so what do the customers do? Fill their box until it`s full? I love the concept but wonder what will happen when your strawberries are out will someone try to get all strawberries? I suppose the law of averages will make it all work out.

Jon_dear, I'm sure that's where the 'monitoring' part comes in to be.

Lucy, great idea, keep us posted.

Marla

no I AGREE it`s a great idea but some people... I want this- i don`t want that... I`m thinking clear signage will help...

The other good thing is that alot of them will be there right at pickup time so they get first dibs. Might get a little down time to do whatever needs doing while waiting for the stragglers to come in.

You are starting to get me warmed up to this idea. I used to think it was stupid because so much time would have to be spent helping/chatting and so the time you save packing would be spent doing that. I know customers would prefer it, but what if they all want the same veggies? Also how do you keep the stuff fresh while they are all coming one at a time? I like to write down what everyone gets each week to keep track of my output vs their fee but that couldn't be done. I know some farms put up signs to guide what they should take. Well let us know more about how it goes! So far with my 'menu' spring fling shares I gave them the amount of points to get to (30-35) and one customer chose 37 worth and wanted to get 4-5 more items somehow. I would have to watch out for people like that in a pick your own situation.

I definitely see problems with popular vs less popular items however sometimes that isn't what you think at all. Some people LOVE beets and kohlrabi and various greens and so on.

I wonder if it would be ok to try it now and again for them? Like 'this week is a choose your own week for those who pick up at the farm. Let's try it out.' It would confuse the older people I bet. I have already confused my 2 older shareholders this season. roll eyes

A farm near us has a "store-style CSA" - they have a farm store, they even sell things like honey, goat cheese, maple syrup from other farms, they give their CSA customers store credit (not the whole season's at once) to shop at the store. I don't know how they manage the inventory, and I really don't know how they can offer full credit and stay in business in a bad year like last year. I thought the whole idea of a CSA was to spread the risk but they said they buy in other products when they have a bad year so that the store always has *something* for their members.

The 1 year that we tried a CSA, was a bad year for us. Lucky for me and my members, I was able to buy from another Indiana farmer to supply them. The members loved that I went to that extra measure, and I felt like I gave them a 'fair' share.

Marla

that clarifies all my questions. I like how it brings them together to "pick" their veggies while keeping them out of your fields. Almost a u pick but pick off the table or out of the bushel baskets. People are wanting to know their farmer... Seems to me that this will work quite well. Congrats.

All of the stuff you say is true Boulderbelt, but the thing that is probably the best business aspect of a C.S.A. is you get early cash flow to start the season.
Your new system is basically like having your farm store open, but also with private produce showings to your C.S.A members.
Mark

I'm not a CSA member, nor a farmer...just a consumer and gardener.

I think more people would join CSAs if they were set up to have more choice. I have several co-workers who have asked if they could buy produce from me. As more people are wanting fresh food and to know where their food comes from. But the main problem that I have had with CSAs is that I don't get to choose what I eat and that I can pay in money and get no food.

You've answered part of that concern which is HUGE for me. Bc I don't like beets and radishes, so why would I pay for them?

Thanks (from a consumer) for thinking outside the box.

I don't do the CSA thing any longer, it wasn't a good fit for me, but that's ok.

Marla

I have a lot of thoughts on this thread and hope I can get them all out straight!
I feel the thing with a CSA is that you are giving food cheaper than if they bought each thing outright at market every week- because they are PAYING AHEAD AND TAKE WHAT IS HARVESTED- THE GOOD AND THE BAD - THE PLENTIFUL AND THE MEAGER. I am not yelling that, just wanted to emphasize. So a CSA share should get more for their money in exchange for exact choice and paying ahead.
Lucy IIRC you don't do any deliveries- everyone picks up at the farm. I bring a few shares with me to work one day a week and leave the coolers in the shade between my car and a tree and it has happened that one person who didn't pick up regularly left her share all week and no one took it LOL! It is in the far corner of a supermarket/Caribou/express clinic. I have had no problems with theft there. I have people provide a cooler with their name on it and inside I put a post it with their name and contents. I usually have a half bushel basket on top of the cooler too. I have had problems with some of the (older) people not getting all of their stuff.

Marla I think you need a permit to buy and distribute for CSA.

More on points: You could tell the customers they could choose any items to equal X points and put a point factor on all the veggie piles (so how are you keeping them fresh BTW?). My points pretty much equal dollars but it sounds better. That would help ensure they all took the right amount.

I think the 'credit' idea Ajsmama mentioned can be experimented with. I do a 100/120 program of paying $100 and getting $120 worth of produce within the usual CSA format. This helps people with limited ready cash still join and brings me more constant income in summer. Also if I were to be very short on veggies for some reason I could have them not pay the next $100. Less risk for them and me but in exchange they get less value than the people who pay $400 right off the bat (in 2 payments).
I know some people who do this credit system at market. I wouldn't call that a CSA but more of a club. The pay a certain amount and get a bit more than that in credit at the market booth over some time.
What do you think is a fair exchange on that? Do you think my $100 for 120's worth is about right?

I let my CSAs fill out a taste questionnaire and avoid a few things they hate. But I don't think complete a la carte ordering or pick up would work at this time. Many of my shareholders are unfamiliar with a lot of veggies and probably wouldn't choose them and try it out unless they were put right in their share. However in the future I may experiment with this.
Babbling on... I mean you cannot totally just grow the most popular things because it is too few crops to do and the season also becomes too short. You have to have the salad turnips and other super early stuff to get the season started.
I agree that you can never truly know what people will want- it even changes from week to week. I have seen that too with asparagus at market. Sells out one week and lots extra the next week. Well it is all experimental and not static!

That is what the CSA near me does. Lots of farms will say that "typically" you pay X dollars and end up getting X+Y dollars worth of stuff - but they choose what to grow and whatever they harvest that week goes into your basket.

Wild Carrot's CSA is unique (as far as I know) in that if you pay X dollars, they give you X + 19% credit to spend in the farm store - for whatever you want, even goat's milk soap, etc. that they buy in. I really don't know how they track their inventory, esp. when the farm store is open to the public - maybe they have special member days/hours?

Then there is the unwritten "guarantee" - I applaud them for buying in when they have a bad year so they can give CSA members their money's worth (or close?) but really don't know how they can afford to do that unless they have savings from the profitable years and of course they can write off the costs of what they buy in as expenses so they have a loss in the bad year, rather than (maybe) just breaking even or having a profit since the CSA income and their normal operating expenses must stay pretty consistent year to year.

These CSA's that guarantee food are missing the mark. As I have said before a big part of CSA is sharing the risk with the farmer and that means to me (and a lot of other CSA farmers who have been doing this 15+ years) if there is a crop failure there is no food nor refunds. People who buy stocks that fail don't get extra stocks from their broker much less a refund, same thing here. There is risk in investing in a CSA farm. granted most of us CSA growers are experienced and grow a very wide variety of crops to mitigate that risk but the risk is still there and quite important.

Also this giving more food than paid for is essentially subsidizing your members (all of whom make a lot more money than we farmers do). Why subsidize people who want to support you and your farm? That makes zero financial or business sense. Don't get me wrong, I give my members a lot of food and usually they get more than they expect but I do not advertise my CSA as a way to get cheap food (we have subsidized agriculture and chain stores such as Wal-Mart for that). It is a way for people to get well grown very fresh food that is superior to what they can get elsewhere and they can get it at a fair price but I will not cut the price (and thus my paycheck) for my members. CSA is also a way for people to connect with farms, something very few people ever have an opportunity to do (maybe 2% to 5% of the population) and this alone should be a big attractor to people interested in eating locally and becoming a locavore.

I find when people ask about price and if the food will be cheap they make bad CSA members and never get what CSA are actually doing. After all it stands for community supported agriculture and not agriculture supported community which you get when you buy in extra food (money out of the farmers' pocket), promise to always give more food than what the member paid for and otherwise subsidize your members.

(BB says,
These CSA's that guarantee food are missing the mark. As I have said before a big part of CSA is sharing the risk with the farmer and that means to me (and a lot of other CSA farmers who have been doing this 15+ years) if there is a crop failure there is no food nor refunds. People who buy stocks that fail don't get extra stocks from their broker much less a refund, same thing here. There is risk in investing in a CSA farm. granted most of us CSA growers are experienced and grow a very wide variety of crops to mitigate that risk but the risk is still there and quite important.)

I do not agree with your views on this matter.
My opinion is if you did not provide produce or a refund and people paid cash money for it you most certainly will end up in the back of a squad car or sued.
Large majority of the people could care less about a farmers plight or weather conditions. If you take $$$$$$ you better deliver a product or give a refund .
This is not the stock market.
And if you get someone dumb enough to pay 500-600 dollars for a CSA share that nothing is guaranteed you better have them sign a long contract .

Perhaps we shouldn't call this 'guaranteed return' of produce a CSA, maybe something else.

Yes, the original CSA idea when it started was only 1 farmer with a few people as members TOTALLY sharing the costs and risks. But now-a-days, there are several CSA-type membership farms that DO supplement with other farms produce.

Some things change because their members require it. After all, we are in business to keep customers, and we do things to make those customers happy.

Marla

Cowpies most CSA do have contracts and that sharing the risk is implied if not explicit in that contract and it has been tested many times over the years and Farms usually do not get sued (and that is what happens is the farm is sued and no one goes to jail). Of course I am talking "acts of God" that are beyond the control of the farmer and not things like the farmer "forgot" to plant or "forgot" to harvest or is a habitual drunk and cannot get his/her act together to do much of anything. This does happen fortunately not all that often but there are probably over 20 cases a year nationally of pure rip off artists, though most seem to be the fake CSA's run by brokers who do nothing but resell and make vague claims about local farms and being Organic)

When the season is bad and food is short or none existent (and when this happens usually the cause is so devastating to the farm like a fire, bad injury/sickness/death of the farmer, tornado/flood or other weather that literally destroys all or a large part of the farm. I know of 3 CSA farms that bad weather/fires happened to in the past 2 years and they were up and running within weeks mainly due to their CSA members chipping in more money (and not expecting to be repaid) as well as physical work.

True most people don't care about the farm or how things are grown and few CSA farms want those people as clients/members of their farm. But there are hundreds of thousands of people out there who are seeking a close relationship with a farm and they are the people who make wonderful CSA members.

CSA is not for everyone, be they a farmer or an eater. CSA's are about risk as I have said and a close relationship between the farmers and the members. The members tend to become friends with the farmers and they do not look at the CSA farm and the farmers as people who simply take their money and had better darned well deliver. It is a lot more than that to them.

For all the rest there are farmers markets, farm stands and of course grocery stores

as for the "New" type of CSA, most of those are just wio=holesale brokers who have decided to call what they do CSA even though local food will generally make up no more than 25% of the food bought by the members, seasonality is tossed out the window and while the broker gets money up front the farmers they deal with get paid as they go and do not get the advantage of getting their money up front before the harvest and can be kicked out of the system at any time thus do not have their risk mitigated. These Fake CSA are to real CSA as Wal-Mart is to a farmers market.