Compensating OP tomato breeders

[carolyn137]

Steve, I started a response but it went away and when I came back Mark's post was there.

I have trouble seeing a situation where breeders would be sharing early generations of varieties before stability, and no, I don't want to discuss what's happening at another message site.

Would ANY of you expect compensation from Tania, Adam Gleckler, Mike Dunton, Jeff in Canada, Carol Knapp, Steve Whitteaker, Lee at J andL,to name some names, or is the focus places such as Tomato Growers, Johnny's, Territorial, Seeds of Change, Totally Tomatoes and the like.?

Carolyn

[PaddyMc]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

I have trouble seeing a situation where breeders would be sharing early generations of varieties before stability, and no, I don't want to discuss what's happening at another message site.

That scenerio exists right now. There are quite a number of 'amateur' (but very serious) breeders out there who are crowd-sourcing early-generation growouts. Mark at Frogsleap did it in a big F2 seed offer a few years ago, Brad Gates has a few people growing out his stuff. As long as you have some faith in the people you're working with, you can see a lot more segregates with 5 growers than you can see with one.

[Boutique Tomatoes]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

I have trouble seeing a situation where breeders would be sharing early generations of varieties before stability, and no, I don't want to discuss what's happening at another message site.

Carolyn

I was thinking in particular of Tom's model, where early generations of interesting germplasm is sold to the public. I know of a couple of situations where enthusiasts of Tom's work are growing unusual selections that bore little similarity to the stated goal of the original variety. Tom made the original cross and sent out F2 seed, but the other grower found something they liked and carried it forward to stability.

While I sometimes consider getting into the seed business with my kids as something they could do at their age and am dabbling at breeding, it's only a hobby for me. I just see this particular area as being very murky as amateur breeders exchange germplasm unless they formalize an agreement as Mark from Frogsleap suggests.

[carolyn137]

I think it might be a good idea to distinguish amateur from professional breeders and that's been touched on in some previous posts in this thread.


I would have a different opinioon of compensation depending on whether someone says they are hobby amateur breeders as opposed to professional breeders.

Yes, I know that Tom has been selling seed for unstable varieties, that's been discussed here at Tville a lot.

And yes, I do know that some give their initial crosses to others for growout and it was only a few weeks ago that I found one of them, not amateur, was having someone in NH do growouts.

And yes, I know that Mark ( Frogsleap)also has growouts done for him in various places.

And yes, I also know that some amateurs are doing many many directed crosses and I can't believe they would even expect any compensation.

So in my mind the questions remain: how to define amateur as opposed to professional breeders who might expect compensation, and for the latter are the targets for placements what I posted above as in small family run businesses or the larger ones I named, at least some of them, above.

Carolyn

[Fusion_power]

Hate to rain on the party, but you are all missing the most fundamental parts. How much time and effort went into developing the new variety? What benefits does it offer to the grower?

If I spend 8 years making complex crosses to introgress 5 disease tolerance traits into a fabulously good flavored tomato that looks and tastes like Lucky Cross, then I might expect more compensation than the average person who has a new tomato that happens to be round, red, highly productive, and decent flavored. In other words, I want to be paid for the sweat equity.

What about the benefits to the consumer? Would they pay a premium to get a fabulously pretty worry free tomato with fantastic flavor?

The simple reality is that no professional breeder can afford to develop a variety under the conditions given above. The time and effort involved simply can't be recovered from an open pollinated variety. This is why commercially developed tomatoes are all hybrids.

In the end, what you have to do is beat the Rutgers mafia. This is the group of OP tomato lines that are already available that have most of the traits being discussed above. You have to come up with a Green Zebra or something similarly novel and useful. Then you have to market it effectively.

DarJones

[Boutique Tomatoes]

Originally Posted by Fusion_power

Hate to rain on the party, but you are all missing the most fundamental parts. How much time and effort went into developing the new variety? What benefits does it offer to the grower?

If I spend 8 years making complex crosses to introgress 5 disease tolerance traits into a fabulously good flavored tomato that looks and tastes like Lucky Cross, then I might expect more compensation than the average person who has a new tomato that happens to be round, red, highly productive, and decent flavored. In other words, I want to be paid for the sweat equity.

What about the benefits to the consumer? Would they pay a premium to get a fabulously pretty worry free tomato with fantastic flavor?

The simple reality is that no professional breeder can afford to develop a variety under the conditions given above. The time and effort involved simply can't be recovered from an open pollinated variety. This is why commercially developed tomatoes are all hybrids.

In the end, what you have to do is beat the Rutgers mafia. This is the group of OP tomato lines that are already available that have most of the traits being discussed above. You have to come up with a Green Zebra or something similarly novel and useful. Then you have to market it effectively.

DarJones

I'm thinking of niche/boutique varieties like Blush, Maglia Rosa, the new Tigers & Bumblebees that Fred/Mark have released. I think these do have good value for the grower & consumer, even if they were not bred specifically with disease resistance in mind. I have to believe that it's hard if not impossible to turn the work of creating these kinds of OP lines into a reasonable return.

I totally agree that if your goal is making money at breeding developing F1's is the only game that works.

[travis]

If your intent is to make (anything approaching serious) money off your breeding efforts, I can only think to offer the following suggestions:

Don't free-share your F1 seeds with anyone.

Don't free-share your F2 or early f-gen, still segregating lines.

Don't distribute for free your finished, stable lines.

Create your own Web site, and sell your seeds for 100% of the gross.

Go to the expense of PVP-ing your best stuff.

Only distribute seeds for cooperative grow-outs under rock solid contractual seed agreements.

Only sell seeds to seed vendors in small bulk lots under exclusive agreement deals at 25 to 33% of retail price (or some similar "consignment" price point).

Or only sell F1 hybrid seed at 50c to $1.00 per seed.

Or only sell plants at the highest price the market will bear.