We just wrapped up our April distribution: 78 home deliveries and 56 CSA pick-ups! We are tired, but thankful for everyone who ordered. As a farm in our eleventh year of operation, we've seen a lot of people, hurdles, and opportunities. We've tried a lot of things, failed at a lot of things, and succeeded at some. But we've never seen demand this high; as many people relying on us to sustain their families.
We've been farming: raising animals, answering emails, fixing broken stuff, doing all the things we usually do. But we've also been thinking about what the future looks like if what we do is going to continue to experience unprecedented demand for some amount of time. To that end, I have a few thoughts I wanted to share:
When it comes to our customers, we plan to be here for you: especially those who have stuck with us in the past, and who have committed to us into the future. I've never guilt tripped anyone with the words, "support local" in my entire life. Its not that I don't believe in the vital importance of a local, distributed food system. I've oriented much of my life around the interconnectedness of eating and being supported by my local biome and relationships with real people in my community. But I want customers who are with us because they truly believe what we are offering is going to benefit their families now and into the future: Whether its the quality of the meats, the trust in the integrity of their production, or the security of sustaining your family from a relationship and not a complex, brittle, just-in-time supply chain, we believe customers who see the benefits to themselves and their families are the most likely people to stick with this relationship, as opposed to someone doing it mostly out of a sense of duty. We also just really like people; making and feeding friends. And so we want what we do to really benefit our customers, and we want them to believe and understand how it does as well.
These past couple of months we have offered our meats at farmers market and through one-time home-delivery bundles, and through our CSA program; and despite all the odds, to a small handful of chefs have even placed orders for their continued takeout programs! We have been blown away by the increased demand in all our retail offerings, and we plan to continue to offer all them into the foreseeable future. But some things will be different:
Firstly, we are committed to taking care of the chefs and CSA members who have kept our farm going over the past few years. We will do our best to hold back product from our one-time retail purchasing programs in order to sufficiently care for these, our most committed partners, as well as we possibly can. They are going to be the people who get first dibs on our meat into the future. If you want to become a member of our CSA, we are going to continue to offer that program to new members until we can't meet the demand anymore. Its not for everyone. It requires some flexibility, trust and commitment. But we offer it because it works for our farm and family and we believe its a way to get great meat, affordably, and in a way that secures your source ongoing: Taking new CSA memberships will be the last thing we shut down, and we will always take care of returning members as well.
Secondly, we will continue to offer our one-time retail purchases at the Original Bardstown Road Farmers Market on Saturdays, and through our one-time delivery bundle program. We believe this is an important way we can support new customers and those unable to commit to CSA membership. But we also are willing and prepared to offer these programs less frequently, in order to have plenty of product on hand for our committed partners. Its also worth noting that our market has increased the spacing between booths to account for current social distancing guidelines. So we are also decreasing our presence there to allow other vendors the space to regularly bring their products, many of them perishable, to market. Please look for these offerings if they are how you choose to buy. But also do understand that the above is why they won't always be available in the ways you might have come to expect.
We appreciate all our customers and hope that you'll continue to buy from us! Thanks for being a part of what we do here.