KENYA · GUIDE 0025 · EDITION 4.2
Tree tomato growing in Kenya: Customers and Market Demand
The buyer and the buying decision
Greengrocers and juice businesses. The offer to test is: Grow tree tomatoes for local fruit sellers.
Develop the tree tomato offer around a retailer's ripeness and turnover preferences, agreeing whether fruit should arrive ready for sale or require further holding first.
Separate interest from an accepted order
Seek a named buyer and confirm site suitability with local extension support.
The purpose of this test is to establish whether the buyer accepts the specified result, delivery arrangement and payment terms. An encouraging interview does not establish repeat demand. Ask what the buyer currently uses, what would make them change supplier and who has authority to approve the first order. Record a refusal as carefully as an enquiry so that unsuccessful offers do not disappear from the evidence.
Collect evidence specific to this offer
Record site advice, planting source, ripeness at dispatch and retailer selling observations so expansion depends on repeatable customer outcomes as well as survival of the trees.
| Question to resolve | Evidence to retain |
|---|---|
| What exactly will the buyer accept? | Ask the retailer to inspect a delivered sample over its normal selling period, documenting which fruit becomes saleable, remains hard or develops visible handling damage. |
| What is included in the first trial? | Develop the tree tomato offer around a retailer's ripeness and turnover preferences, agreeing whether fruit should arrive ready for sale or require further holding first. |
| How will a prospect see the offer? | Ask fruit retailers what sizes move fastest and whether they collect or expect delivery. |
| What must happen before repeating the trial? | Fruit should be sound and consistently graded; avoid harvest damage that shortens its usable life. |
Decide whether to continue
Review the specification with the buyer before committing to tools or stock. A trial is commercially useful only if actual costs, rejected work, time spent and cash collected can be reconciled. A promising farm-gate sample can fail in retail if ripeness varies widely within each delivery and the seller cannot confidently recommend fruit ready for use.
If a buyer changes the required output, record a new scope and re-cost the test. Do not count a request for a different product as proof of demand for the original one. Keep personal contact details in your private records and use customer statements publicly only with permission.
Turn the example into a buyer test
Fictional tree-tomato order: a smoothie kitchen buys 15 kg of tamarillo fruit of one approved colour and maturity grade, in three 5 kg net crates. The cook peels and prepares a 1 kg sample using its recipe and records flesh yield and flavour. The deliverable is a colour-and-lot sheet plus a peel-loss worksheet. The name tree tomato must not be confused with ordinary tomatoes; the order supplies whole fruit, not puree or a medicinal product.
| Buyer discussion | Evidence to retain |
|---|---|
| Specification to confirm | The order names tamarillo/tree tomato and contains a sample photograph; ordinary tomatoes cannot fill it. |
| Output to inspect | Accepted fruit weight excludes damaged returns and container tare; repeat orders use the same colour and ripeness grade. |
| Failure that can defeat acceptance | Kitchen receives ordinary tomatoes |
Ask the buyer to describe one acceptable and one unacceptable result. Record the decision maker, price basis, quantity, handover point and payment date privately. A sample request, an encouraging conversation and an accepted order are different evidence. Keep the first commitment within your demonstrated capacity; no customer interview or successful trial is asserted here.
What a failed test should change
Compare invoice, source labels and approved photograph. If the offer cannot meet that check, revise the specification or process before promising a repeat. Keep rejected offers and reasons in the same register as positive replies so that your record does not exaggerate demand.