Jolly Pumpkin has been planting and growing family fun since 2020.

We wouldn’t exist without the help of so many people, my parents, friends, and especially my sister Kate, who now runs the Café. Back in 2020, right in the middle of the Covid pandemic, I decided to take the leap and start something new. It was a tough time for everyone, and launching a business then was more than a little daunting…but it also felt like the right moment to try.

I’d just left my job as a rural surveyor and returned home to the family farm. The trouble was, the farm wasn’t really earning anything, so I started scribbling down ideas for how we might diversify. One of the ideas that stuck was pumpkin picking. The only hitch? Our little farm on the outskirts of Taunton didn’t have the access needed to welcome visitors.

That’s when I reached out to Mark and Tracey, landowners and farmers in Silverton, Exeter, through contacts I’d made during my short-lived surveying career. Thankfully, they loved the idea and agreed to let me rent a little bit of their land. Thanks to their support, every October since then we’ve been able to invite families along for some good old pumpkin-picking fun.