Food Connects has so much to celebrate! Not only are we celebrating 10 years of Food Connects, but 2022 was a successful year for our Farm to School and Food Hub programs. We are so grateful to our community for your continued support for Food Connects and our local food economy. Check out our 2022 Annual Report today!
2021 Food Connects Annual Report
Hot off the presses: Food Connects 2021 Annual Report!
Food Connects has so much to celebrate! 2021 was a successful year for our Farm to School and Food Hub programs—we saw tremendous growth and have some great stories to share with you. We are so grateful to our community for your continued support for Food Connects and our local food economy. Check out our 2021 Annual Report today!
2020 Food Connects Annual Report
Hot off the presses: Food Connects 2020 Annual Report!
2020 was a strange year for everyone. And despite the uncertainties and challenges we faced, Food Connects has much to celebrate—from new initiatives and partnerships to innovative Farm to School programming and record Food Hub sales growth. We are so grateful to our community for your continued support for Food Connects and our local food economy.
Keeping Our Families Fed
Farm to School Cafe and Food Connects Feed Families Throughout the Holiday Season
Families in the Windham Northeast Supervisory Union (WNESU) received three free food boxes over the holiday break thanks to the tireless efforts of the Farm to School Cafe staff and farmers throughout the region. The food boxes contained a week’s worth of bulk meal ingredients for breakfast and lunch to help stretch families’ grocery budgets and keep students nourished over the long break. The Farm to School Cafe reached out to Food Connects to fill those boxes as much as possible with high-quality foods from local producers, including fresh NH-made bread, VT cheese and produce, and fresh fruit.
Thanks to numerous USDA waivers in response to COVID-19, universal free meals have been in effect nationwide since last March and schools have been operating under the Summer Food Service Program—which provides higher reimbursement rates per meal for schools. These two changes combined translate to easy to access meals for all students and a reliable revenue stream for school nutrition programs. The holiday food boxes extended that support through the break, all students qualified for this program—each family simply filled out a form for each student so the Farm to School Cafe team knew how much food to order.
“We were inspired by the Burlington School Food Project who blazed the trail on these meal kits,” says Harley Sterling, School Nutrition Director for the WNESU. “And grateful to the Vermont Agency of Education who has been incredibly supportive in developing this program.”
“Many students rely on school meal programs for both nutritious breakfasts and lunches each day during school,” says Conor Floyd, Food Connects Farm to School Program Manager. “When school is not in session, however, a gap in access to nutritious and filling food appears. Programs like the holiday food boxes allow all students in the supervisory union to have the same access to meals throughout school breaks, no matter their family’s income level.”
With increased meal flexibility as a result of the USDA waivers mentioned above, school nutrition programs have piloted new programs, including sending bulk ingredients home with students over extended breaks. These pilots often involve quick turnaround times and last-minute requests. Food Connects’ short supply chain and strong relationships with its producers helped the Farm to School Cafe access source-identified products from VT, NH, and MA on short notice.
"We're just thrilled that these universal meals programs allowed us to give kids and families in our community a little boost, especially this time of year,” says Sterling. “Making sure every kid has access to the great food grown and made in our area has always been our goal, and Food Connects makes it easy by letting us know what products are available and bringing them right to our kitchens."
With less than two weeks between the initial phone call from Sterling and the first delivery, the newly expanded Food Hub team sprang into action. The Food Connects Sales and Procurement Teams worked with Harley to brainstorm and source a variety of food products that:
families would eat but also inspire fun and new cooking ideas,
fell within the required price range,
were kid-friendly and easy for parents to cook, and
were hyper-local—the farthest items traveled only 87 miles while 7 of the 10 farms that provided food are located within 25 miles of Bellows Falls Union High School.
Once the orders were placed, the Food Connects Operations Team activated their network of dedicated drivers and expanded delivery fleet to pick up and deliver these orders—all while navigating their regular order and sales cycle to customers and capping off a record-breaking year in sales with Food Connects’ largest pre-Christmas delivery weeks ever. Although the Food Hub was closed for regular sales during the week of Christmas, the Food Hub staff generously volunteered to pick up extra shifts to ensure the orders made it to Bellows Falls Union High School in time for the Holiday Meal box distribution.
As the Farm to Cafe team kept families fed throughout the holiday season, they also bolstered the local food economy—buying food from 10 Food Connects farms and food producers: Basin Farm, Champlain Orchards, Dutton Berry Farm, Grafton Village Cheese, Green Mountain Orchards, Harlow Farm, Mi Tierra Tortillas, The Bread Shed, Valley Veg, and Yalla Vermont. Over $19,000 was spent at these local food businesses. “This is money that is going straight back into the community,” says McKenna Hayes, Food Connects Food Hub Co-Director, “being paid out to area producers and distribution staff, who in turn use those funds at other local businesses.”
So what did families actually receive? 2,100 pounds of potatoes, 852 quarts of yogurt, about 6,000 apples, 600 pints of cider, 180 bunches of kale, 1,100 loaves of bread, 600 bags of frozen blueberries, 1,416 pounds of carrots, 300 tubs of hummus, 400 blocks of cheese, and 300 tortilla packets.
Every box contained food as well as ideas for how to use it—providing students and families with educational tools to make easy, wholesome meals. “We sent out little educational activity sheets with simple recipes that anyone can do with just water and a microwave,” says Sterling. “From kale chips and cheese ("Mayan sandwich") quesadillas to baked potatoes and English muffin pizzas.”
“This is a great example of how our organization can collaboratively problem-solve to help our community,” says Hayes. “Harley relied on his partnership with our Farm to School and Food Hub teams and we leveraged our community-based networks and short supply chains to respond to the request quickly. It truly shows the successful ability to pivot school lunch services in the COVID-19 era.”
January 2021 Quarterly Newsletter
2020 Reflections from the Executive Director
What's Been Cooking in 2020?
Growing Markets for Local Dairy
2020 Reflections from the Executive Director
Wow! What a year behind us, and who knows what is in store for 2021. What we do know at Food Connects is that we are all grateful to have jobs and meaningful work and that our community needs us more than ever during this pandemic and with the disruption to the food system.
We are excited to share and celebrate with the community that we nearly doubled revenue in 2020, including $1 million of local food sales! That means more dollars in the hands of farmers in our communities in VT, NH, and MA and more dollars recirculating back into the local economy. We extend our deepest thanks to our farmers, food producers, wholesale customers, and our community for their widespread support!
I am so grateful to the Food Connects team, which grew from 12 employees at the start of 2020 to 21 employees! I am so impressed with both the current staff in how they onboarded and trained the new team while doing their jobs, as well as the new team in adapting and getting up to speed quickly during the challenging times of COVID-19.
We continue to push hard on using our aggregation and distribution Food Hub to transform the regional food system. During the winter months, we are looking forward to bringing in source-identified food from real farms that may not fit everyone’s definition of local. What might be considered provocative, we see value in supporting local farms and supply chains that share our values of transparency, caring for the environment and people. Many of us are asking ourselves, “Would you rather eat broccoli from a family farm in North Carolina or a corporate farm in California?” and many of us are answering the former. Now it’s our job to figure out the logistics of making that happen and how that fits into our work ahead!
We continue to play a leadership role in strengthening the entire food system, knowing that a larger effort is needed outside of our current programming. Our strong, sector-spanning relationships have proved crucial to the success of many of these conversations, and our ability to connect schools, farms, local businesses, and charitable food organizations has been a keystone in the region’s response to COVID-19. Programs we were involved with sprung up quickly; ranging from small, focused efforts such as the Weekend Food Boxes, to statewide initiatives like Everyone Eats! which first piloted in Brattleboro. As we head into the new year, reflection and thoughtful planning is a priority. We plan to convene a community dialogue, providing the space to breathe and think collectively about how to capitalize on and improve the new partnerships and systems which have sprung up over the past year.
Our Farm to School program has developed a larger emphasis on food security in response to the pandemic, while still ensuring that robust farm, food, and nutrition education is supported in our schools. In the spring, we focused on ensuring gardens were planted and fully utilized as a refuge for families and students. This fall, we worked closely with administrators and food service directors applying for Coronavirus Relief Funding, maximizing the resources our local schools received.
This all of this means is that we are starting off 2021 with a bang and a clear focus on doing more of what is important towards our vision of Healthy Families, Thriving Farms, and Connected Communities.
- Richard Berkfield, Executive Director
Food Connects Raises Over $10,000 to Expand Local Food Markets
Food Connects successfully completed our “Growing Local Food Markets in the Monadnock Region” campaign. This campaign, run through the Local Crowd Monadnock, focused on improving the Food Connects Food Hub’s internal infrastructure to expand market access for their local farmers and food producers.
Thanks to the generosity of over 70 different individuals, Food Connects raised $10,850 by April 18. Additionally, community shoppers at the Monadnock Food Co-op and Hannah Grimes Marketplace supported this campaign through sales promotions and customer round-ups. “We are incredibly humbled and grateful for the generosity of our community,” says Richard Berkfield, Executive Director. “We continue to see an outpouring of support for our local food economy and we want to thank all of our community supporters and partners for their commitment to local food during this time.”
The funds raised through this campaign go towards Food Connects’ food safety program and delivery infrastructure. As Food Connects grows and improves its internal systems it can access larger wholesale markets, allowing the 70+ local food producers they work with to sell their products on a larger scale, supporting individual business growth goals and creating a more resilient local food economy.
“Picadilly Farm works with Food Connects to extend our farm sales to regional buyers throughout Windham and Cheshire Counties,” says Jenny Wooster, co-owner of Picadilly Farm. “Their work is great for connecting farms and local producers with local schools, local institutions, and local stores. We're lucky to have Food Connects as part of the food security network here.”
Connecting farmers and local food producers to wholesale customers is no small feat. The Food Hub team is working hard to manage the growing demand for local food and saw a record sales week in early April—normally one of the slowest months of the year. The internal infrastructure of Food Connects’ systems is critical to supporting successful market growth. To improve systems, the team implemented an Integrated Pest Management Program and purchased warehouse storage shelving, color-coded transport boxes, allergen and warehouse cleaning supplies, and SKU guns, with more equipment to be purchased with the successful completion of the campaign.
“The funds from this campaign will have a major impact on our day-to-day operations,” says McKenna Hayes, Food Hub Operations Manager. “We will gain operational efficiencies, purchase the required equipment, and formally integrate food safety procedures and record-keeping into our distribution systems.”
The entire Food Connects team would like to thank the community for their support of local food during these trying times. If you would like to learn more about how you can help improve the local food economy or volunteer opportunities, please contact info@foodconnects.org.
Food Connects Closes in on $10,000
Food Connects is now over 75% of the way to its crowdfunding goal of $10,000 for ourr “Growing Local Food Markets in the Monadnock Region” campaign. This campaign, run through the Local Crowd Monadnock, aims to increase market access for local farmers and food producers.
Thanks to the generosity of over 50 donors, Food Connects raised $7,741 as of March 31. These funds will go towards implementing the first steps in Food Connects newly optimized food safety plan—covering the cost of the food safety certification and audit, the monthly fees for the Integrated Pest Management Program, staff training, and necessary cleaning and transportation supplies.
A large portion of these funds was raised through the Monadnock Food Co-op’s Round It Up program for March. Co-op customers had the opportunity to round up their change at the register for this campaign, resulting in $4,341.19. “We are so grateful for the incredible generosity of the community at the Monadnock Food Co-op,” says Richard Berkfield, Food Connects’ Executive Director. “These funds will help Food Connects develop the necessary infrastructure needed to sell to larger wholesale customers.”
The outbreak of COVID-19 has heightened the need for and awareness of supporting the local food economy. “Now, more than ever, it is important to strengthen our local food businesses,” says Berkfield. “Many food producers are seeing a loss of sales due to college and restaurant closures. Our campaign focuses on developing current and new markets to ensure that there is a broad and diverse set of customers always available to purchase local food. Resilient local food economies can weather the storm.”
Despite the COVID-19 outbreak, Food Connects is continuing on with its local food delivery. “The last three weeks we’ve seen a 50-80% increase in our local food sales,” says Alex McCullough, Food Hub Manager. “We are delivering food to local co-ops and markets, hospitals, school meal programs, and buying clubs in record numbers. This diverse group of customers is allowing us to continue supporting farmers and finding outlets for their food.”
A matching challenge is now in place. The Monadnock Food Co-op will match each donation to the Food Connects crowdfunding campaign dollar for dollar up to $500. Food Connects needs to raise $2,259 by April 18.
Food Connects Unveils New Cooler & Freezer
Food Connects hosted our Ribbon Cutting Ceremony on December 12, 2019, at their Brattleboro Development Credit Corporation (BDCC) Business Park location to celebrate the unveiling of our new 1,000 square foot cooler and freezer.
Over 50 Food Connects’ staff, board members, funders, partners, customers, producers, and family members joined to celebrate this milestone. Guests sampled Food Connects’ products, prepared by Harley Sterling, School Nutrition Director of the Windham Northeast Supervisory Union, and his staff at the Farm to School Cafe. Richard Berkfield, our Executive Director, opened the evening with gratitude towards all of those who supported Food Connects throughout the years and, more recently, the Cooler Campaign.
Richard Berkfield
“We moved in here a little over a year ago with a few ideas about how to turn this place into our new warehouse,” Richard told the crowd. “For a long time, we had masking tape on the floor representing two large boxes, one frozen, here and another cold there. As you might imagine, we felt constrained. And the reality was the cooler wasn’t going to be big enough for our growth trajectory and we would have to do something again soon. It didn’t feel right.”
Our team knew the space had the potential to help the organization grow, getting more local food to more community members in the region. With the help of the BDCC, we were able to identify a space adjacent to our offices for expansion.
Adam Grinold
“At the BDCC we are always on the lookout for folks and businesses that have a bit of a growth mindset—that’s definitely Food Connects,” remarked speaker Adam Grinold, Executive Director of the BDCC. Our organizations have worked together for several years in support of workforce development around food systems. “[They’re] already a job creator with 14 people supporting the mission here, this new location has tripled the storage capacity, it’s close for both collection and distribution access. Food Connects is more than just a food distribution company, they are food systems leaders.”
The support from the BDCC has been invaluable in getting Food Connects where we are today and with the funding from the High Meadows Fund as well as many other generous individuals and businesses, we raised $200,000 to make our dream of an expanded Food Hub become a reality.
Gaye Symington, President of the High Meadows Fund, also spoke at the event. The High Meadows Fund promotes vibrant communities and healthy natural ecosystems in Vermont. Their Farm to Market Initiative is focused in particular on increasing the sale of Vermont farm and food products through wholesale and institutional markets that recognize, and are willing to pay for, the value of fresh, healthy local food.
Gaye Symington
“Food Connects matters,” remarked Gaye “because they are focused on buyers who value high-quality food. Food Connects matters because they make sure a greater share of the consumer’s food dollar can get back to the farmer. And Food Connects matters because as they demonstrate this approach can work, they nudge the rest of the food distribution system to better serve farmers and producers as a key element of the food system.”
Food Connects’ new cooler and freezer will allow us to offer our wholesale customers—including schools, hospitals, independent groceries, and business food programs—more options for using local products in place of commodity foods. This increase in capacity will allow us to build market channels for more producers and consumers in Southern Vermont and New Hampshire, the Upper Valley, and Western Massachusetts. And the timing of the new facility couldn’t be better—Food Connects hit over 30% growth for the second year in a row, totaling over $550k in local sales for 2019.
“We have so much gratitude to all of our many partners and supporters,” said Richard. “Producers, customers, donors, staff, board, and other advocates along the way have gotten us to this point. We are excited for the impacts our expanded Food Hub will have on our local economy and to bring you more local food.”
To watch the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony online and see pictures from the event head to www.facebook.com/FoodConnects
Our Van is in the Spotlight
Food Connects expands wholesale delivery with new van
A new refrigerated van will allow Food Connects to expand delivery.
Posted Monday, October 8, 2018 8:15 pm
Brattleboro Reformer
BRATTLEBORO — Food Connects, a nonprofit organization that focuses on farm-to-school programming and wholesale local food distribution, added a new refrigerated van to its Food Hub fleet for deliveries.
Food Connects was able to purchase the new refrigerated cargo van thanks to grant support from the State of Vermont Working Lands Enterprise Board and USDA Rural Development. The van allows Food Connects to have two drivers making deliveries simultaneously, increasing the amount of locally produced food delivered in southeast Vermont, southwest New Hampshire, and western Massachusetts. Deliveries are made to more than 100 hospitals, schools, independent grocers, co-ops, and other wholesale buyers in the region.
Adding the van to the Food Hub fleet was necessary to keep pace with the rapidly growing demand for local food in the region. And the arrival of the van was well-timed, as sales dramatically increased this fall. Food Connects has had multiple and consecutive record-breaking sales weeks since the purchase of the van, and sales in September were higher than any single month in the organization's history. All of these dollars stay local and go back to more than 60 local producers in the community.
The van presents even more opportunities for the future of Food Connects. It creates an opportunity to increase the variety of items sold, including the amount of frozen products it delivers to customers. Food Connects will be able to reach remote buyers more efficiently and more often, helping with their expansion of services to the Upper Valley region. It's also an investment in the effort to provide the best and most reliable customer service to all of the organization's customers, and it strengthens market development support for local agriculture and food businesses that is critical to the future of the rural economy.
Food Connects is an entrepreneurial nonprofit that delivers locally produced food as well as educational and consulting services aimed at transforming local food systems.
Organization streamlines local food distribution with new refrigerated van
Thursday, October 18, 2018
By Meg McIntyre, Keene Sentinel Staff
For one area nonprofit organization, a new refrigerated delivery van will make it easier to connect people with locally grown food and products.
Food Connects is a Brattleboro-based nonprofit organization that delivers locally produced foods from more than 45 farms, vendors and producers to organizations throughout southeastern Vermont, southwestern New Hampshire and western Massachusetts.
For food producers — such as Monadnock Region participants like Farmer John’s Plot in Dublin, Picadilly Farm in Winchester and Terra Nova Coffee in Keene — Food Connects helps streamline the wholesale distribution process, according to Laura Carbonneau, communications manager.
“They don’t have to go and make all these individual deliveries; we aggregate it, and get as much back to the farmers as possible,” Carbonneau said.
Food Connects was recently able to purchase a new refrigerated delivery van through grant funding from the state of Vermont Working Lands Enterprise Board and from U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development, which will allow for two delivery drivers to be on the road at one time.
Until now, the organization hasn’t always been able to meet its demand with only one box truck available for shipments. But with the new refrigerated van, the organization will be able to increase the number of deliveries it’s able to make, Carbonneau said.
“We’ll be able to increase in terms of not only how many, but where we’re going to be able to go, too,” Carbonneau said. “Because we are kind of concentrated in this southwest corner and southeast corner of Vermont and New Hampshire, and now we’ll be able to broaden that a little bit further.”
Food Connects serves a wide range of organizations, from the Monadnock Food Co-Op to Cheshire Medical Center to the ConVal Regional School District.
“When local schools and businesses are purchasing locally, they’re investing back into their community, and they’re getting food that’s not transported all the way from California or Florida,” she said. “It’s local, and it gives a better sense of connection to the community as well.”
Beyond helping organizations purchase farm-fresh products, Food Connects also runs farm-to-school programming with networking and educational events in Vermont schools. For example, the organization helps facilitate taste tests for the Harvest of the Month campaign, which promotes seasonal eating.
“Some of the support that we offer is helping food service directors figure out how to incorporate local food into their menus, because that’s not always the easiest thing to do,” Carbonneau said.
In 2017, Food Connects also took over management of Monadnock Menus, a program the organization helped start through the Cheshire County Conservation District in 2013 to help area farmers and food producers market and distribute their products to different enterprises.
Carbonneau noted that through operating that program, Food Connects has increased its focus on New Hampshire and the Monadnock Region.
“Really we do focus a lot on New Hampshire and getting food into New Hampshire schools and stores, and we purchase from a lot of different New Hampshire vendors and farmers and producers. So it’s really not just a Vermont thing, and it’s becoming more of a tri-state thing with Massachusetts too,” Carbonneau said.
“But right now it’s definitely the Twin States working together.”