By Kristen Thompson & Tom Brewton
Killington Grand Resort Hotel distributes local food to employees as part of their employee food box program.
Last month, we told you about our collaboration with up-and-coming food hub Vermont Farmers Food Center (VFFC) to bring local food boxes to Killington Grand Resort Hotel (KGRH) employees. We talked to Heidi Lynch, Executive Director of the VFFC, about their work and the value and impact of this collaboration. We also spoke to Greg Lang, Executive Chef at KGRH, about the impetus and impact of this project at the hotel. Check out the conversation below.
Can you tell us more about VFFC?
Employees pack shares for VFFC customers at the VFFC food hub.
Heidi: “Our mission is to relocalize the food system through increased food access and infrastructure. We’re located in downtown Rutland with a 2.93-acre campus on an old industrial plate. Our programs include our Farmacy project, a produce prescription program based on the idea of “food as medicine.” We have an educational program called FaBLE for farm-based experiential learning and two additional farm-to-market food access programs. Then there’s our Wholesale Food Program, where we work with producers to link them with restaurants and other entities.
We were founded in 2012, so we’re celebrating our ten-year anniversary!”
How was the employee food box idea brought to life, and how many years has it been happening?
KGRH employees pick up gift bags from the resort during COVID-19.
Greg: “Through COVID-19, we started to think of ways we could help our employees deal with everyday situations and knew everyone was struggling out there. And we have our Play Forever Commitment [to protect the environment and support our community] here at Killington Resort. Amy Laramie, [Director of Brand Marketing, Events and Special Projects,] spearheaded that. We started doing gift bags for employees and buying products for those from our main distributors.
As we went through COVID-19 and everyone was getting back on their feet, we still wanted to help everyone out. And we’re always looking to do things that are local and sustainable. Our team, led by Amy, wanted to reach out to regional distributors. That’s where I got involved and started reaching out to Food Connects and local farms. I was first in touch with Andrew Graham [from NOFA-VT], and we talked about it.
KGRH staff distribute food boxes to fellow employees.
We started thinking about putting together a local CSA for our staff. Our boss, Scott Harrison, [Director of Hospitality,] also suggested we work with Heidi and Tom on a more local level—that they could help with delivering and local sourcing since they’re already connected with everyone and already know everyone.
Local producers are going through a hard time. We do a lot with local ingredients in our restaurants already. Doing a CSA for our staff was an extension of our efforts to help local farmers, as well.
We set up to do four food boxes over the summer. We’ve done two so far. Now we’re looking at how the program is working and seeing how it’s working and what we can do better.”
What made you decide to work with Food Connects and VFFC?
KGRH staff unbox Miller Farm milk.
Greg: “We’ve already done some work with VFFC in the past with some of the [gift] bags we did through COVID-19. So Scott Harrison, who’s the Director of Hospitality, it was his wish to go through [VFFC and Food Connects] because they already have relationships with the farms and know what is out there.
If, for whatever reason, I’m telling Tom [at Food Connects] that I’m looking for 600 ears of corn that I’m going to need, and the farm I’m looking to buy it from their crop is done for the season, he can help us. And if the product isn’t looking as good of quality, they’ll tell us and help us find someone else to buy from. It made the food box program a much easier service to onboard.”
What excites you about this partnership between KGRH, Food Connects, and VFFC?
Tomatoes and garlic at the VFFC food hub.
Heidi: “Everybody is choosing to act from shared values and not just load off the costs. We’re building from the soil up. How cool is it that Killington Resort has the capacity to make those choices and take those actions?!”
Why prioritize local?
Greg: “We do an awful lot to support our local farmers, and we just feel it's the correct thing to do, the right thing to do. Rather than bringing something in from Mexico, Chile, and so forth, why wouldn’t we bring something in that was made locally and is fresh? The carbon footprint we eliminate is huge.”
What feedback has KGRH received from the 250 employees who have received these food boxes?
Greg: “They loved the variety of the product… They appreciated that we did it at a local level. They really appreciated that they were able to get local corn, local tomatoes, local zucchini, and local squash.”
What did VFFC learn from Food Connects throughout this process that you can take back and apply to VFFC’s work in food distribution?
Heidi: “What was really cool in this process was that Food Connects has been doing this work in a more sophisticated way, and we’re still very formative. There’s a generation of mature Food Hubs in Vermont that have already been operating and collaborating. We’re part of the more emergent ones that haven’t done this in this capacity, with this scale of distribution and larger collaborations.
Farmers deliver produce to the VFFC food hub.
These new food hubs are filling in geographic gaps and other kinds of gaps where food hubs already were. We’re kicking into gear. As our community is turning to us—producers, community members, buyers, farmers—we’re figuring out how to do this. We learned so much technical assistance and got to work together and learn alongside Food Connects in this collaboration.
We came together to work with Killington. Killington valued the diversity of products from Food Connects and the localness of VFFC. Food Connects brought a scale of product, and VFFC brought small producer support.
VFFC employees hard at work in the food hub.
Working with [Food Connects’ Food Hub Director] McKenna Hayes to determine delivery drop time, whether trucks line up with loading dock heights, and who’s available to unload—VFFC does all that but doesn’t do it in as advanced a way. Now we can have that already in mind when we have our own delivery vehicle. We’re hoping to do cross-docking* with Food Connects in the future and got the opportunity to start thinking about that.”
*Cross-Docking refers to when a product is dropped off and picked up from a third-party location between its starting point and final destination without entering into the third party's recorded inventory.
Anything else you’d like to share with us?
Greg: “I certainly hope we can continue to do the program to support our staff and local farmers. Killington Resort is always looking for ways to support local efforts.”
Heidi: “I’m excited for what this next era looks like of connecting more producers in the more far reaches of the community or working at a different scale, what it looks like to link them with these possibilities, and what that will inspire more people to grow. We need producers and growers to keep plugging in for all this to keep growing and to get food to all the places in the community where people eat.”