What tomatoes and fruit trees taught me about progress

Gardening nerds, this one's for you

In my marketing work, I sometimes use the metaphor of fruit trees and tomatoes to describe the difference between short-term sales and long-term brand building.

Tomaotes are inexpensive and easy to grow. Buy a few starts from your local garden center, give them water, fertilizer, and halfway decent soil, and in three months or less, boom. More tomatoes than you can eat.

Fruit trees, on the other hand, take years to bear fruit. You pay a lot of money for a young apple tree, baby it with the tenderest care year after year, and maybe, maybe in three years you get apples.

Three years is a long time. When you’re out there working hard in your garden, getting tons of tomatoes and zero apples despite your efforts, it can feel like the fruit trees aren’t pulling their weight. You might be tempted to divert resources away from the fruit trees and focus on growing more tomatoes.

Don’t get me wrong — I looooove me some fresh-picked tomatoes

But — and this is a big but — you have to plant tomatoes every year. Last year’s effort's don’t contribute anything to this year’s harvest.

Fruit trees, on the other hand, eventually turn into orchards that bear fruit year after year after year.

If you spend all your time chasing tomatoes, you’ve got nothing left to give to your fruit trees.

What’s one thing you can do today on behalf of your future orchard?

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