2014 Farmbook [#059 Special]

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Meet members of the pennsylvania association for sustainable agriculturE, working to bring fresh, delicious food to local eaters

Brian Fox of Salem Mountain Farms

Minding Their Business There’s no single way to run a farm profitably. These farmers reveal the many ways it takes to make it work.

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foodworks

…And we are not your average

CSA

Urban farmer, Adrian Galbraith-Paul from Herritage Farm, rests after harvesting crates of heirloom tomatoes.

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Featuring Philly made foods Customizable shares and flexible pick-up locations making good food accessible to all

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Good Connections What it takes to succeed in farming

Farming today is in a perpetual state of rethinking and revision—indeed, the only real constant is change itself. It can even be difficult to keep track of where the leading edge of this change is to be found, and when the older methods are being left behind. The “look” of a farm is no longer the best indicator of its success, if it ever was.

What distinguishes a successful farming operation from one that may be languishing, or just getting by, is an invisible factor that can be summed up in the term “connection.” And the connections required for a successful farm flow in two directions, both upstream and down. Show me a successful farmer, and I’ll show you someone who understands the context of the farm in the natural environment, and has developed personal relationships with those who purchase and consume the farm’s products.

So-called “modern” industrial farming assumed from the beginning that such connections were not so important, and that farmers could do best working in isolation from concerns for the environment and marketplace. This attitude led to a dramatic period of consolidation, decreasing the number of farms across the country, and to the emergence of mega-farms that served national and international markets in a relatively faceless way. And yet, this prevailing system

still requires much state and federal assistance in order to survive.

But look at the farms highlighted in this section and you’ll see a different, more promising story emerging. They are run by farmers who have connected themselves in a multitude of meaningful ways, and are constantly looking for new ones. They understand their place in nature and, more importantly, the needs of their customers, treating them almost like family.

Maybe that’s the ultimate lesson here: that a vibrant and successful food system really is a family, made up not only of farmers and eaters, but the businesses that thrive between them, and all the native plants and critters—including in the soil—that allow us to borrow the resources of their domain, and to whom we must also return those resources in kind.

Brian Snyder, Executive Director PASA (Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture) pasafarming.org

Your neighbor’s our farmer.

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Three Springs Fruit Farm

ben w enk

Family Trees Innovation bears fruit for seven generations by emily teel • photos by albert yee

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the unusual distinction of living on a street named after his family. Three Springs Fruit Farm on Bendersville Wenksville Road in Aspers, Pennsylvania, has been in operation since 1818 and there, with his father and uncle, Wenk grows apples, cherries, peaches and pears. ruit farmer Ben Wenk has

Seven generations of Wenks have called Adams County home, and it was Ben’s great-great-grandfather, Ferd Wenk, who first planted four of the family’s acres in apples. Ben’s grandfather, Donald Wenk, built on that legacy when a group of apple growers in the area formed a cooperative and bought Musselman’s, a nearby apple processing company.

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Ben recognizes his grandfather’s entrepreneurial vision. “He saw an opportunity, [so he] took out a bank loan to buy enough trees to plant the balance in orchards,” he says. Donald took a risk by filling the rest of the property with fruit trees, and he worked double shifts in order to pay back the loan while getting the orchard established.

Donald farmed during the day and worked the night shift at a cardboard factory for more than a decade when Ben’s father, Dave Wenk, was a kid. “What we have now is built on that sacrifice,” Ben says, referring to the fruit farm.

The Wenk family now owns 257 acres, and through a complex array of leases with their neighbors, they farm a total of about 485 acres in apples, peaches, pears and cherries. Ben also grows vegetables to diversify the farm’s selection at the eight farmers markets they attend weekly during the growing season.

Whereas vegetables are annual crops that will grow, produce and wither in the course of a single season, an apple tree is a 25-year investment. Though young trees begin yielding fruit after just three or four years, they take

located in

Aspers, pa Approx. people served annually

500,000 Major products

apples, pears, cherries & peaches business model

farmers markets, wholesale, direct to restaurant, co-packed and processed fruit

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longer than that to come into full production.

Ben says his father is, only now, planting trees a second time on land that he planted when he was Ben’s age. The 25- year life-cycle of an orchard outpaces that of a person. “You only get a couple shots at it,” Ben says.

Added to this is the complication that the apple harvest occurs during one breakneck month, and that means, “All your income is based on that one month,” Ben adds. By also growing and selling vegetables such as kale, tomatoes and peppers, the farm is less vulnerable.

Another safety net for their business is that

they’re members of an apple-growing community and they have the option of selling some of their fruit to nearby processors. Another company, Rice Foods, supplies East Coast fruit to large supermarket chains.

The presence of these companies means that Three Springs almost always has a buyer for their products. They make less on the factory option than they would had they been able to sell the fruit through another outlet, but having the processors means that they seldom have a crop that results in a total loss.

While having these outlets as options might provide some sense of security, they can also dull creativity.

“You can sustain a business growing entirely for the factory, [but] you cannot grow a business that way,” Ben says, adding that it’s nice to have a safety net. “What you get from the factory is completely tied up in variables that you have no control over.”

Ben’s goal for Three Springs is to take as much control over the sale and marketing of its products as possible. “It’s more time, more effort and more capital,” he says. ”But I’d rather risk our business on our own success or failure than leave that on a variable I can’t control.”

As a musician who very nearly went to Penn State to study trumpet performance, Ben changed his major to the School of Agriculture following a brief conversation with his father, who said, “We never really talked about this, but the farm’s always gonna be here for you if

you have an interest in it.” After he graduated in 2006, he returned to the family farm. Slowly, he picked up more responsibility, taking on such projects as expanding Three Springs’ access to the urban markets in Philadelphia and in the Washington, D.C., area.

“I was still trying to establish myself as a worthwhile investment to the business,” Ben says, about entering into Three Springs as a partner with his father and his uncle, John.

Even if he once made novice mistakes, his projects have proven to be profitable for the farm. Pound for pound, direct sale to consumers is their most lucrative outlet, followed by wholesale to businesses, such as Kimberton Whole Foods and Greensgrow. Ben has been able to strengthen these relationships through his friendly presence at markets such as Headhouse, and by using Twitter and Instagram.

Although running the markets calls for a significant time investment, he loves the lifestyle that farming offers him, and recognizes that it would be far more difficult without the expertise of his father and uncle. Having them to lean on means that he can focus on innovation and his own projects.

And farmers markets end up being good for him as well. He’s a gregarious guy who relishes the social stimulation they provide. “It is so good for me professionally to go to the city to hear about what people are cooking, to pick up on the latest trends. ... I learn a lot from [my customers].”

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COUNTRY TIME Farm paul a nd ember cr i v el l a ro

Pork Life

Connections, smart decisions plump up production by emily teel • photos by albert yee

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affectionately about the city’s most highly regarded chefs as though they’re the neighborhood kids with a lemonade stand. Ember, and her husband, Paul, are some of the preemminent porcine professionals of Philadelphia. Country Time Farm’s customers include Le Virtu, South Philly Tap Room, American Sardine Bar, Southwark and the eateries of Jose Garces and Marc Vetri. mber Crivellaro speaks

located in

Hamburg, PA Approx. people served annually

1,000 s Major products

Pork business model

farmers markets, CSA, direct sales to customers & restaurants

2004

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Paul worked for years as a meat cutter at local chain grocery stores, and they started raising pigs on the side. “We got into it as a parttime venture.” Paul says. “My father always had a couple, and said if you want to make a little extra money, raise pigs.” When the couple moved to their Hamburg, Pennsylvania, farm in 1989, they carefully scaled up production. Even in their phases of growth, they’ve intentionally kept their operation modest so they can keep their work as hands-on as possible. The Crivellaro’s breeding program includes about 30 sows, and they produce about 600 pigs each year, Paul says. The business itself is focused.

“I see people raising chickens, eggs, meat birds, steers, gardening ... and 90 percent of them can’t do it properly, so we specialize on one thing and we try to do it correctly,” he says.

Even so, they’ve had to be creative to stay viable in the industry. In the early 1990s, during the height of pork as “the other white meat,” they saw massive consolidation.

“The big boys wanted to get rid of small farmers,” Ember says. “We ended up selling pigs for 10 cents a pound, live weight.” At that price, the Crivellaros couldn’t even break even on what it would cost to get a pig to processing weight. “If Paul didn’t have a full-time job … we would have lost this farm,” she adds.

This led Paul to reach out to Drew Keegan, who at the time was the director of PA Preferred, a publicprivate partnership between the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture and companies in the state that helps to promote the state’s agricultural products.

“He connected me with St. Joe’s food marketing students ... and a project to connect the farm to restaurants,” Paul says. Those students helped the couple brand their product. “We got two restaurants that way, and the rest was word-of-mouth,” Paul says.

Soon, the Crivellaros found themselves at the forefront of farm-to-table distribution that would become a standard sourcing practice for many Philadelphia restaurants. On one hand, they started distribution in 2004 at the right moment, and they never had to look for customers. (“We didn’t have to! They called us!” Ember says.) But they’ve also had to pave the way: defending pricing that was higher than the industrial average, and politely declining requests for donations of their products and their skills.

Despite the challenges, the pair has settled into a comfortable rhythm with their wholesale, restaurant and farmers market customers. When asked about what’s next for Country Time, Paul ensures that “as long as I can do it, we’ll do it.” Which is good news for Philadelphia chefs and diners who, having enjoyed a decade of Country Time pork on menus, might not know what to do without it.

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SPIRAL PATH Farm

brow nback fa mily

Living The Dream

An idealistic vision becomes an dynamic business

by emily teel • photos by albert yee

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piral Path Farm is a well-oiled machine. Tidy

rows of kale, tomatoes and broccoli line sections of the farm in Loysville, Pennsylvania, and when you see their community supported agriculture (CSA) operation, it’s clear that a considerable amount of planning and organization went into the farming and the business. But it wasn’t always so well-coordinated.

Though aspiring sustainable farmers now have a wealth of resources at their disposal, Terra and Mike Brownback had to learn on the job. “We both grew up in suburbia,” Terra says.

As an idealistic couple with a vision of living off the land, they wanted “to save the world, [and] to farm environmentally,” so in 1978 they purchased the farm. But they soon found they had little knowledge of how they would actually make that vision a reality. Sustainable agriculture networks, such as the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture (PASA), didn’t exist yet, and though their neighbors were helpful, they didn’t share the Brownbacks’ vision for ecologically balanced farming.

“We got into farming because of our optimism, [but] we got in over our heads,” Mike says. Beyond that, the 8 pa s a

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property’s 1880s farmhouse was run down, it lacked a bathroom, and critters had taken up residence in it. They had their work cut out for them.

“Our parents had a fit,” Terra says, recalling when the couple broke the news to their families. But the Brownbacks were determined. “We had an 11-month old baby, but we had our dreams.”

They started by raising pigs, having had some success raising feeder pigs from 1973 to 1977 at Mike’s grandmother’s small farm in Montgomery county. For the Brownback’s first 15 years as farmers, through the birth of two more sons, Spiral Path Farm practiced conventional livestock agriculture, raising pigs and cultivating 60 acres of cereal crops that included oats, corn, hay and wheat. With this, the Brownbacks felt economically safe, but they had diverged from their original inspiration to become farmers who didn’t use the chemicals that they found themselves dependent on.

In the early ’90s, they started to question themselves.

“We were approaching 40 and we’re like, ‘When are we gonna have our dream?’” Terra says, recalling their vision to farm environmentally. They had “knowledge of organic, but no concept of how to pay the bills that way,” Mike adds.

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located in

Loysville, pa Approx. people served annually

CSA with more than 2,000 members Major products

more than 50 varieties of usda certified organic vegetables & annual fruits business model

farmers markets, wholesale & CSA

1992

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But even if the kind of agriculture they were practicing didn’t reflect the idealism that inspired them to buy the farm, “We were making a living,” Terra says. “The organic thing felt like jumping off a cliff.” So the couple decided to leave the decision to a coin toss. Heads, they would stay the course. Tails, they would reinvent the farm as an organic produce operation.

“The coin toss said go,” Mike says.

Their business plan was to get out of the pig business and convert the farm to organic agriculture. They attended a workshop on how to operate a CSA at the second annual conference held by PASA. The couple decided to start with five acres of chemical-free vegetables to support the 22 households in the Harrisburg area that signed up for the farm’s first CSA. The change has been a good one. For Terra and Mike, 2013 marked their 20th anniversary as a certified organic CSA farm. The barn has been converted into a packing house where employees load vegetables into half- and fullshare boxes. Those boxes are sent to 40 pick-up sites in Harrisburg; Silver Spring, Maryland; and Bethesda, Maryland, providing food for more than 2,000 households, according to the Brownbacks.

To an outsider, operations on the farm appear slick and professional, and the Brownbacks are adamant that it’s all the result of the same making-it-work approach to business that led them to farm in the first place.

“A lot of this has been seat-of-the-pants and

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unbridled optimism,” Mike says. “It’s not about avoiding the catastrophe—it’s about what are you gonna do when it happens ... because it happens on a daily basis.”

Spiral Path’s story, like many other entrepreneurial ones, includes days where they wanted to quit, and one in particular. “There’s an unparalleled tragedy in our life—losing our son,” Terra says, referring to their eldest son, Arias, who died in 2001 of a heroin overdose at the age of 24.

“The day he died, I had cabbage I had just planted. It was August 11, hotter than hell, and the cabbage was gonna die because it was so hot,” Mike says. “I had to get pipes in that field and get water on them … I just lost my son. I’m not gonna lose the cabbage, too.”

The needs of the farm forced the Brownbacks to put one foot in front of the other in the face of their grief. “In some ways, the farm has held us together,” Terra says.

Arias is memorialized every year at PASA’s annual Farming for the Future Conference. The Arias M. Brownback Memorial Scholarship Fund, founded in 2001, offers small grants to young farmers to facilitate their attendance at the annual conference, is meant to inspire and support young farmers and help them fulfill their potential.

Today, their sons, Will and Lucas, are taking on the mantle of the farm and the CSA operation. Succession planning to formalize the eventual transfer of the farm is one of the few things that the Brownbacks insist does not align with their “seat-of-the-pants” approach.

The family is working to make sure that the transition from their leadership to that of their sons is a smooth one, and with good reason—the farm represents a life’s work of blood, sweat and tears, too.

“We’re getting to the age where we’d both like to have more time to pursue ... other pursuits,” Terra says. “And it’s not seat-of-the-pants.”

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Peterson & ShANER Farms r a ndy sh a ner

Retail Value

Improvising on sales gets to the meat of the business by emily teel • photos by albert yee

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to the Manatawny Creek in Berks County is ideally suited for grassland, and even in Pennsylvania, grassland means cattle. Here Randy Shaner, his father, Bob Shaner, and his cousin, Chad Hoffman, raise grass-based, grain-finished 100 percent Angus cattle on 900 acres located in at the Peterson & Shaner Farms in Douglassville, PA Douglassville, Pennsylvania. he red shale soil sloping down

Approx. people served annually

150 customers Major products

Naturally raised black angus beef business model

Direct sales

2009

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The business, started by Robert Shaner Sr. (Bob’s father, Randy’s grandfather) and his business partner, Edward Peterson, is now in its third generation of operation. It’s the experience that accompanies that longevity that Randy thinks, in part, gave them the confidence to make a challenging business decision to try using an untested commerce model.

When Randy was growing up, his family had a retail shop on the farm. After their cattle was processed and inspected at Smithfield Meats in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, they brought the

whole sides of beef back to the farm, where they butchered and sold the meat in their retail shop. But soon, they found themselves competing with pre-packaged grocery store beef, even if the two products weren’t comparable in quality.

“We had a premium product, but we weren’t getting a premium price,” Randy says. “We started tracking costs and realized we were losing money in the retail store … especially in the summertime when we should be making hay,” he says. Eventually, this spurred the family to close the retail shop. “Your labor is worth money, too,” Randy adds.

The shop’s closing prompted some customers to ask whether the farm could process animals one at a time and freeze the meat for them. “We had enough interest that, in ’93, we started doing freezer halves,” Randy says. A “half” is a side of beef, and the farm’s alternative to operating their shop was to sell their steers by the half and break down halves into portions for customers to store in their freezers, creating their “freezer halves” model.

The farm still sends cattle to be processed and USDA inspected at the slaughterhouse, but it’s returned to their own refrigeration, where it’s dry-aged. A few times a month, customers visit the farm to purchase an entire side of beef—a forequarter, a hindquarter and the rib section, yielding between 350 and 450 pounds of meat—at once (though two to three families often divide up that quantity), for the hanging weight of about $2.55 per pound. About 60 percent of that total weight is what they take home once the bone and fat are removed, so the actual price per pound ends up being about $4. That means $4 per pound of ground beef, for prime rib and for filet. Even the most inexpensive grocery store beef can’t beat that price.

On freezer-half day, a former meat cutter at a Genuardi’s supermarket helps with the butchering. Buying this much beef at once is a big expense, but families get a major price break from what a similar quantity of beef would cost at a supermarket; and because they’re face-to-face with their butcher, they can specify what cuts they want.

The farm benefits, too. They only butcher cattle that they know they’ll be able to sell, and the direct-sale model is increasingly popular. “We did about 12 the first year, now we’re up to about 70,” Randy says. His father, Bob, is encouraged. “The opportunity in agriculture has never been better,” he says. “It’s such an exciting, positive time.”

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Salem Mountain FarmS sa m a nd br i a n fox

located in

Waymart, PA Approx. people served annually

2 summer farmers’ markets per week / 1 winter farmers market per week Major products

Garlic, Asparagus, Salad greens, carrots, beets, radishes, turnips business model

farmers markets, direct sales to customers And restaurants, Wholesale & CSA (beginning this year)

2002

was going to be a challenge.

“We didn’t want to take on debt to start the farm,” says Sam, whose family includes three young children. “If I was by myself, or if it were just my wife and I, it would be different. But when you have a couple kids, you need to have the steady income.” Though Sam and his family live on a property down the road from the farm, he works a day job at a Walmart distribution center. When people ask why he doesn’t just “go farm,” he brings up the unpredictability aspect. “We could have a rainstorm and lose everything, and then what do I do?” In the meantime, Sam bides his time farming on weekends, hoping that at some point he’ll be able to focus on farming full-time.

Brian, too, has worn two hats. From 2005 through 2007, for the first several seasons of their fledgling agricultural operation, he continued to work as a graphic designer in Washington, D.C. Every Thursday night during the season, he would drive 4.5 hours from the city to the farm. “Friday, Saturday and Sunday, we’d slam in 2,500 bales of hay, I’d jump in the car at 8 p.m., drive back to D.C. and recover at my desk job,” he says. In 2008, the brothers bought their beef cattle and Brian transitioned into full-time farming, although he still moonlights as a graphic designer in the off season.

Brian and Sam are definitely still working long hours, nce

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Their Own Design Brothers change the blueprint of their family farm by emily teel • photos by albert yee

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were raised on a conventional dairy farm in Northeastern Pennsylvania, Brian Fox took a completely different career path before realizing that he’d rather be farming. Brian spent his days as a graphic designer in Washington, D.C., before delving full-time into tending vegetables and cultivating garlic. But ask him today what he thinks of swapping a desk job for this and it’s clear he made the right move: “I’d rather be this kind of worn-out.” hough he and his brother, Sam,

The brothers own Salem Mountain Farm in Waymart, Pennsylvania. Sam had always had the agricultural dream, but their parents ended the dairy operation in the 1970s. He and Brian knew that starting their own agricultural business, even if it was on the family land,

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So you wanna be a farmer... but they’ve made an investment in those early days that is now paying off.

When they started, they began with planting a few hundred dollars’ worth of garlic, a crop that’s relatively low-maintenance, but has high value at harvest time. In the beginning, Brian says they didn’t have any way to sell it, so they just kept replanting it. “Within three years, we were planting 500 pounds,” he says. That multiplication of an initial investment has been a good one.

Even if they sell three-quarters of their finished garlic to a wholesaler, the remaining seed garlic would cost them about $7,000 if they had to buy it now. Currently, they sell most of their garlic to a wholeasaler in New York, but they’re looking into the possibility of making a value-added product with it—possibly pickled garlic.

Their lean, dynamic 115-acre farm also includes an array of vegetables, 40 acres of hay, grass-fed beef cattle, egg-laying hens and a few pigs. The brothers are still trying to hone in on their best business strategies. They do two farmers markets a week during the summer and one during the winter, and they’re toying with the idea of offering community supported agriculture (CSA) shares. The money they get for wholesaling the garlic gives them enough to keep farm operations going. “[But] we’re not

Before you bet the farm on buying the farm, consider this advice:

quite rich yet,” Brian says, laughing, adding that it’s not about the money.

“You have to want to farm—honest to god, it is a vow of poverty,” he adds. “We’re not making tremendous money here, but we’re making enough to keep going. We’re pay-as-you-go, if we can’t pay for it now, we don’t do it.”

Sam agrees that many new farmers convince themselves that they need more than they actually do. “[They’ll say] ‘If we only had a bigger tractor, we’d be able to make more money’ and that’s the lie that farmers get into.” (At Salem Mountain, the newest tractor is from 1976, and they paid cash for it just a few years ago.)

Mostly, they’re trying to take the process one season at a time, and not get ahead of themselves.

It’s a time of challenges, but also of possibility.

“You have to be an optimist to be a farmer or to be an entrepreneur,” Brian says. “The farm will take every bit of work and money you throw into it. … I usually say that I want to quit at nighttime, but in the morning I say, ‘Let’s do this.’”

Asked whether or not he misses the predictability of a day job, Brian laughs.

“I miss the paycheck,” he says. “But I don’t miss taking anybody’s bull----, and the bull--- that I do deal with I can compost and put on the vegetables.”

Be flexible:

You may find that, once you begin your operation, your best laid plans need to be rethought. Keep your mind open about revenue streams you may not have considered.

Be financially smart: There are going to be circumstances that are out of your control, but budgeting can help prevent your plan from being derailed.

“There’s a lot of hidden costs. … Count your costs every step of the way,” advises Randy Shaner of Peterson & Shaner Farms.

Value yourself:

Ben Wenk of Three Springs Fruit Farm says to compensate yourself for your time. “Your time is worth something,” he says. “If you are not budgeting for your time you’re going to be completely exhausted and penniless.”

Rest:

It’s not all work and no play. “Take your day off when you can, and cultivate another interest besides the farm,” says Terra Brownback of Spiral Path Farm.

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BUCK RUN FARM, COATESVILLE, PA

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Look for items labeled from around here to find products grown, raised or crafted within 100 miles (or so) as the crow flies.

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