Pick your own: banned

Greedy customers not wanting to pay at a pick your own strawberry field have eaten up to £10,000-worth of strawberries. The Cambridgeshire farm has now banned the pick your own strawberries option.

Hacker’s Fruit Farm in Dry Drayton, near Cambridge, has offered pick your own strawberries for 40 years, making up to £40,000 during the season.

Mark Spight, who runs the farm, said that up to £10,000 of that £40,000 was being eaten by ‘greedy gorgers’ who at the strawberries in the field and had no intention of paying.

‘The cheek of people was unbelievable,’ says Mr Spight. ‘People were treating it like a giant open buffet. We spotted one family sitting in the  field with a bowl of water to wash them and then a bowl of cream they were dipping them in.’

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Mr Spight’s strawberries are going to be replaced by gooseberries, loganberries, tayberries and currants.

‘We still allow “pick your own” for the berries, as they are far too sharp for people to gorge themselves on. But we will only allow in people who look likely to behave.’

The Camrbidgeshire farm has, however, banned pick your own strawberries after losing up to £10,000-worth of strawberries to customers not wanting to pay.

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