COVID-19, undoubtedly, impacts all of us—our communities, our businesses, our families, our farms, our schools. Our team at Food Connects is fortunate enough to still be in full operation, albeit under very challenging circumstances. We’re telecommuting, leveraging community partnerships to feed families, and hitting local food sales records.

But what does it look like with our boots on the ground? And how is our team coping with this new reality? This is your opportunity to get to know our staff, professionally and personally, and find out how COVID-19 has changed our lives.

Farm to School

Conor, Farm to School Program Manager

In April our work with schools took a brief pause while teachers and administrations figured out what the rest of the year would look like. In the meantime, community collaborations quickly sprung up and our work with the Hunger Council intensified. By the end of April, most school FTS teams were meeting virtually as well, so things got fairly busy. We're continuing to support schools but also have a larger community organizing role now. I'm looking forward to a little bit less screen time this summer!

We've been working with the Windham Southeast School District (WSESD), the Vermont Foodbank, and Foodworks on the weekend foodbox program through the schools. We're also a part of the team piloting a new aid program in Brattleboro before it goes statewide. It focuses on putting restaurants to work feeding the food insecure in our community. Both are really exciting, but also true collaborations with all the messiness that accompanies them.

There's been a big emphasis on community and a collective reevaluation of what matters most. While not all our new habits and collaborations will continue beyond the pandemic, I'm hoping that the most important and strongest ones will stick.

I've picked up mountain biking which has gotten me outside a lot more! I've been reading a lot more and have an ambitious stack of books queued up as well. My partner and I recently went on a camping trip where we did nothing but hammock, read, and swim. 

I'm grateful to be able to work for an organization that has a direct role to play in our collective response to the pandemic.

Sheila, Farm to School Coordinator

We are focused on supporting school nutrition professionals in adapting to the many changes that have occurred in school meals due to school closures, coming up with creative ways to address increased food insecurity for families in our community like the food box program, supporting Farm to School teams with garden planning this spring, and writing lots of articles to help tell the story of all the amazing work that is happening in our schools during these unusual times.

My hope is that our communities will come out of this experience stronger and with a better sense of what it takes to care for each other and nourish families in our community. I think people are more aware than ever of the important role that school nutrition professionals play in feeding our youth, and of the importance of a thriving local food system that is accessible to all.

I've been working from home rather than going into the office and balancing work with supporting my 12-year-old daughter with remote learning. It feels like a lot to manage! In my spare time, I am cooking a lot and spending lots of time with my husband, my daughter, and our 2 cats. I have become even more devoted to long daily walks and my circus classes (now online), and I am strengthening my meditation practice.

I have been actively seeking out beauty during my daily walks and photographing what I see, I am journaling more often, and my daughter and I are gathering rocks from the river and painting them with messages of hope and healing and scattering them on the hiking trails near our home.

I'm grateful for my health, my family, the opportunity to do meaningful work at Food Connects, and the joy that I find from spending time outside in nature and listening to music that I love.

Food Hub 

Nathanael, Food Hub Operations and Fleet Coordinator

Since the COVID-19 epidemic hit the United States and New England, our sales volume has increased significantly at the Food Hub. This gave us the opportunity to hire more drivers and staff to help the Food Hub operate more efficiently and smoothly—a hugely positive thing for us. In terms of safety, we are implementing many new precautions—adding a bit of time to some of our routines. 

Currently, I'm researching information about another vehicle to add to our fleet. Our sales and delivery volume has gone up greatly over the past year, and even faster during the COVID 19 period, and we are running out of capacity to move local products. We're looking at a medium-sized truck to add to our fleet—something in between the Sprinter and the Freightliner sizes.

The pandemic gave the Food Hub a new opportunity to tangibly help our local community—whether that be the farms that we purchase from or the people who end up consuming the food we deliver. COVID-19 has really highlighted why short supply chains are so critical for food supply safety and continuity. I believe some of the upswings in sales we experienced will stick, even after the pandemic subsides. People appreciate what we do and the service we provide. In addition to these things, I believe our community has come together during this tough time to support each other.  

I've been busier than ever at Food Connects. We've hired a few new drivers and employees in the past few months, which allowed me to step away from some of the driving duties and focus on some other Operations tasks and projects, which is fun. My family lost our child care option for the spring and summer, which makes running our own small farm incredibly challenging. It's been stressful, but we're doing what we can to continue growing and selling local veggies for our community. It certainly feels more important than ever to continue doing so. 

I've been taking a few more hikes with my son, who is now getting old enough for such things. And of course, catching up on some house and farm work.

I'm so grateful for my wonderful wife and family, who have supported me through all of this change at the Food Hub, and are proud to see me out there supporting local farms and the community. I'm grateful for my Food Hub colleagues who are, without exception, amazing to work with through this challenging time. A weaker organization might struggle with this kind of new pressure, but I feel it provides us a way to come together and collectively figure out a way to meet each challenge on a day to day basis. It's truly an amazing place to work.  

I'm so thankful for Food Connects and glad to be an integral part of the local food system. It's truly an honor and feels like a meaningful pursuit. Not all people are fortunate enough to have such meaningful work. Hopefully, if anything positive comes out of this situation, it will be to highlight meaningful work for everyone and potentially shake up the system to allow more people to have these kinds of opportunities.  

Mary, Food Hub Driver

As one of Food Connects newest hires for the summer season, I wouldn't be working for this organization if it weren't for COVID-19. As a result of the global pandemic I, along with all of Peace Corps 7,200+ volunteers, was evacuated halfway through my two-year service with the Peace Corps in Jamaica. Although a big change I am thrilled to be working for such an impactful community organization here in Southern VT!

I am grateful every day for my health, the health of my friends and family, the opportunity to be back in VT, and enjoying the state's gorgeous outdoors and to be working on such a wonderful team here at Food Connects! 

Alex, Food Hub Manager

I’m almost entirely focused on simply keeping up! As someone recently told us, the COVID-19 emergency has "lubricated" the wheels of the local food system, including at Food Connects. Local foods are in greater demand than ever for a lot of reasons, I think, including the fact that local and regional supply chains are able to bounce back and adapt relatively fast. Our sales of local foods are up, on average, between 2 and 3 times what they were last year at this time. For those of us working behind the scenes to interact with customers, maintain supply chains, and physically move the food from points A to B to C, all that means we have our work cut out for us to keep the wheels turning.

This means fewer projects and more daily responses. But, though we're behind as a result of the shift in attention, we're still pressing forward with updating our distribution and sales software system. We're also working on putting together export programs for Vermont cheeses and other specialty goods. Other food hubs around New England and the East Coast are in a similar situation—scrambling to keep up, scrambling to find supply, and introducing new products for their rapidly expanding customer base. We're trying to figure out how to help Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts products make it into those broader supply chains. 

This state of emergency is the best chance that we've had to prove what local and regional food systems can do, and it's a kick in the pants for us and others to "grow up," and grow up fast.

Working from home has blurred a lot of lines, but often in a good way—my 18-month old son is a bigger part of my weekdays than he was before COVID-19, even if that means just listening to him talking up a storm downstairs. And. after years of neglect, I've gotten back into cycling, to the point of mild addiction. We're also really enjoying spending a lot of energy on preparing memorable meals at home. 

I'm grateful for the Food Connects team who've given so much of themselves to the work of boosting local foods over the last few months. It's been a difficult time in many, many ways, but I'm very happy to see that Food Connects and the food system will, hopefully, emerge stronger than ever. 

McKenna, Food Hub Operations Manager

My work as the Operations Manager with the Food Hub is much more intense; the stakes are higher both in terms of sales and customer expectations, but more importantly to me, in regards to keeping our staff safe and advocating for their needs to do this important work. We didn't stop during COVID-19, and continue to work hard to support our community. This requires our operations team to come into the warehouse everyday and for our drivers to be out and about picking up products and making deliveries even through the most intense periods of COVID-19. We implemented much stricter sanitation and safety protocols, and figured out how to adjust and manage immense growth on the fly, a hard enough task on its own, while also in the midst of the pandemic. 

We hired three new employees to help us keep up, and will probably need to hire more as the busy season approaches. I am working on systems development to help ease hiring and training burdens as well as organizational development as our team continues to grow. We quickly developed more efficient operational systems, both in our cooler and vehicles, to increase the capacity of products that we can handle and safely distribute. We only moved into our new cooler space in November, and are quickly learning the best ways to utilize it most effectively—we are not afraid to test out new ideas and adjust in real time.  

In a very strange way, the universe gave us a chance to step up and serve our community— to put our money where our mouth is and really prove the importance of our work. We always talk about the importance of local food and regional food and community systems, but this experience is putting that to the test. We provided food to our customers when larger, broadline distribution systems were struggling or focusing on serving their bigger, urban customers and we helped our producers pivot to access new markets. The pandemic has shone a very bright spotlight on the importance of resilient community and regional systems, especially food systems. 

My personal life has slowed down and become much more intentional. The weeks are high intensity, so I use the weekends to really decompress and hang out. It has been nice not having plans every single weekend and is a habit I will take with me into post COVID life-19. 

I recently purchased my first home and it has been fun working on house projects and setting up our gardens. We also recently rescued a dog—his name is Timer, he is 8 months old and loves to lounge in the sun just like me! 

I'm so grateful to live in Vermont and belong to this community! I am also grateful for the incredible team I get to work with here at Food Connects, I continue to be amazed and inspired by each and every one of my coworkers. 

My parting thought: Local Food is an Essential Service! 

Admin

Laura, Development & Communications Manager

It’s been a strange few months since we received “stay-at-home” orders. I’ve transitioned telecommuting from my home in Keene, NH. I am fortunate to have the ability to do so with my work. As the COVID-19 pandemic was hitting our region, we were midway through a fundraising campaign focusing on improving food safety and market access for farmers. Thanks to the immense support of our community, we were able to exceed our goal.

And our communications work is now a mix of “business-as-usual” and new storytelling opportunities. We always share content supporting our local businesses and food access. Now we are in overdrive making sure we promote these programs and businesses, ensuring that the community has access to these resources and these businesses continue to flourish. We’ve pivoted some of our fundraising efforts to support unique challenges each program faces, we’ve worked to implement and promote a curbside pickup program for individual households, and I even did a stint working on sales for the Food Hub!

The pandemic is impacting our local food system in many ways. While there are more restrictions on farmers’ markets and restaurants are closing, we are seeing buying clubs form and farmstands and CSAs thrive. I hope that the support for local food and businesses, home gardening, and self resiliency continues after life gets back to “normal,” it’s actually been inspiring to see. Another silver lining? My work-life balance has significantly improved!

Transitioning to working from home was hard. I am extremely active in the local theater community and all 5 shows I was involved with were canceled or postponed. Since I’m home all day I’ve had a lot of time to recenter and focus on self-care. My gardens are thriving and I’m already working on preservation for the fall. I’m continuing to work out and have taken up boxing. And, I added two kittens to my home, Basil and Jenkins, courtesy of Karen! 

As an extrovert, I’ve had to find new ways to stay connected and I’m grateful for those opportunities. I’ve had socially distanced BBQ’s, participated in virtual Lions Club meetings, written letters to friends, and continue to reach out and stay connected. I’m also extremely grateful for the flexibility of my team while I, virtually, teach culinary and theater classes at a local summer arts camp.

Karen Sprague, HR Coordinator/Full Charge Booker

Like my colleagues mentioned, our sales continue to increase. For me, that means the number of receivables and payables increase. I am working towards a bigger push towards ACH payments for our customers to easily make their payments. I’m educating myself to understand the restrictions and guidelines for business operations. It’s a lot of work keeping up with Government COVID-19 funding and protocols. And mostly, I miss seeing ALL of my co-workers in person and our chats in the hallways. 

I believe that because of COVID-19 there is now an increase in awareness of where food and other durable products come from. I hope this continues. 

Although my part-time work for Food Connects was not impacted in a negative way, my farmstand/retail sugarhouse business was closed and the financial impact was and will continue to be substantial until the country re-opens and people feel comfortable.

Because the farmstand was closed, I actually decreased the amount of baking (my biggest hobby) as the outlet for the sales was unavailable. Living on a farm, I am just spending more time cleaning and caring for the animals.

I am grateful that I live in an area that was not greatly impacted and my family and friends are all healthy.

And I want to congratulate ALL Food Connects staff. The Food Hub Team for working hard through this pandemic with positive attitudes as we increased our customer base and our local food producers. The Farm to School team for continuing to build strong relationships with local schools as they moved to bag lunches versus cafeteria lunches. Marketing and Communications for creating a continuous line of communication with the public in regards to the great work Food Connects is involved in with the pandemic. And our Executive Director, Richard, for leading us through this and continuing to find additional revenue sources, so that we may continue to grow and strengthen.