Local, Sustainable Marketing 101

I just read an interesting article in this month's Countryside and Small Stock Journal. The article itself is focused on women in small, sustainable agriculture and, no, I am not a woman. However, there are a few things that pertain to all of us in the realm of sustainability and relationship marketing. There is, after all, more to it than just growing something, putting it in the package and selling it.

The focus for us at, Cedar Cove Farm, is on local people. We want to help those in our community to have food that is fit to eat, things that are not produced by the big agribusinesses, that are free of toxins and hormones and antibiotics. We believe in the way God intended for us to eat and desire to share that.

The article states that the idea of locally grown food helps reduce the dependency on transportation costs and other things that are related to high energy costs. You may recall that I work a full time job as a produce manager. I can assure you that your grocery store is feeling the pinch as wholesalers are raising their prices to cover the ever increasing fuel costs. Not to mention that all of the food is trucked thousands of miles before it gets to your store. There have been many strawberries that I have had to throw out after a day or two, because of either sitting in a warehouse or on a truck. Besides that, the berries get picked a bit early to extend their shelf life and you never get the same flavor as you would from a berry picked that day. Local growers do charge a bit more for their wares, however, you are going to see a point where local may be cheaper because of the lack of transportation costs.

We value the people we come in contact with, we want to develop a relationship that will serve our customers and keep them coming back to us. We are small but we are building around this idea and we want to remain small. We want to leave room for the farmer down the road to sell his goods, maybe to the same people. Like Joel Salatin said in one of his books, we'd rather see a thousand people growing chickens on grass than to have one Tyson providing chicken to a thousand people, making them unhealthy through their questionable practices.

Like the Salatins and so many others, we want to grow food fit to eat through sustainable practices that allow the animals to thrive in their natural state, not in a large building or on a feed lot. We are beginning to understand how grass needs the cow to grow healthy and the cow needs the grass to grow healthy. Under proper management, the land can replenish itself without all the expensive inputs.

If you would like to read more, look for the article entitled "Rural women business owners lead the rural renaissance" in the latest issue of "Countryside and Small Stock Journal".

On a related note from another article in another publication-"The Stockman Grassfarmer", Alan Nation says, "Europeans are paying eight dollars a gallon for diesel this summer. If the average American used as little petroleum as the average European, the world would be awash in oil despite the increased consumption in China and India. The U.S.A. is 25% of the world market for petroleum, what we do will have a huge impact everywhere. He goes on, "You can always manage to use a little less of any input whether it is hay or fuel or grain."

The idea of sustainable agriculture is to use what is in front of you, and to think outside the box. Remember my article on "holons"? Growing grass is cheap, it takes energy from the sun, which is free and is harvested by ruminants, which is very cheap labor and costs no fuel to cut, rake and bale it.

Another principle along these lines is organic growth. It is bad business to continue to go further into debt in order to grow your business. Staring small and using capital from the sales of your product to promote or create growth, growth from within, is best. Especially in today's economy, debt is not a good idea. If debt must be incurred, use it wisely and be careful not to over-extend the load. Grow from within.

Getting the pH in the soil balanced and building up the missing trace minerals will go a long way to improving and maintaining the health of your livestock and curb health problems. This is the least expensive way to keep your livestock healthy. Unless, that is, you like vet bills.

You can read more in the Stockman Grassfarmer, click on the link to the right and go subscribe today. You won't regret it, I can't seem to be without it.

Until next time...