Market Mobile: a giant leap for RI farms, chefs and schools
The first ever Market Mobile online order just happened this Wednesday, January 7. How it works: chefs order from farms online on Wednesdays and then farmers bring the orders to the Wintertime Farmers’ Market on Saturdays. From the market, one truck will make deliveries to each customer, which will save a lot of time and gas and contribute to our goal of a more efficient local food system. Most of the farmers already sell at the Wintertime Farmers’ Market. So the Market Mobile offers another sales outlet for little extra effort, and it will offer chefs and schools a market’s worth of local food via a simple order form. We’re also holding Farm-to-Chef Tours every Saturday in January and February 10:30am to 11:30am at the market so that chefs can meet farmers and become familiar with their products before placing an order. E-mail Jen for more info or to take part!
9 farmers and producers participated this first week. Aquidneck Farms beef was a big hit, as were littlenecks from Matunuck Oyster Farm, which just had a great feature in the Projo. Also available were Farmacy Herbs; Hill Orchards; Narragansett Creamery; Baby Greens; Blackbird Farm; Bomster Scallops; New Harvest Coffee. And there are even more producers that will be on next week’s order.
3 chefs participated this first week. Chef Dave of Local 121 has the distinction of placing the first order! Many kudos to Chef Beau of New Rivers and Chef Matt of Chez Pascal, who round out the first set of Market Mobile customers. It’s thanks to chefs like these that RI farmers are able to keep producing honest, flavorful food. They get it.
Many other farms, chefs and schools are very interested and will be joining the Market Mobile pilot program over the next few weeks. Despite the winter, as more farms join on we expect greater selection of veggies, herbs, meats, breads and other staples over the next few weeks. The Market Mobile project is starting off in a pilot phase and so currently delivers to the Providence area only. If successful, we hope to have delivery routes to the rest of RI by late summer.
A bit of background: Creating an online farm-to-business sales network was actually one of the first projects that Farm Fresh took on back in 2005. We realized soon after we set this goal that it was a bit too ambitious. So instead we focused our efforts on the online farm guide, which was a much better first step at re-connecting local farms and local businesses. In 2009, the Market Mobile builds on the farm guide’s infrastructure (and our offline experience with markets and the Market Basket program). We’re finally ready, and we’re really excited for this summer when the Market Mobile orders will be overflowing with colorful veggies and fruit galore.