Guinness World Records has designated the Kraay Family Farm’s corn maze as the largest QR code in the world.
(l-r) Rachel, Reuben, Ed, and Linda Kraay, are members of Woody Nook CRC in Blackfalds, Alberta.
QR (quick response) codes are two-dimensional codes which, when scanned with a smartphone, offer information on a product or company by sending the user to a website.
Although not the largest corn maze in the world, the Kraay family created the largest QR code on seven acres of the 15-acre corn maze.
Each year the Kraay family (which includes Ed and Linda Kraay, along with their son Reuben and his wife, Rachel deKoning Kraay) cuts a different design into a corn field. Rachel said she came up with the idea for this year’s maze while looking through a magazine. Noticing all the QR codes, she realized that they looked a lot like a maze and wondered if they could make one.
The family agreed to go along with the idea, but the feat took some time to perfect. In order to be considered for the world record, the Kraays had to be sure that theirs was a functioning QR code that could be scanned from the air and would direct the user to the Kraay Family Farm website.
Flying over their farm in a helicopter, they held the phone out the window. “It didn’t work the first time,” said Rachel. They figured out the contrast wasn’t good enough, so “we got in there with the rototiller and dug up the paths real nice and dark. . . . The second time we went up, it scanned right away!”
The farm is well-known throughout Alberta for its annual unique corn mazes, something that began 13 years ago. Located in Lacombe, approximately halfway between Edmonton and Calgary, the farm is one of Alberta’s premier tourist attractions. In addition to the maze, more than 20 other activities are offered.
“We mainly do this so we can stay on the farm and to give others an opportunity to come out to a farm and experience a bit of farm life,” Rachel said. “We also take the opportunity that having so many people on our property brings to raise money each year for a different cause. This year we are raising money for the World Food Programme and our local food bank.”
Has anyone ever become so lost in the corn maze that they needed to be rescued? “People get lost every day,” Rachel said, “but we send in our Corn Cops who look for people who might be starting to worry, and we give them a few extra hints to get them out a little quicker. Some kids do lose their parents, but we always get them back together.”
