Member Spotlight

FoodHub Member Connections: Rural Schools Tag Team on Local Purchases

Wednesday, May 22nd, 2013 by
Vicky Brown works with students to grow food for the cafeteria at North Powder Charter School’s school garden.

Chuck Lowry has been raising beef cattle for 30 years. And while he has been selling cuts to friends and family from his ranch in Baker City for years, as well as into the conventional market, it didn’t occur to him that there was another local market he was missing out on.

That is until Vicky Brown of North Powder Charter School in North Powder, OR, found Lowry Family Beef on FoodHub. This year, she purchased ground beef and roast, and plans to do it again for the next school year.

“Chuck was very excited to help us out and very proactive in promoting his beef,” she said, “and it is a fabulous product. FoodHub is a great resource for me. I can check out product and communicate with my lap top rather than getting on the phone.”

And while it may be easy to find beef in cattle country, as a recipient of HB 2800 funds, which granted nearly $200,000 to 11 Oregon schools to purchase more Oregon product, Vicky said her school district and others in Eastern Oregon are still struggling to procure other local items and have them distributed to their dispersed locations.

Some distributors do have routes through the area, but many broadliners usually arrive from Boise or Spokane and, according to Vicky who is charged with tracking the provenance of her HB 2800 purchases, don’t carry Oregon-grown products. Many farmers regularly drive upwards of four hours to distribute their product into the Portland market, but, Vicky said, it’s been a challenge to encourage them to look in their own back yard for customers.

“Here in Eastern Oregon it’s all about distribution, distribution, distribution,” said Vicky.”We have until the end of June to spend the money but getting product is hard. Our time is precious and these food service ladies are going to farms and getting product on their own.”

According to a survey conducted by FoodHub and Ecotrust’s Farm to School staff of schools and pre-schools in Eastern Oregon, 142,700 meals are served daily to children by these kitchens and cafeterias. Roughly speaking, if all of these schools and preschools purchased Hermiston watermelon for just one of these meals or snacks (about 125,340 servings), it would support the purchase of 20,548 pounds of watermelon, and return about $15,411 into the local market at $0.75 per pound.

“This is my second year tapping into other local schools and trying to gather our purchasing power,” said Vicky who regularly coordinates purchase and delivery of product not only for her own kitchen, but also for others in a similar situation including the staff in Joseph, also HB 2800 recipients, who will often drive nearly two hours on their own time to pick up their portion of joint purchases. “The need is here,” she said.

Flex your region’s connections.

Build a business case for your region’s local food system by searching for other buyers in your area to start coordinating purchases. If you’re a seller looking for new local markets, use the Knowledgebase to find direct marketing tips and best practices. Have something to offer that’s not food? The Marketplace is ideal for advertising cold storage or commercial kitchen space that’s available for others in your community to use and may also be easy one-stop pick up sites for any coordinated purchases.

Community Fisheries Network raising the bar on accountability

Wednesday, April 17th, 2013 by

This is a repost from the Ecotrust blog, which is designed to inspire fresh thinking, spark innovation, and encourage investment in natural economies. Read more stories about Ecotrust’s work, and that of our partners and friends, at blog.ecotrust.org.

Community Fisheries Network members are pushing for new metrics for to track progress on sustainability and traceability. Photo by Scott Trimble.

As the seafood industry faces a wave of new questions about the legitimacy of fish labels, the Ecotrust-backed Community Fisheries Network is buckling down and working to build back public trust by establishing rigorous accountability on sustainability standards for its 13 membership organizations nationwide. (more…)

FoodHub Member Connections: Adelante Mujeres Makes Farm to School Connections

Thursday, March 21st, 2013 by
Farmers from Adelante Agricultura and Melissa Lusk of OCDC meet to discuss challenges and opportunities of local sourcing during the Washington County Farm to School Meet and Greet.

Rebuilding the local food economy takes flexibility, ingenuity, and great partnerships. As more nonprofits and advocacy organizations take the lead in connecting local buyers and sellers, relationships are initiated and built in a variety of settings. Adelante Mujeres – a nonprofit in Forest Grove, OR that not only trains and educates aspiring Latino farmers, but also helps those growers build business relationships and thrive in new markets – had one such opportunity to build grower-buyer relationships through a Washington County Farm to School Meet and Greet hosted by Ecotrust’s Farm to School staff.

To reach out to schools and producers in and around Washington County, the Farm to School team used FoodHub to bring good potential online connections to life.

“FoodHub is one of the main ways through which we search for potential event attendees,” said Ecotrust Farm to School Coordinator Katy Pelissier. “Its a quick and easy way for us to search for buyers and sellers that we know will be interested in working together. And, we know it will be straightforward for them to follow up with each other after the event, because they can continue to connect on FoodHub.” (more…)

New Farm to School grants put local foods in Oregon students’ lunches

Monday, February 11th, 2013 by

This is a repost from the Ecotrust blog, which is designed to inspire fresh thinking, spark innovation, and encourage investment in natural economies. Read more stories about Ecotrust’s work, and that of our partners and friends, at blog.ecotrust.org.

This semester, school lunch for nearly 60,000 Oregon students is transforming thanks to an infusion of local food and food education.

The Oregon Department of Education has announced that eleven school districts are the recipients of competitive Farm to School and School Garden grants totaling $189,140. The majority of the funds (87.5%) will be spent on purchasing Oregon food products, with a smaller portion (12.5%) dedicated to food-, agriculture-, and garden-based education activities.

Local food is on the lunchline and garden programs are on the rise in Oregon, thanks to new Farm to School funding from the state. Photo by Shawn Linehan.

The funding goes to diverse districts and schools across the state, from the tiny rural community of Joseph nestled in the Wallowa Mountains, to Oregon’s second largest city, Eugene, in the heart of the Willamette Valley.


Local food is on the lunchline and garden programs are on the rise in Oregon, thanks to new Farm to School funding from the state. Photo by Shawn Linehan.

(more…)

Eugene Local Food Connection Opens Doors to New Business

Friday, February 1st, 2013 by

An annual event for the past seven years, the Local Food Connection in Eugene, OR, has truly become a hub for creating connections. Hosting more than 250 attendees last year – including 70 buyers or distributors, 28 processors, and 71 regional producers – the conference has one overarching goal: Help people find new business opportunities.

“If you’re coming with a product to sell, we determine our success by helping you find a new place to sell it,” said Event Coordinator Jared Pruch. “For food buyers the goal of the conference is to let you know about opportunities to buy locally produced food.”

The theme of the 2013 conference is “Values Added: Celebrating the Values of Our Local Food System”, reflecting the stories and values that lie behind local food products, and the place-based and cultural significance of this unique food region. A new feature this year, conference organizers will be acting as connection brokers to ease the process of finding the right person to talk to in a room of 200.

“The most valuable aspect of this event is just having everyone in the same room for the day. Having that face-to-face time is really important,” said Pruch. “In the past we left it up to attendees to find each other. This year we’re incorporating brokers who have a roster of food buyers from restaurants, grocery stores or institutions ahead of time so that when people try to connect there will be someone there to help make an introduction.”

In addition to providing brokers for their networking sessions, the conference will host several new panels including breakout sessions about starting a food cart and building community food systems in rural areas. Along with new breakout sessions, the conference will be bringing Jacques Gibson to the podium for a keynote address covering his family’s success through Lochmead Dairy, which was one of seven dairies in operation in the Junction City, OR, in the 1950s and today is the only one left.

“He’s going to talk about some of the key decision they made that helped them grow their business from a small family business to regional food player,” Pruch said.

Attendees can also look forward to a locally sourced lunch, which, last year, left one university school buyer – who provided the conference with an anonymous testimonial – impressed with the variety of products available in what is typically thought of as the off season.

“I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the ingredients that were donated prepared in different manners,” they said. “I also thought that since we were not in peak season it was a great variety with what was available, and I wanted to taste everything.”

Registration for the conference is $30 and includes breakfast and a light lunch as well as the attendee’s choice of workshops.

More information about the 2013 Local Food Connection can be found online at localfoodconnection.org.

FoodHub Connections: Flying Fish Company puts big impacts in small packages

Tuesday, January 29th, 2013 by

As one of FoodHub’s early adopters, Lyf Gildersleeve has a list of local connections almost as long as Flying Fish Company’s first Portland storefront – a retrofitted bread delivery truck parked on a corner in Southeast Portland. And while his current location on Hawthorne Street isn’t much bigger, Gildersleeve has managed to sell more than a half million dollars worth of product through the 176 square foot shack – to which he recently added a shipping container converted into a commercial kitchen and walk-in refrigerator. According to the Food Marketing Institute, that’s on par with average sales per square foot of most grocery stores, which are normally 46,000 square feet per store.

To keep the shelves stocked and the product fresh, Gildersleeve builds working relationships with local farmers, ranchers and fishermen, and he finds them with FoodHub.

“One the great connections I had last year was with Copper River Fish Market for their sockeye,” he said. “I ended up getting thousands of pounds from them last summer and will again this coming June.”

Last year’s list is impressive: 2,000 pounds of Copper River salmon, 2,000 pounds of Chinook salmon, 5,000 pounds of Oregon-caught tuna, 2,000 pounds of Dungeness crab, 2,000 pounds of bay shrimp, plus local pastured eggs, grassfed meats, local cheese, and other specialties like local Frog Eyes Wasabi. A sampling of FoodHub connections includes Rainshadow El Rancho, Chicken Scratch Farm, Provenance Farm, Reister Farms Lamb, Deck Family Farms, and Buchholz and Son Farms, LLC.

“We’re fortunate here in Oregon – it’s a pretty abundant place,” said Gildersleeve, who moved to the Pacific Northwest to be closer to the region’s burgeoning local food marketplace after opening his first Flying Fish location in Park City, UT.

He’s not the first Flying Fish-monger: It’s a family business. Flying Fish Co. was first started by his father, Craig Gildersleeve, in Sandpoint, ID. His sister Amber now runs the original shop after starting a third location in Durango, CO. After growing up in the business, Lyf understands the challenges farmers, fishermen and ranchers face when bringing their products to market. “When I buy something from a farmer or a fisherman I give them a check when they deliver,” he said. “I take the risk and don’t ask them to front it because I understand the need for cashflow.” (more…)

Gearing up for Organicology 2013

Monday, January 28th, 2013 by

It’s been a big year for organic. Earlier this year the Organic Trade Association released an infographic illustrating the mammoth economic impact of organic products : In 2011 alone the sector grew by nearly 10 percent to over $30 billion, with increased sales in organic fruits and vegetable contributing more than 50 percent of those new dollars. While that is excellent growth, Natalie Reitman-White, Director of Sustainability at Organically Grown Company, says it’s no time for folks who work in the organic food sector to rest on their laurels.

“The organic movement and the organic trade are living and breathing and constantly evolving based on the amount of energy we put into them,” she says. “As more people are turned onto organics and those products are becoming more available, it’s about understanding the variety that you have to choose from and who you’re supporting in the marketplace.”

That’s what she hopes participants will take away from this year’s Organicology conference happening Thursday-Saturday, Feb.7-9, 2013, at the Hilton Downtown in Portland, OR.

Now in its third year, the biannual conference brings together the organic food community – including growers, eaters and advocates – to advance knowledge of the sector and address challenges faced by organic food producers through workshops, networking, a trade show and keynote addresses from industry experts.

“While there are a lot of sustainable ag conferences, this is the premier venue for experts in the organic policy arena, as well as the organic farming and retail arenas to share their knowledge,” Reitman-White says. (more…)

FoodHub Member Connections: Pure Simple juices the Home Orchard Society

Wednesday, December 5th, 2012 by

As a registered dietician, Dulcinea Ward found that many of her clients were buying health food products that had to be shipped from New York to the Pacific Northwest. Something about that didn’t seem quite right. Wasn’t there an abundance of fresh fruit and vegetables right here that would not only taste better, but be fresher and higher in nutritional value?

So, in June 2011, she started her search for fresh, local, organic ingredients and created her line of Pure Simple Juices. Her product highlights the bounty of the Pacific Northwest and the seasonality of the region without the use of artificial sweeteners or preservatives, leaning instead on the natural sweetness of the fruit and vegetables she sources at the height of the season.

While she had always had an appreciation for the abundance and variety of local food available, she used her first season selling at the Portland Farmers’ Market to deepen her knowledge of the region’s seasonal fluctuations and used the content of the farmers’ stalls to inspire her juice offerings for the week.

“It was really sweet for me, being pretty new to food production, to be able to connect with local farmers, build those relationships, and have a better understanding of what was seasonal and available right then,” she said.

However, as her business grew she found herself in need of additional sources to keep her supply chain stocked. While she maintained the relationships she had forged at the farmers’ market new ones were needed to keep production up to par. (more…)

Connections Illustrate Value of Virtual FoodHub Network

Wednesday, December 5th, 2012 by

At the root of it all, the local food movement is about physically getting good food to the table. However, there’s a lot of work going on in the background to make “Buy Local” go from bumper sticker to business practice. When the nonprofit Ecotrust developed the online tool FoodHub they started with the basics: Who do you call when you want to buy blueberries direct from a local producer? Who do you get in touch with when you want to bring in a sample of your delicata squash to a school or restaurant?

As the FoodHub community approaches its third anniversary (the tool is now serving more than 4,000 Members) we continue to see the inherent value of helping buyers and sellers create virtual connections as a mechanism for creating real-world relationships.

David Hoyle of Creative Growers in Noti, OR, discovered FoodHub in 2010 and jumped at the chance to use the tool to find new accounts. As a farmer of 15 years with several accounts already in place, Hoyle said he appreciates the ease of finding high quality connections through the FoodHub network.

“What we’re looking for is someone who week in and week out is going to be a steady customer,” he said. “One of things about FoodHub that I really like is the people you meet there are very in the game. They want it to be more than a sale. They’re looking for a relationship.”

Todd Birzer, a new farmer in Beaverton, OR, also noted the value of having an online network available to help him create initial contact with buyers.

“I underestimated how much time and effort it would take to find buyers,” he said. “I didn’t know some of the people we’ve been selling to and I wouldn’t have found them on my own. One of the great aspects about FoodHub is having an organized list of potential buyers, to be able to search for those buyers and contact them through FoodHub.”

While many tools in the food-tech landscape have been developed to connect consumers direct to producers, FoodHub is concerned primarily with wholesale buyers and sellers, in essence aiming to bring local food to other consumer experiences – at corporate campuses, hospitals, restaurants and even schools.

“FoodHub is a great tool to find out who is in your regional neighborhood and know what they’re producing,” says Diane Hyndman of Wahluke School District in Matawa, WA. “It’s hard to know what farms are 40 miles out there. They might be out of our immediate community, but still close enough to get food from. FoodHub brings the farmers market right into my office.”

For more information about how FoodHub helps food people find each other and connect email us at meet@food-hub.org or call 855-FOODHUB.

Latino Community Farmers in Oregon Feasting on New Market: School lunch

Saturday, August 18th, 2012 by

This is a repost from the Ecotrust blog, which is designed to inspire fresh thinking, spark innovation, and encourage investment in natural economies. Read more stories about Ecotrust’s work, and that of our partners and friends, at blog.ecotrust.org.

La Esperanza farmer Araceli Roman and her daughters at the Forest Grove Farmers Market. Photo by Shawn Linehan.

In 2010, the nonprofit Adelante Mujeres saw a clear challenge when the Latino farmers on its 12-acre La Esperanza Farm in the city of Forest Grove, Ore. continued to struggle selling their abundant harvests. Adelante Mujeres provides courses in sustainable agriculture to low-income Latinos, and offers graduates small farm plots and a booth at the Forest Grove Farmers Market to sell their fresh produce. But daunting social, linguistic, and technological barriers were making it difficult for the La Esperanza farmers to find diverse buyers for their organic vegetables.

Over two years, Portland State University and Ecotrust worked in close partnership with Adelante Mujeres to pilot a program that connects La Esperanza farmers to local wholesale buyers seeking fresh, organic produce. In the process, they took a hard look at how these farmers could support greater community health among the low-income residents of Washington County. (more…)

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