localharvest.org - anyone have any experience?

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bkt

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Here's the site: Fort Lee, NJ - Farmers Markets / Family Farms / CSA / Organic Food / Pick your Own

This came recommended to me for meeting up with local producers and becoming acquainted. Does anyone here have any experience with this? It serves many locales across the nation.
The CSAs I’ve looked into in the area I felt were seriously overpriced and small quantities in return. Rochester Public Market might be worth the trip. Not too far from you are the Penn Yan, Romulus, and Ontario Prroduce Auction in Gorham where you can buy small or large lots , 3 days a week and groceries from time to time. Ontario Produce Auction is on Facebook with information. The produce auction is supplied by local families and just as good/better than fancy CSAs. And, local farm stands generally get their stuff from produce auction.
Genecco’s on 332 in Canadaigua sells to the public, too. They supply restaurants and other places.
 
I've used that site before to locate markets close to me. Don't know much else about it.

I seem to recall the name from my culinary school days as a resource to get product not quite, shall we say attractive enough to sell, to help donate to feeding centers similar to what Table to Table does. TtoT takes unsaleable product from restaurants and bakeries to use in the feeding centers.
 
I was affiliated with them more than a decade… affiliated – meaning they wedged themselves into every farmers market in the state and I, as a farmer, had to deal with them if I wanted to sell my veggies.

From a farmers standpoint… they were trying to build markets. Then… busy bodies who never grew a potato or ear of corn… decided what was needed was upscale farmers markets so folks with cash would feel safe. These clueless morons made a mess of things in my state.

The result of their activities… little farmers were priced out of these “new markets”. There used to be lots of folks who might only have a few extra tomatoes to sell on one day, or a few extra ears of corn. Now they had to buy nice tents and tables or pay $100+ in fees each visit (both or tent rental) plus the yearly fees... to sell their $20 in tomatoes. All those folks vanished and a full 50% of the yearly produce vanished with them.

They did something really bad. They took affordable fresh food from those who needed it most and could least afford it. With all the extra fees the few farmers left had to raise prices. The elderly and poor could no longer pay even with WIC assistance programs.

So… the well off got nice places to shop, where they could feel good about helping poor farmers.. and to hell with everyone else.

Repeat - These clueless morons made a mess of things in my state. There were whole sale rebellion by farmers all over the state. Many of us formed our own farmers markets, pooled cash and rented facilities to sell at. The two I shop at now are maintained by my fellow rebellious farmers. I was involved with starting each.

But you can meet local producers at local harvest places. Usually commercial farmer raising crops or livestock... no more small growers.
 
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Example of pricing…. At the farmers market where I (as a child) helped my grandmother sell veggies, where I sold peaches decades later….

The old market was a shed under an overpass. Farmers backed their trucks up to the shed. We sold right off the tailgate. I paid $25 each year to sell.

The city built a multi-million dollar facility with entertainment venues (tore down the shed). They called it the “The River Walk”. Dozens of little shops sell over priced goat milk soaps, do-dads and do-hickies. But to sell peaches… I have to pay for parking, $20 per day, I had to unload my truck, move everything inside a building. I paid $50 a day to rent a table in the building. I paid $10 to rent a special approved cart just to haul my entire load of peaches to my table. Regular carts weren’t allowed.

So I was out $80 before I sold a single peach. Say it was a light day, I only had 20 baskets of peaches to sell. At $12 a basket that’s $240… minus $80 to the market. Basically a 30% sales tax, it’s a no win for most growers...

They've killed all of the old farmers markets in my area, every community used to have one... no more.
 
Around here, IMO, CSA's are just something to cater to the well to do and make them feel like they are sustaining farms. In reality, not so much
The Princess subscribed to a CSA but we ended up giving away or tossing what we did not eat.

Ben
 
Example of pricing…. At the farmers market where I (as a child) helped my grandmother sell veggies, where I sold peaches decades later….

The old market was a shed under an overpass. Farmers backed their trucks up to the shed. We sold right off the tailgate. I paid $25 each year to sell.

The city built a multi-million dollar facility with entertainment venues (tore down the shed). They called it the “The River Walk”. Dozens of little shops sell over priced goat milk soaps, do-dads and do-hickies. But to sell peaches… I have to pay for parking, $20 per day, I had to unload my truck, move everything inside a building. I paid $50 a day to rent a table in the building. I paid $10 to rent a special approved cart just to haul my entire load of peaches to my table. Regular carts weren’t allowed.

So I was out $80 before I sold a single peach. Say it was a light day, I only had 20 baskets of peaches to sell. At $12 a basket that’s $240… minus $80 to the market. Basically a 30% sales tax, it’s a no win for most growers...

They've killed all of the old farmers markets in my area, every community used to have one... no more.

I don't know about the pricing here. But sounds the same to me
 
I've used that site before to locate markets close to me.
And that's about all I plan to do with it.

Thanks, everyone, this has been helpful.
 

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