word is a small change to make and a large change to what the name promises: the same farm, the same family, no longer defined by six weeks in October.

The website was rebuilt around the seasons rather than around a single event. Strawberry picking, the sunflower maze, cut flowers and bouquet making, pumpkin picking and Christmas trees each get their own space, with booking as the clear next step from every one of them. The About section does the work that matters most for a farm attraction, which is establishing that this is a real working family farm rather than a field with a car park, because that is what people are choosing.

ShoutOut handles the currency problem. Through the Fruitcake app, Daniel and Bethan can send us news, an event, a change of dates or an update on what is ready to pick straight from the farm. We build the page, our team checks it, and it comes back for their approval before it goes live. The Latest News section stays genuinely up to date, which for a seasonal business is not a nice extra but the core of the offer.

The Result

Libby's Patch now reads as a farm with something on across most of the year, and each season has a page working for it rather than borrowing attention from the pumpkin one. Visitors get accurate dates and honest information about what is ready, and the farm gets a website that reflects the season it is actually in.

For a business in Cheshire competing for family days out against every other attraction within an hour's drive, being the one with current, trustworthy information is a real advantage.

Why It Worked

Rebrands get treated as cosmetic, and this one shows why that is wrong. Nothing about the farm changed. What changed was what the name allowed people to assume, and that assumption was quietly capping three quarters of the year.

The second half was making it sustainable. A seasonal business needs frequent small updates, and any system that requires sitting at a desk to make them will fail on a farm in June. Sending it from a phone and getting a finished page back for approval fits the way the work actually happens. Both sit on the pay monthly plan, with hosting, backups, support and content help included. Our web design in Macclesfield, Congleton and Cheshire pages cover the local side.

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