LUDLOW, Maine — In today’s technological age, there is no reason that a large network for small farmers can not be formed here in Aroostook County.
That is the thinking behind a new business venture started by Roxanne Bruce called Green Bean Saves, LLC that hopes to connect small farmers with consumers on both a local and national level.
“I started this venture in March, but the actual concept formed three years ago,” Bruce said. “Our organization was created because the field research for my doctorate in marketing found a need in the small farm community. Many of the farmers that I worked with just did not have the time to do online marketing along side all of the other responsibilities of being a small farm owner.”
Based out of her home in Ludlow, Bruce has created an online network of small farmers (www.shopsmallfarms.com) that is designed to not only help farmers market their goods, but to also provide input on what types of produce consumers are craving.
To qualify as a small farm and be listed on this portal, the farmer must be selling his products directly to the consumer and must be making less than $350,000 in sales each year.
According to the USDA census, 3,180,074 farmers are in operation in the United States. Of that amount, only 5.5 percent are bigger than the small farm criteria.
“When we talk about small farms, we do not measure it by acres, but measure it by annual income,” Bruce said. “Our target annual income is $350,000 or less, because we have discovered that farms in this income bracket share many of the same problems.”
For her dissertation, Bruce said she at first focused on helping farmers in Maine. What she found was most were not using social media and had very little to no online presence.
Another interesting fact jumped out at her. “I found many of the farmers were not varying their products to their customer’s desires,” she said. “They were basically just growing what they liked to grow. And many did not treat their farms as a business.”
To try and help prevent farms from struggling with this problem, Bruce came up with an online network to provide area specific and farm size specific information for all of its members in their member only portal section.
On top of that, she provides consultant services for a yearly fee of $30 for farm members. She also has added tax and accounting services so that small farm members can have an accountant work with them throughout the season, and a tax specialist will take care of filing for the farm.
“We also have consultants in the food inspection field, agronomy, marketing, photography, big data, contract negotiation, accounting, tax, lean operations and more,” Bruce said.
The group currently has 12 small farms as members, but she hopes that number will grow as word continues to spread. For more information, visit www.shopsmallfarms.com.
