Community Supported Agriculture
Agricultural
Markeng
Service
April 2017
New Models for Changing Markets
ii
Recommended Citaon: Timothy Woods, Mahew Ernst, and Debra Tropp. Community Supported Agriculture – New
Models for Changing Markets. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Markeng Service, April 2017. Web.
Acknowledgments: This work was funded by Cooperave agreement 12-25-A-5660 with the Agricultural Markeng
Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. This study necessarily involved extensive interviews with numerous
Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) operators and builds on the previous case study of selected CSAs published as
The Changing CSA Strategic Business Model. The authors would like to again acknowledge the contribuons of many to
that study that were used to frame the quesons for this survey. James Barham with AMS provided regular guidance on
the survey design and cases.
Disclaimer: The opinions and conclusion expressed do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Department of
Agriculture or the Agricultural Markeng Service.
Author Contact:
Timothy Woods, m.woods@uky.edu, 859-257-7270
USDA Contact:
Debra Tropp, Debra.T[email protected], 202-720-8326
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iii
Community Supported Agriculture
New Models for Changing Markets
Timothy Woods and Mahew Ernst, University of Kentucky
Debra Tropp, USDA Agricultural Markeng Service
iv
v
Contents
Introducon 1
Background and Methods 2
What is the issue? 2
What did the study nd? 3
How was the study conducted? 4
Changes in the CSA Model Over Time 6
CSA Growth Opportunies 7
CSA Business Models and Risk Management 8
Future of Community Supported Agriculture 9
CSA Manager Survey Design and Data 10
CSA Business Characteriscs 11
Other Market Channels for CSAs 14
Changes in CSA Products, Business Funcons, and Protability 15
Evaluang Local Food Market Demand, Compeon, and Shareholder Recruitment 19
Cooperaon Potenal for Mul-Farm CSAs 22
Discussion and Conclusions From the CSA Manager Survey 24
The Changing CSA Business Model – Six Case Studies 25
CSA Interview Queson Themes 25
CSA Case Study 1: Elmwood Stock Farm 27
CSA Market Discovery 28
For Experienced Growers 28
Season Extension 29
Shareholders 29
Communicaon and Customer Connecon to Farm 30
Regional Eorts, Mul-Farm CSAs and What is a CSA? 31
Growth Opportunies 31
CSA Case Study 2: Penn’s Corner Farmer Alliance 32
CSA Market Discovery 33
Relying on Experienced Growers 34
Quality Essenal 34
vi
Season Extension and Value-Added Processing 35
CSA Growth Opportunies 36
Advantages of Being a CSA and How the Business Model is Shiing 37
Sidebar: CSAs and E-Commerce 37
CSA Case Study 3: Farmer Dave’s 38
Farmer Dave’s Sliding-Scale CSA Business Model 38
Reaching Low-Income CSA Shareholders With Urban Partners 39
CSA Case Study 4: FairShare CSA Coalion 43
Madison Eaters Revoluonary Front – The Beginning 43
Cash Flow by Cookbook 43
Community Connecons 44
Health Rebate Program Keys 45
Outlook and Producer Perspecve on Health Rebate Program 45
Other Funcons of FairShare 46
Future of FairShare CSAs 47
CSA Case Study 5: Innovaons in Denver Urban and Urban Fringe Markets 48
CSAs and Urban Agriculture 48
Granata Farms, Downtown Denver, Elaine Granata 48
Star Acre Farms, Arvada, CO
CSAs and Planned Urban Development Iniaves, Jackie Raehl 49
Issues for Denver Metro CSAs 50
Partnerships Viewed Essenal to Growth 50
Peer-to-Peer Learning: Building Farmers Programs 51
Changes in CSAs over Time 51
Relaon to Other Market Channels 51
Perspecves on the Future of Denver-Area CSAs 52
CSA Case Study 6: Fair Shares Combined CSA 53
An Innovave Local Food Retailer 53
Building Suppliers and Shareholders 53
Changes in Customers, Business 54
Producer Perspecves 55
Tips and Consideraons for Enhancing CSA Success
Through Strategic Business Pracces 56
References 58
Photo Credits 60
1
A
steady growth in CSAs and related markeng
structures has been observed concurrent with
the growth in direct markeng and consumer interest in
local foods. The CSA model has evolved from its original
emphasis on organic and sustainable agriculture along
with various measures of shareholder risk-sharing with
producers (Ernst and Woods, 2009). Current business
models for CSAs are diverse and innovave. Producers
have adapted the CSA model to t a variety of emerging
direct markeng opportunies, including:
• Instuonal health and wellness programs;
• Mul-farm systems to increase scale and scope;
• Season extension technologies; and
• Incorporang value-added products, oering
exible shares, and exible electronic purchasing
and other e-commerce markeng tools.
A 2009 regional survey by Woods et al., revealed that
CSA producers tend to have a diversity of market outlets
and have used the CSA model to both scale up and to
build a farm brand in community markets. Most CSAs,
connuing with the current survey, are small (with some
notable excepons) but growing, maintaining fewer than
80 shareholders. Most businesses have been started
within the past 5 years. Producers have been able to
diversify markeng channels readily from a CSA base to
include direct to restaurants and small grocers and even
work with wholesale distributors to reach a wider market
area. However, the role and dynamics the CSA plays in
helping producers to supply food compevely in the local
food system is not very well understood as it is a relavely
new business structure with a rapidly evolving model of
operaon.
Introduction
This study proposed to idenfy the trends in CSA business
model adaptaon including changes in product innovaon
and protability drivers as the CSA markeng model
evolves to address emerging consumer preferences and
direct markeng opportunies. By conducng a naonal
survey of CSAs, researchers hoped to:
1. Describe the current use of the CSA business model,
including scale and regional dierences;
2. Idenfy the role and strategic dynamics of the CSA
model in a local foods business start-up;
3. Idenfy the emerging and adapted uses of the CSA
model to pursue scale individually and through
cooperaon and pursue alternave local foods
markets; and
4. Examine perspecves of CSA operators on expected
future business and market innovaons.
These objecves will yield important new knowledge
regarding the trends and trajectory of CSAs, providing
perspecves on changes in the CSA business model for
consideraon by current and prospecve managers, and
idenfying future research and educaon program needs
for CSAs for supporng agencies such as Extension, USDA,
and local food Nongovernmental Organizaons.
Many of the themes and issues featured in the naonal
survey were informed by a series of focus group interviews
conducted with CSA operators in six geographically diverse
parts of the country. The results of these focus group
interviews appear in summary format in the laer part of
this report.
2
Background and Methods
What is the issue?
This project provides an analysis of the emerging
markeng and business strategy trends of CSAs
1
in the
United States. Regional studies (Strochlic and Shelly,
2004; Oberholtzer, 2004; Woods et al, 2009; Galt et al,
2012) have shed some light on trends with this business
model, but have tended toward a narrower geographic
analysis, have emphasized sociological elements, or had
not explored CSAs as part of a comprehensive markeng
strategy. These are important dimensions to CSAs given
their historical roots, but their role as part of a producer’s
local foods/direct markeng strategy is changing and
not well understood. Regional and scale dierences
are evident. Naonal studies, such as the Census of
Agriculture, indicate 12,617 farms marketed through a CSA
in the 2012 Census, up slightly from the 12,549 idened
in 2007. Geng an accurate count on CSA businesses is
more dicult than it may seem, given the expansion of
mul-farm, food-hub, and non-farm-based CSA delivery
models. The divergence in CSA counts across various
public and private agencies has been addressed by Ryan
Galt (Galt, 2011) and the measurement problem connues.
The Biodynamics Associaon, one of a number of local
food system advocacy groups, in an eort to provide a
history of CSA, cites McFadden’s 2012 esmate of between
6,000 and 6,500 CSAs, but also references LocalHarvest
esmates at that me of 4,571 acve CSAs
2
(Biodynamic
Farming and Gardening, 2012). The CSA denion and
counng has only become more dicult. The variaons
of the CSA value proposion and markeng strategy for
producers are also not well understood. Some producers
have used the tradional CSA model as a market entry
point for local foods distribuon and then graduated to
other business models as scale allowed. Others have
adapted the tradional CSA model to CSA-like models that
beer accommodate single or mul-farm scale economies.
This study ulizes a naonal survey of CSA managers
conducted in 2014 to document changes in the CSA model
with parcular aenon paid to regional dierences,
urban/rural locaon of the farm, and the age of the CSA.
Given the rapid growth and increased diversity of business
pracces being observed, USDA/AMS, in partnership with
the University of Kentucky, conducted the naonal survey
of CSA managers. The survey’s aims were to document the
emerging markeng and business strategies of producers
using the CSA model and to understand the variaons in
performance and sustainability of the business model.
Part of the analysis provides a current descripon of
the CSAs across the country, but a further objecve is to
understand the dynamics of this model in the context of
entry into the local foods market, including understanding
the CSA manager percepons of compeng local foods
delivery models in various market contexts. The study
documents manager interest in mul-farm collaboraons
to pursue various innovaons and adaptaons of the
tradional CSA model. The results should be instrucve
to CSA operators, policy makers, and support agencies
working alongside various local foods eorts.
The CSA business model has evolved signicantly
as entrepreneurs and market forces have opened
opportunies for the implementaon of the model
in ways quite unlike the early CSA operaons. New
products, season extensions, mul-farm collaboraons,
new shareholder groups, markeng collaboraons with
dierent organizaons, innovave aggregaon and
delivery strategies, new urban producon connecons,
and health and wellness alliances are among the current
trends reshaping the CSA business. Neil Stauer, General
Manager for Penn’s Corner Farm Alliance in Pisburgh, PA,
noted that CSAs have changed from an emphasis on the
farmer to the consumer. “When CSAs were rst around,
it seems like it was more like customers saying, ‘We really
believe in you, the farmer, and how can we make this work
for you?’” he observed. “Now, it seems like it has shied
and the farmers are saying, ‘How can we make the CSA
work beer for you, the customer?’”
A series of six case studies were completed based on
interviews with farmers, managers, and customers who
represented various models of CSA business organizaon,
market focus, producon and markeng innovaon across
the country. While the authors recognize that there are
numerous cases of innovaon across CSAs naonally – and
1 Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), as used in this report, is dened as a producer-consumer local producon and markeng partnership
that involves a subscripon-based contract for the delivery of seasonal products from the farm. The tradional CSA placed substanal emphasis
on sustainable agriculture, shared producon risk, consumer involvement with producon acvies, and authencity of local sourcing (Bougherara,
Grolleau, & Mzoughi, 2009; Henderson & Van En, 1999). A “shareholder” is dened here as a CSA subscriber, typically a consuming household and
a “share” is the season subscripon.
2 Localharvest is a web directory for local sourced foods through a variety of market channels. Their naonal acve CSA count for April 2015 was
5,638 according to www.localharvest.org
3
these aren’t exhausve—they believe that these stories
add texture and nuance to the changing character of CSAs
in the United States, and help reveal how they are adapng
to new opportunies, but also to new compeon. Cases
were selected for geographic diversity as well as types
of innovaon, including CSAs from Kentucky, Wisconsin,
Pennsylvania, Missouri, Massachuses, and Colorado.
A geographically diverse case-based approach can be
parcularly useful for gaining producer and agency
perspecves on innovaons in the CSA markeng model.
To that end, a set of CSAs were selected naonally that
represented tradional single farm models; co-operaves/
mul-farm CSAs; low-income consumer-targeted CSAs;
mul-farm innovaons targeng parcular consumer
segments with a unique health and wellness markeng
partner; CSAs associated with urban market innovaons;
and a for-prot food hub concept that ulized a CSA
aggregaon and distribuon model. Interviews with key
informants aliated with each CSA or CSA community
were coordinated through a variety of agency contacts.
What did the study find?
The study documents important trends associated with
the CSA business model naonally. The CSA model has
been in place for many farms for some me now. The
earliest CSAs established in the United States date back to
the mid-1980s, and more than 25 percent of the managers
who responded to the survey indicated their CSA had
been in operaon for over 10 years. CSAs have grown in
number as documented in the Census of Agriculture, but
the naonal CSA manager survey indicates they have also
grown in shareholder size over the past 3 years (note
table 4).
The CSA business model has denitely evolved. Only about
27 percent of the CSAs surveyed are cered organic, a
departure from the focus of the earlier CSA movement (46
percent were cered organic and 92 percent were at least
using organic or biodynamic pracces in the 2001 survey
by Lass et al). Many of the surveyed CSAs have taken
advantage of new direct markeng tools, including web-
based sales, season extension technologies, and oering a
greater diversity of products – including processed items.
Most of them have a diversied markeng mix, ulizing
a variety of other market channels. The majority of CSA
managers who responded to our survey also sell through
farmers markets and area restaurants, but oen include
other market channels, as well.
Surveyed CSA managers generally view their markets
posively for growth potenal and see the CSA distribuon
model as an important contributor to farm sales (58
percent indicate that the CSA accounts for at least half of
all their farm sales) and protability. About 55 percent
indicated that the protability of their CSAs had at least
increased to some degree since they had started their
CSA – with 10 percent indicang that their protability
had “increased a lot.” Furthermore, more than half of
surveyed managers expected their CSA sales to increase
over the next 2 years.
There is some evidence of variability in perceived market
demand and the protability/performance outlook for
CSAs depending on region, proximity to urban centers,
and the CSA’s age, which are documented and discussed
throughout the study. The CSA distribuon model is
being adapted to numerous products, markets, and
groups of producers. This study found roughly similar
ulizaon of various and alternave market channels
for CSAs regardless of their proximity to urban locaons.
The dierences were more evident in the producon
techniques, product markets, and business strategies
implemented, highlighng the diversity of approaches
CSA operators adopted depending on their specic
market context.
CSAs use websites to sell product and give informaon
on locaons of farm stands, restaurants and wholesale
markets where their product is sold.
4
The study documents dierences in manager percepons
of compeon for local food to local markets coming from
new CSAs, expansion from exisng CSAs, farm markets,
and other retail channels that have also expanded local
foods markeng. The determinaon of who is the
compeon seems to be largely inuenced by proximity
to urban markets and the age of the CSA, and to some
degree, on the CSA’s locaon.
Surveyed CSA managers also seemed generally
interested in exploring mul-farm business innovaons
and collaboraons that enable them to pursue new
markets, engage in more aggressive promoon, oer
vouchers to select consumer targets, share logiscs,
and share producon. However, the degree to which
these innovaons had been successfully adopted by CSA
managers varied considerably. For example, the interest
in voucher programs targeng low-income consumers and
clients of health and wellness programs seemed to greatly
outweigh current pracce, suggesng that there seems to
be room to help facilitate selected aspects of mul-farm
CSA cooperaon before it reaches its full market potenal.
The case studies provided numerous illustraons of
business model innovaon, underscoring the fact that the
CSA markeng model connues to be adapted to t many
market circumstances. Based on manager percepons
of business growth, compeveness, and protability,
there appears to be growth potenal for a diversity of
successful strategies within the CSA framework – including
single farm, mul-farm, co-operavely owned, and even
non-farm owned. The study also idened a diversity of
market targets as yet untapped, including the tradional
shareholder who prefers organic produce. However, it is
clear from both our case studies and our survey that CSA
managers are increasingly focused on using their CSA as a
way to facilitate consumer access to local foods in general,
rather than specically targeng consumers of organic fruit
and vegetables. Farms and farm networks are connually
nding new ways to reach non-tradional market
segments with CSA shares. This includes incorporang
e-commerce, adding products through season extension
and mulple season oerings, adding shares for alternave
product lines beyond tradional produce, and working
with urban, health/wellness, and community development
partners to access a broader base of customers, including
lower income shareholders. The Madison, WI, FairShare
CSA Coalion has ulized wellness plan vouchers to
substanally expand demand for share parcipaon with
local farmers. Coalion members, as sll independent
farm-CSAs, have organized to both collecvely promote
the voucher program and to provide quality standards
crical to maintaining the program. Denver area CSAs
have provided many of their own innovaons including
collaboraons with city planning, urban markets, and
peer-learning among CSA farmers. Non-farm aggregaon
models to deliver CSAs have been emerging as well,
including the Fair Share CCSA in St. Louis where a small
food retailer built a CSA business around a shared vision
for local foods with area farmers.
How was the study conducted?
This study is a follow-on study that explored six cases in
CSA innovaon. The earlier study included both individual
farm and mul-farm iniaves and explored a variety of
non-tradional approaches to CSA products and target
markets. The study ulized a web-based survey to explore
naonal business development trends for CSAs based
on observaons in the inial case studies. We designed
the survey instrument to examine current business
characteriscs, sales in related market channels, changes
in producon and markeng strategies, compeon and
local food demand, prospects for business cooperaon,
and shareholder recruitment. The target populaon was
CSAs that had been in operaon for at least 2 years, given
the emphasis on changes in business acvies.
3 The directory is based at the Robyn Van En Center at Wilson College at www.wilson.edu.
CSAs innovate to reach urban and non-tradional
markets in East Boston.
5
There was no current naonal CSA database of addresses
available from which to develop a distribuon list.
Therefore, a master list had to be compiled drawing from
communicaons from State departments of agriculture,
local foods registers, and food markeng databases.
Many of these were out of date and required updang
for current contacts. A database was assembled through
a variety of earlier business lists assembled by the Robyn
Van En Center,
3
but expanded through updates provided
by various State departments of agriculture, grower
associaons, and LocalHarvest.com lisngs. We assembled
a database and sampling process that would provide equal
representaon in the nal sample and allow comparison
of regional dierences. A balanced sample of 525 was
therefore selected from each of the four regions of the
country, using USDA designaons for Southeast, Northeast,
North Central, and West.
We sent a preliminary invitaon to the CSA manager or
lead operator requesng parcipaon and explaining the
goals of the survey. Any CSA could opt out. We followed
up 3 weeks later with a second invitaon. Surveys were
distributed to 2,100 addresses that did not opt out of the
study, 525 to each region. A total of 495 CSAs returned
usable surveys during the period of February to July 2014,
yielding an approximate 24 percent eecve return rate.
Usable responses regionally were collected from the
Northeast (100), North Central (119), Southeast (87), and
West (189), providing some dierences in response rates
by region.
We used a case-based approach to gaining producer and
agency perspecves on innovaons in the CSA markeng
model ahead of the naonal CSA manager survey. A set of
CSAs were selected naonally that represented:
• Tradional single farm models,
• Cooperaves/mul-farm CSAs,
• Low-income consumer-targeted CSAs,
• Mul-farm innovaons targeng unique consumer
segments with a health and wellness markeng
partner,
• CSAs associated with urban market innovaons,
and
• A for-prot food hub concept that ulized a CSA
aggregaon and distribuon model.
These cases were selected to provide a diversity of market
and geographic perspecves. We coordinated Interviews
with key informants aliated with each CSA or CSA
community through a variety of agency contacts, including
local Extension oces, producer associaons, local food
non-prots, and local government agencies.
6
Changes in the CSA Model Over Time
F
armers who have adapted and innovated to reach
growing local market demand have found numerous
ways to adapt the CSA subscripon model in a way that
ts their goals and unique market condions. The model
is highly exible to accommodate a variety of products
– produce, meat, dairy, eggs, as well as value-added and
processed products coming from the farm.
The denion of CSA has evolved as well. Farmers and
shareholders both have adapted the concept to encompass
and represent a variety of local food systems relaonships.
The more successful models, those CSAs characterized
as sustainable business ventures while meeng the
mutual mission goals of the farm and shareholders, have
maintained a close farmer-consumer connecon. The
inclusion of urban community development and health
care workers has actually added an interesng new
dimension to the CSA community, as well as peer-to-peer
learning. Many consumers view the CSA as an extension of
the community farm market experience and seem happy
to include other community partners.
The term “CSA” is becoming increasingly confusing to
many. Most farmers and consumers recognize and
understand the subscripon model, but need addional
reecon around the meaning of community as it relates
to sustainability. As other business models emerge that
are seeking to take advantage of the growing demand
for local food, farmers will need to pay parcularly close
aenon to the meaning of community as a means of
dierenang themselves to their core consumers.
Most of the farmers we interviewed selling through CSA
also had signicant markeng acvity in community
farm markets, on-farm retail, direct to restaurants and
grocers, and other market channels. Farmers were
selling increasingly more through the CSA as the model
was able to be adapted to their customer needs. Few
farmers recommended the CSA as a starng point for new
producers. The producon management, distribuon,
and markeng require considerable experse and benets
substanally from experience.
7
CSA Growth Opportunities
G
rowth opportunies fall in a number of categories
– new products, season extension or year-round
sales, scaling up through mul-farm partnerships, ulizing
e-commerce, and connecng to new consumer segments.
This can include low-income consumers or health and
wellness programs.
New product opportunies have emerged for CSA
distribuon of all dierent kinds of products – cheese,
sh, owers, wine, sauces, and other custom-processed or
co-packed products have added to consumer interest and
seem to relate to shareholder retenon. Shareholders are
drawn to greater variety, but farms must be cauous not to
press for too great a variety. There are diminishing returns
associated with greater inventory management.
Season extension is a great opportunity, allowing farms
to signicantly expand the scope, ming, and quality of
products coming from protected agriculture environments.
This makes part-season shares and specialty shares more
feasible as well.
The role and eecveness of mul-farm CSAs was mixed.
There is a sacrice in control and challenges with managing
quality and consistency. There is a risk of loss in perceived
value to the shareholder moving from a farm estate
product to an aggregated “local” product that may not
be idened with a specic farm. Sll, many producer
associaons that are aggregang product through
warehouses (e.g., Penn’s Corner) have found equitable
ways to ulize their collecve scale to put in place
resources like managers and/or collecvely promote their
products to the local foods community. Others, somewhat
aligned with the food hub model, have found volume and
product variety advantages to aggregaon, creang market
opportunies for parcipang farmers who probably
wouldn’t be there otherwise (e.g. Fair Shares in St. Louis).
E-commerce will likely play an increasingly important role
in both logiscs and markeng for CSAs. New rms like
Farmigo and Small Farm Central are among a number of
new private support ventures that help CSAs expand this
means of shareholder and producer communicaon and
trade. Social media connects closely with the community
dimension of CSA and can also play a part in enhancing
producer-shareholder linkages.
8
CSA Business Models and
Risk Management
M
any advantages to the CSA model were noted
throughout the various interviews. Farmers in
the more tradional single model connue to idenfy
cash ow, relave protability to other markeng
channels, producon planning, and product exibility as
main aracons. Farmers noted that, much like farmers
markets, the CSAs can be a good plaorm to introduce
new products on an experimental basis or to expand
variaons on share types (adding meat or egg shares,
or oering half-shares), taking advantage of a highly
interacve direct-to-consumer framework that can provide
good feedback on demand.
However, mul-farm models can be benecial as well.
Mul-farm CSAs have the potenal to help farmers
manage specialty crop risk by contribung to a more
diverse porolio of products that can collecvely be
more aracve to local food buyers. They can open new
markets through expanded scale or scope. Developing this
advantage requires having the right partners and not every
CSA is willing to engage other producers where supply and
quality may not be consistent.
CSAs have also successfully worked through community
partnerships with urban, land, or economic development
agencies that help farmers access non-tradional markets.
These partnerships make the CSA model aracve largely
because products and services can be readily adapted to
customer needs in markets not tradionally served by
these farms. The CSA business model, whether single or
mul-farm, has been adapted to allow farmers to make a
stronger connecon to their most loyal customers using
more exible products and services and cost-eecve
distribuon models.
Farmers do many things to collaborate to make their CSA
successful including coming together to market, sharing
personnel resources, diversifying products, adding new
product lines, developing shared e-commerce plaorms,
and providing greater supply assurance to shareholders
and/or wholesale customers. Farmers also develop peer
educaon and shareholder educaon on health and
nutrion through collaboraons with other community-
based partners.
CSAs diversify their products
through meat and egg shares.
9
Future of Community
Supported Agriculture
M
ost farmers in these cases remained very opmisc
about the opportunies for growth and connued
innovaon. The CSA seems to be both exible and
eecve as a means for connecng with consumers who
value local products and closer relaonships with farms.
The future of CSAs will have to balance the economic
benets of various mul-farm and third-party aggregaon
strategies that necessarily place increased distance
between the farm and the consumer and the challenges
and growth limits of remaining very focused on a local
community.
There is increasing compeon for the local food dollar as
consumer demand for local food expands. Other retailers
see a range of preferences for local products – from a
core group with very strong preferences and concepons
for local to those who might have some interest in local
but may be more price-sensive. Grocers, specialty
wholesalers, and other dedicated distribuon rms have
tried to make inroads into these markets and provide some
degree of new compeon with CSAs.
Farms that are able to clearly dierenate their oerings
through close or direct relaonships with customers are in
a good posion to maintain their advantage, parcularly
with the core consumer. There are strategic quesons
farmers must address as they consider mul-farm models
and the future of CSA, parcularly as individual farm
identy is lost. These types of aggregaon models place
them closer in concept to the retailers that are pursuing
the loyal local foods customer.
The inclusion of new community partners that may not
have been previously associated with CSA oers substanal
promise for CSA farms to build on their value proposion.
This includes collaboraons with health and community
agencies, economic development partners, low-income
support agencies, urban development projects, community
property development projects, and other local food
markeng partners, all of which can contribute to new
opportunies for CSA farms.
The balance between building toward a crical mass of
local food awareness distributed through a variety of local
channels and actual market compeon will be a factor
CSAs will have to watch closely. They will need to pay
aenon to their unique value proposion and how the
CSA can uniquely deliver that – parcularly to the core
local foods consumer who places very high value on a
close relaonship with the farmer. The strategic reach of
retailers and other aggregators is generally more mediated
as they try to reach local consumers, but they are geng
beer at it. Figure 1 suggests a conceptual framework
for considering the spectrum to local food marketers and
their strategic reach against the local food consumer value
proposion.
Figure 1. Local Food Strategic Reach and Value Proposion to CSA Shareholders
10
CSA Manager Survey Design and Data
W
e ulized a web-based survey to explore naonal
business development trends for CSAs. The survey
instrument was designed to examine current business
characteriscs, sales in related market channels, changes
in producon and markeng strategies, compeon and
local food demand, prospects for business cooperaon,
and shareholder recruitment. CSAs that had been in
operaon for at least 2 years were the target populaon,
given the emphasis on changes in business acvies.
There was no current naonal CSA database of
addresses, so we compiled a master list drawing from
communicaons from State departments of agriculture,
local foods registers, and food markeng databases. Many
of these were out of date and required updang. We
selected a sample of 525 from each of the four regions
of the country, using USDA designaons for southeast,
northeast, north central, and west.
We sent a preliminary invitaon to the CSA manager or
lead operator requesng parcipaon and explaining the
goals of the study. Any CSA could opt out. Three weeks
later, we followed up with a second invitaon. Surveys
were distributed to 2,100 addresses that did not opt out
of the study, 525 to each region. CSAs returned a total of
495 usable surveys, yielding an approximate 24 percent
eecve return rate. We collected usable responses
regionally from the northeast (100), north central (119),
southeast (87), and west (189), providing some dierences
in response rates by region.
Demographic characteriscs of the CSA managers
responding to the survey suggested a relavely large share
of female managers, younger, and generally well-educated.
These are summarized in table 1.
Table 1. CSA Manager Characteriscs
Gender
Female 259
Male 171
Age
18-24 7
25-34 102
35-44 116
45-54 92
55-64 87
65+ 26
Educaon
Less than high school 0
High school graduate or equivalent 16
Some college/associate’s degree 94
Bachelor’s degree 187
Graduate or professional degree 131
11
CSA Business Characteristics
Seasons in Operation
Many CSAs have been around for a while, over 26 percent
having been in business for over 10 years. The survey
targeted CSAs that were more established with a view
to looking at business trends over recent years. This
populaon was screened to only include those that
had been in existence for at least 2 years – a handful
of respondents indicated only one season of actual
producon. There is evidence of a cluster of CSAs that
have been around for 3-5 years and another for 10+ years.
The CSA typically involves a few years to establish to
plan for producon and to recruit shareholders. Figure 2
provides a summary of the distribuon of CSA seasons of
operaon.
Figure 2. How many seasons has your CSA been in operaon?
Characterization of Production Methods
Organic producon may have been the focus of CSAs early
in the CSA movement, but there has been a clear shi
to non-cercaon; only 27.2 percent indicated organic
cercaon of producon. Most managers indicate they
are implemenng producon systems at least according
to organic standards or cered (86.2 percent). Table 2
summarizes producon methods.
Table 2. How would you characterize your
producon methods?
Producon N* Percent
Cered organic 134 27.2%
According to organic standards, but
not cered
291 59.0%
Incorporate some organic along with
convenonal methods
61 12.4%
Primarily convenonal growing
techniques
7 1.4%
Total 493
12
Farm Sales Share from CSA
The average share of sales to the farm operaon coming
from the CSA was reported to be 53.2 percent. The
CSA was the major market channel for 58.1 percent
of those reporng. The role and changes with other
market channels is taken up in more detail later. Table 3
summarizes the share of farm sales from CSA.
Table 3. Percent of total farm sales comes from CSA
% Farm Sales from CSA N* Share of Responses
less than 25 120 25.5%
25-49 77 16.4%
50-74 117 24.9%
75-100 156 33.2%
Total Responses 470 100.0%
Average % of Farm Sales
From CSA
53.2
Shareholders Enrolled
CSA managers were asked to provide observaons in the
number of shareholders during the last 2 years and an
esmate for 2014. Average growth in parcipaon was +6
percent in 2013 and another +11 percent in 2014 (table
4). It is especially interesng to look at where they have
grown faster by proximity to urban areas. CSAs with more
of an e-commerce orientaon in another recent survey
were observed to be larger and growing at an even faster
rate. Huntley observed in CSAs parcipang with Small
Farm Central, 248 CSA farms that were also part of the
memberassembler.com E-commerce support network
reported larger share sizes among this group – averaging
213 shareholders with an average CSA income of $30,342
and an average 79 percent sales growth over 2013 sales
(Huntley, 2014).
Table 4. How many CSA patrons did you have
enrolled in…
2012 2013 2014
— Shareholders —
Average All CSAs 120.4 127.4 140.9
Although average shareholder size has been growing,
there are a large number of relavely small CSAs. The
average shareholders reported for 2014 was 140.9, but
the median response was 60 shareholders. Shareholders
numbers reported at each quinle suggest a wide range
between the smaller and larger CSAs – a long le tail in the
distribuon from the mean, as noted in gure 3. In 2014
61 percent of the CSAs reported under 100 shareholders
(down from 65 percent in 2012).
Figure 3. Distribuon of Shareholders Across Sample
13
CSA Proximity to Urban Communities
Farms ulizing the CSA distribuon model locate in a
variety of sengs. We explored the proximity of the
CSA to urban areas through the survey instrument.
Responses indicated a fairly even distribuon between
urban and rural locaons. Locaon will likely have
implicaons for distribuon and collaboraon tendencies,
as well as general shareholder growth, sales volume,
and opportunies to develop various markets. Table 5
summarizes CSA farm locaon informaon.
Table 5. Which of the following best describes
where your CSA is located?
Locaon N* Percent
Near (within 50 miles) a large city
(over 1 million)
104 24.2%
Near (within 50 miles) a small city
(250,000-1,000,000)
143 33.3%
Small town 114 26.5%
Countryside 69 16.0%
*N= 430
Regional analysis of the data suggests considerable
geographic dierences, summarized in table 6. CSA
shareholder size was larger in the Northeast and smaller
in the Southeast. Probably related, the average age of
the CSA was older in the Northeast and smaller in the
Southeast compared to the naonal average. Western-
based CSAs were slightly more likely to be cered organic,
and less so in the Southeast. CSAs in the Southeast were
more likely to be located within 50 miles of an urban
center, while rural sengs for producon were more likely
in the other regions.
4
Dierences in the expected protability of the CSA looking
ahead to the next 2 years were most striking between
those on the lower end of the range in the Northeast (39
percent) to the high end of the range in the North Central
region where 59.7 percent of respondents expected
increased sales. Sales growth expectaon is an important
variable and reects the manager’s percepon of
compeon, local demand, and opportunies to innovate.
4 A previous naonal survey of CSAs by Lass, Stevenson, Hendrickson, and Ruhf in 1999 noted 41% of the CSAs as cered organic – although this
was prior to the USDA cercaon. The median respondents sold 29 full shares and 23 half shares, and 70% reported operang on 49 acres or less
– at a median of 18 acres.
Table 6. CSA Business Characteriscs by Region
Region
*
Northeast
North
Central
Southeast West Overall
Average CSA Size (shareholders esmated for 2014) 203.8 154.5 105.9 125.7 144.8
Age of CSA
**
(years) 7.8 6.5 6.0 6.8 6.8
Cered Organic (%) 28.0% 22.7% 19.5% 32.8% 27.2%
Share in Urban Locaon
***
54.7% 54.7% 67.1% 56.5% 57.4%
Expect Increasing CSA Sales Next 2 Years 39.0% 59.7% 52.9% 51.3% 51.1%
N 100 119 87 189 495
*Regional designaons of various states in this study follow those made by USDA – Northeast, North Central, Southeast, and West.
**The average age of CSAs by region used an imputed value of 13 years for the categorical variable “10+ years” for the purposes of esmang an
average over each group.
***A signicant number of respondents reported their CSA locaon close to urban populaon centers. Urban here means located near (within 50
miles) of a large city – over 1 million or small city – 250,000 to 1,000,000. Specic responses related to locaon by region are reported as follows:
Northeast North Central Southeast West All
Urban 47 58 47 95 247
Total 86 106 70 168 430
14
Other Market Channels for CSAs
The CSA markeng channel was clearly a substanal focus
and priority among those managers responding to the
survey. Many CSAs ulize addional market channels
to diversify and to complement their CSA market. Low
and Vogel (2011) discuss many of the issues relang to
direct and intermediated markets. This survey did not
explore the specic use of and relaonship to intermediary
market partners, although specialty wholesalers and food
hubs have certainly ventured into the CSA subscripon-
type delivery model, sourcing from local producers and
aggregang products for delivery. Wholesalers have
increasingly partnered with growers to beer serve area
grocers and restaurants with local products. It is evident,
however, that other direct markeng channels (community
farmers markets and on-farm retail) are more common
markeng venues for CSAs.
Table 7 summarizes the level of acvity that survey
respondents reported in various markeng channels.
One of the more striking results was the extent to which
CSAs sell to restaurants – over half of them. The specic
use of direct-store deliveries versus using intermediaries
in delivery was not explicitly addressed, although it is
not surprising to see restaurants and farmers markets
dominate the list of alternave market outlets for CSAs
given the complementary distribuon strategies typical
of CSAs.
We conducted an analysis of the data to explore possible
dierences in market channel strategy by urban versus
rural locaon of the CSA. This value does not necessarily
correspond to actual sales by channel, which may sll
be dierent by business locaon. But, as noted in the
summary on table 8, the markeng channel mix broken
out by proximity to populaon centers seems to be
approximately the same with only slight variaons.
Table 7. Indicate which markets you used to sell
farm products
Market N* Percent
CSA 469 100.0
Farmers market 304 64.8
Restaurants 258 55.0
On-farm retail 194 41.4
Grocery 180 38.4
School/instuons 92 19.6
Contract to processors 17 3.6
Aucon sales 12 2.6
Other (please specify) 76 16.2
Table 8. Market Channel Parcipaon by CSA Locaon
Locaon Near large city Near small city Small town Countryside
CSA 100% 100% 100% 100%
Community farmers market 60% 69% 69% 68%
On-farm retail market 47% 37% 35% 56%
Grocery 32% 38% 44% 43%
Restaurants 58% 61% 54% 47%
Schools/Instuons 19% 17% 26% 19%
Aucon sales 4% 2% 2% 0%
Contract to processors 3% 5% 4% 3%
15
Managers were asked to provide an outlook for the various
market channels, looking ahead to sales changes in the
various markets over the next 2 years. Managers were
provided a “does not apply” opon for each market where
they either may not be selling or don’t have a good feel for
the channel. The majority of responses expected increases
in each of the market channels with the excepon of
aucon markets.
Sales to schools/instuons were noted most frequently
as being expected to increase, followed by on-farm retail,
restaurants, grocery, CSAs, contracts to processors, and
farmers markets. Only about 10 percent or fewer expected
to see decreasing sales in any of these markets. Table 9
summarizes these observaons.
Table 9. How do you expect sales to change in these markets over the next 2 years?
Sales Change
CSA
Channel
Community
Farm Market
On-farm
Retail
Market
Wholesale
to Grocery
Wholesale
to
Restaurant
Wholesale
to Schools &
Instuons
Aucon
Contract to
processors
Decreasing 51 33 8 24 31 6 5 4
About the
same
163 123 78 72 92 33 8 16
Increasing 253 175 158 132 182 98 5 23
N 467 331 244 228 305 137 18 43
By Percent
Decreasing 10.9% 10.0% 3.3% 10.5% 10.2% 4.4% 27.8% 9.3%
Same 34.9% 37.2% 32.0% 31.6% 30.2% 24.1% 44.4% 37.2%
Increasing 54.2% 52.9% 64.8% 57.9% 59.7% 71.5% 27.8% 53.5%
Changes in CSA Products,
Business Functions, and
Profitability
The CSA model has evolved in recent years through
a variety of producon and markeng innovaons.
Part of the survey explored specic addions to the
tradional CSA model or whether the CSA has observed a
connuaon of pracces that were commonly associated
with the CSA business model.
Changes to Products and Production
Managers were asked to reect on changes in funconal
aspects of their CSA from when it began, focusing
parcularly on a variety of producon-oriented acvies,
indicang whether the type of acvity was decreasing,
increasing, or did not apply. Specically, we examined
changes in scale, the variety of products oered,
incorporaon of processed products, season extension,
sourcing from other producers, on-farm shareholder
acvies, and share packing on the farm. These are
summarized in table 10.
16
Table 10. Manager Response to: Changes in Your CSA Operaon Since It Began
CSA Producon Funcon
Decreased
a lot
Decreased
some
Stayed
about the
same
Increased
some
Increased
a lot
N
Scale and variety of products
oered
7 22 94 194 126 443
1.6% 5.0% 21.2% 43.8% 28.4%
Processed products oered
2 8 76 101 28 215
0.9% 3.7% 35.3% 47.0% 13.0%
Season extension technologies
2 3 97 178 102 382
0.5% 0.8% 25.4% 46.6% 26.7%
Product sourcing from other
producers
10 10 74 98 31 223
4.5% 4.5% 33.2% 43.9% 13.9%
On-farm shareholder acvies
9 30 140 99 25 303
3.0% 9.9% 46.2% 32.7% 8.3%
Share packing on the farm
13 9 176 45 33 276
4.7% 3.3% 63.8% 16.3% 12.0%
Note: Percent represents of those that indicated the funcon applied to their CSA
The trend toward increasing scale and variety of products
was fairly pronounced and widely applicable. More than
28 percent of the CSAs indicated that the scale and variety
of products oered had increased a lot since their CSA
started, and 72 percent indicated it had at least increased
somewhat. This development suggests that CSAs are
discovering certain scale and scope economies in their
product lines and are diversifying their product oerings
more over me. The addion of processed products was
not as widespread, but certainly increasing among those
CSAs where processed product had been introduced.
Season extension technologies were also widely ulized
and were increasing in use by more than 72 percent of
the CSAs using them. Season extension technologies help
expand both the scale and scope of products available to
shareholders.
Product sourcing from other producers was less common,
although the data suggest this pracce is increasing
somewhat. This is an alternate strategy to achieving
product diversicaon and scale. Parcipants in focus
group interviews voiced mixed opinions about mul-farm
CSAs, parcularly related to quality control, reputaon
and customer relaons management, and dilung the
farmer-shareholder connecon (see more on this topic in
5 Only 4 of the 200 CSAs surveyed by Woods et al in 2009 used workshare or barter agreements.
the Elmwood Stock Farm case study). Other CSA operators
were able to very eecvely use mul-farm scale and
scope to access markets they would not otherwise be able
to achieve on their own (Penn’s Corner Farm Alliance).
On-farm shareholder acvies that invite CSA members
to visit and/or work on the farm is an historical pracce
of CSAs commonly used in the spirit of building the
community part of community supported agriculture.
While many CSA operaons sll incorporate this to some
extent, nearly a third of the CSAs surveyed indicated that
these types of acvies didn’t apply to their operaon.
Shareholder packing on the farm and other similar work-
for-product type of arrangements, once a common part of
the CSA, are similarly becoming less commonplace.
5
A summary of these producon acvies across regions
and between newer (in operaon 5 years or fewer) is
provided in table 11. Key regional dierences appear
to relate to observed changes in season extension –
substanally greater frequency of increases in the North
Central region of the United States and less frequent in the
Northeast. This result may be due to Northeast producers
either already having implemented some of these season
extension pracces or, possibly, reects dierences in
producon and markeng cultures or observed demand
between the regions (see table 6).
17
Younger CSAs seem more inclined to adopt processed
products as part of their markeng mix and more likely
to favor sourcing from other producers than their older
peers Another somewhat counter-intuive observaon is
the indicaon that younger CSAs are more likely to report
increasing use of on-farm shareholder acvies than
CSAs that have been in operaon longer than 5 years. It
is unclear whether or not these dierences in preference
reect dierences in targeted markeng strategies or
simply reect changes that naturally occur during the
business life cycle of a CSA.
Changes to Business and Marketing
CSA managers were also asked to reect on how a series of
CSA business funcons have changed since the incepon
of their business. Specically, managers were asked
to consider the changes to the sales and protability
of their CSA associated with adding share purchase
opons, cooperave markeng, exible payment opons,
shareholder turnover, shareholder communicaons, and
web-based sales. We then asked managers to summarize
the overall contribuon of the CSA to overall farm sales
and the overall protability of the CSA. An overall
summary from all CSAs to changes in these business
funcons is summarized in table 12.
Table 11. Proporon Indicang Producon Funcon “Increasing Some” or “Increasing a Lot” by Region and
CSA Age
Region CSA Age
CSA Producon Funcon NE NC SE W
Newer
CSA
Older
CSA
Scale and variety of products oered 71.6% 76.1% 75.7% 68.6% 71.0% 73.5%
Processed products oered 60.0% 56.6% 64.9% 60.0% 65.5% 54.3%
Season extension technologies 61.8% 85.0% 73.8% 71.0% 70.3% 76.5%
Product sourcing from other producers 55.6% 58.6% 58.8% 58.1% 63.3% 53.6%
On-farm shareholder acvies 40.3% 34.1% 46.3% 44.1% 47.6% 34.8%
Share packing on the farm 27.1% 28.0% 31.0% 28.0% 26.5% 29.9%
Note: Percent represents of those indicang the producon funcon applies to their operaon. Increasing is relave and not an absolute measure
here. “Newer CSA” is dened here as having been in operaon 5 years or less.
18
Table 12. Consider the following potenal changes to your CSA sales and protability since it began – please
indicate where they may apply
CSA Business Funcon
Decreased
a lot
Decreased
some
About the
same
Increased
some
Increased
a lot
N
Share purchase opon
(part-season or special shares)
6 20 135 144 61 366
1.6% 5.5% 36.9% 39.3% 16.7%
Markeng cooperaon with other producers
7 11 103 104 26 251
2.8% 4.4% 41.0% 41.4% 10.4%
Flexible payment (i.e., installment plans)
2 9 187 138 46 382
0.5% 2.4% 49.0% 36.1% 12.0%
Shareholder turnover
13 48 276 68 20 425
3.1% 11.3% 64.9% 16.0% 4.7%
Communicaon with shareholders
0 11 174 184 66 435
0.0% 2.5% 40.0% 42.3% 15.2%
Web-based sales
1 3 92 112 82 290
0.3% 1.0% 31.7% 38.6% 28.3%
Contribuon of CSA to overall farm prots
13 38 167 146 71 435
3.0% 8.7% 38.4% 33.6% 16.3%
Overall protability of CSA
11 26 157 197 44 435
2.5% 6.0% 36.1% 45.3% 10.1%
Note: Percent represents of those that indicated the funcon applied to their CSA
Table 13 summarizes these business funcons across
regions and CSA operaon age. There was some regional
variaon with more frequent reports of increases in
shareholder turnover issues in the Southeast, and
relavely greater increases in web-based sales, overall CSA
protability, and the contribuon of the CSA to overall
farm prots in the North Central region. Meanwhile,
greater CSA age seems to be posively associated with
increases in communicaon with shareholders and web-
based sales.
Table 13. Proporon Indicang Business Funcon “Increasing Some” or “Increasing a Lot” by Region and
CSA Age
Region CSA Age
CSA Business Funcon NE NC SE W
Newer
CSA
Older
CSA
Markeng cooperaon with other producers 45.8% 47.9% 55.3% 56.4% 51.6% 52.0%
Flexible payment opons (i.e., installment plans) 43.2% 53.0% 49.1% 47.0% 46.0% 50.3%
Shareholder turnover 22.6% 16.8% 28.2% 19.0% 19.0% 22.4%
Communicaon with shareholders 55.2% 58.7% 52.8% 59.9% 53.6% 61.4%
Web-based sales 55.8% 74.3% 69.6% 66.1% 63.8% 70.2%
Contribuon of CSA to overall farm prots 47.1% 57.1% 52.1% 45.9% 51.6% 48.1%
Overall protability of CSA 48.8% 65.1% 54.1% 53.2% 53.9% 56.9%
Note: Percent represents of those indicang the producon funcon applies to their operaon. Increasing is relave and not an absolute
measure here. “Newer CSA” is dened here as having been in operaon 5 years or less.
19
Evaluating Local Food Market
Demand, Competition, and
Shareholder Recruitment
Market demand and compeon for local food in a CSA’s
primary trade area can substanally inuence the kind of
business strategies the CSA employs, its mix of product
oerings, and its emphasis on CSA-based markeng
compared to other distribuon opons. Demand and
compeon measures presumably have an impact on
shareholder recruitment and the staying power of the
CSA. In the naonal survey, CSA managers were asked to
evaluate the overall demand situaon in their immediate
trade area and to also rank the relave importance of
exisng competors for local food sales. Geographic
dierences related to regional locaon and proximity to
urban centers were also considered.
In general, CSA managers were very opmisc about
demand for local food in their market area. The
percentages of managers expecng connued demand
growth was very strong – around 25 percent reporng
that they expected demand in their area to increase
signicantly, and 85 percent expecng demand to increase
to some degree. Only 3.5 percent of surveyed managers
indicated that they expected the current level of demand
to decline. These overall results are summarized in
table 14.
Comparisons of percepons of demand for local food
varied slightly by region, proximity to urban areas, and
age of the CSA. CSA managers in the Northeast were
more likely to report local food demand as unchanging or
declining. Managers of younger CSAs and CSAs in rural
locaons also reported less robust demand for local food
than their industry peers. This could partly reect arion
of older CSAs in less-than-desirable market situaons
or older CSAs that have adapted their business over
me to beer t the current market situaon. Table 15
summarizes these percepons.
Table 14. How would you rate the demand for local food in your market area?
Declining
signicantly
Declining
somewhat
Staying
about the
same
Increasing
somewhat
Increasing
signicantly
N
4 11 48 257 106 426
0.9% 2.6% 11.3% 60.3% 24.9%
Note: Percent represents of those that indicated they had a basis for knowing demand for local food
Table 15. Local Food Demand Percepons by Region, Populaon Proximity, and CSA Age
Demand Changes NE NC SE W Rural Urban
Newer
CSA
Older
CSA
Same or declining 22.4% 14.0% 14.1% 11.7% 18.8% 11.6% 17.6% 11.9%
Increasing Somewhat 55.3% 62.6% 57.7% 62.6% 58.6% 61.6% 60.6% 60.0%
Increasing Signicantly 22.4% 23.4% 28.2% 25.8% 22.7% 26.9% 21.8% 28.1%
N 85 107 71 163 181 242 216 210
20
Another important issue facing CSA operators is the level
of nearby compeon for the consumer’s local food
dollar in their immediate trade area. To obtain a beer
understanding of how CSAs view their primary sources of
market compeon, surveyed CSA managers were asked
to rank the relave importance of emerging sources of
compeon facing their CSA. The overall rankings are
summarized in table 16. New CSAs entering the trade area
and the expansion of established CSAs in the same trade
area were ranked as the highest sources of compeon,
followed by farm markets. Natural food stores that
typically oer both organic and local products followed
next in the rankings roughly equal with tradional and
high-end grocers oering local food. Restaurants selling
local food and home food delivery services ranked near
the boom of the list for emerging sources of market
compeon.
Interesngly, several of the survey respondents included
wrien comments regarding compeon for local food
sales, nong that in their area they perceived lile
threat from compeon in the marketplace, as the
emergence/expansion of other CSAs and the increased
number of retailers oering local foods actually served
to raise awareness of local food among consumers and
subsequently drove up interest in CSA parcipaon.
Consequently, they saw the overall expansion in local
food market outlets as essenally complementary to
their business rather than a source of direct compeon.
Other industry representaves noted the importance of
establishing a crical mass of CSA operaons in order to
implement related programs that served to boost demand
(Fair Share Coalion and wellness voucher programs, for
example).
Percepons about compeon are quite variable across
geographic regions, proximity to populaon centers, and
between newer and more established CSAs. CSAs in the
Northeast and North Central regions idened new CSAs
entering the market as the most signicant source of
emerging compeon, those in the Southeast and Western
regions ranked farm markets were ranked as the most
signicant source of market compeon for local foods.
Home food delivery services were rated as a source of
more signicant inuence on market compeon in the
Western region than anywhere else in the Naon.
Table 16. Ranking of the Signicance of Emerging
Sources of Compeon Relang to the CSA
Business
Mean
rank
Standard
deviaon
New CSAs entering the market 3.47 2.16
Farm markets 3.48 2.02
Established CSAs Expanding 3.90 2.23
Natural food stores 4.65 1.99
Other home food delivery
services
4.65 2.47
Tradional grocers oering
local food
4.73 2.14
High-end grocers 5.25 2.06
Restaurants oering local food 5.87 2.13
Note: (rate highest = 1 to lowest = 8); N = 433
Dierences were noted between rural and urban markets
as well. Managers of rural CSAs ranked farm markets
as a greater inuence on local food market compeon
than urban markets, while urban markets ranked home
delivery services and high-end grocers higher than their
rural counterparts (using t-tests comparing average rangs
between the two groups). Newer CSAs rated natural food
stores as relavely greater sources of market compeon
than older CSAs while older CSAs rated home delivery
services as greater sources of market compeon than
younger CSAs. These comparisons are highlighted in
table 17.
21
Table 17. Emerging Compeon Rankings by Region, Populaon Proximity, and CSA Age
NE NC SE W Rural Urban
Newer
CSA
Older
CSA
New CSAs entering market 3.01 3.27 3.65 3.76 3.33 3.57 3.55 3.40
Farm markets 3.37 3.42 3.56 3.55 3.26 3.64** 3.55 3.42
Established CSAs expanding 3.66 3.66 4.18 4.06 3.83 3.98 3.74 4.07
Natural food stores 4.67 4.59 4.94 4.54 4.52 4.76 4.43 4.87**
Other home food delivery services 5.21 4.64 4.77 4.33 4.96 4.44** 4.87 4.43*
Tradional grocers oering local food 5.06 4.59 4.59 4.70 4.86 4.62 4.67 4.78
High-end grocers 5.06 5.74 4.76 5.24 5.54 5.02** 5.28 5.21
Restaurants oering local food 5.95 6.09 5.54 5.82 5.69 5.98 5.91 5.82
Note: t-tests were conducted for mean ranking levels for each market type between two group sets for rural-urban and newer-older CSAs.
* and ** indicate stascal signicance at the 10% and 5% levels.
Following the quesons on market demand and
compeon, managers were asked to evaluate shareholder
recruitment for their CSA for 2014 compared to previous
years. Overall, about an equal number reported
recruitment to be more dicult and less dicult. Table 18
summarizes these results.
As illustrated in table 19, shareholder recruitment was
explored across regions, rural/urban areas, and CSA age,
and revealed relavely minor dierences in responses.
The CSAs in the North Central and Southeast regions
seemed to have generally less diculty with recruitment,
consistent with the demand observaons noted earlier.
Newer CSAs also expressed slightly less recruitment
diculty – 35 percent reported recruitment to be
“somewhat less” or “much less” dicult in 2014 compared
to previous years, as opposed to 20 percent among
managers of older CSAs. This laer result is not surprising
given that older CSAs presumably have to deal more with
replacement due to subscriber arion in their designated
market areas.
Table 18. CSA shareholder recruitment for 2014
compared to previous years has been….
Recruitment Diculty N Percent
Much less dicult 43 11.2%
Somewhat less dicult 62 16.1%
About the same 180 46.9%
Somewhat more dicult 78 20.3%
Much more dicult 21 5.5%
N = 384 does not include 12 that indicated queson doesn’t apply.
22
Table 19. CSA shareholder recruitment for 2014 by Region, Urban Proximity, and CSA Age
Recruitment Diculty NE NC SE W Rural Urban
Newer
CSA
Older
CSA
Much less dicult 8% 16% 16% 8% 13% 10% 14% 8%
Somewhat less dicult 13% 20% 17% 15% 16% 16% 21% 12%
About the same 49% 39% 44% 52% 48% 46% 43% 51%
Somewhat more dicult 22% 18% 22% 20% 17% 23% 18% 23%
Much more dicult 8% 7% 2% 5% 5% 6% 4% 7%
N 76 88 64 156 164 220 194 190
Cooperation Potential for
Multi-Farm CSAs
CSA business model innovaons take many forms. They
include business models built on a foundaon of mul-
farm sourcing and/or regional CSA cooperaon to either
access non-tradional markets or build scale and scope
economies to overcome distribuon and promoon
challenges.
There are a variety of ways farms can collaborate to
pursue their CSA mission with both informal and formal
partnerships, ranging from informal shared methods of
distribuon to the creaon of formalized cooperaves
like those featured as a case study in this report - Penn’s
Corner Farm Alliance and the FairShare Coalion in
Wisconsin.
In the survey we explored a series of prospecve
CSA business acvies that could potenally involve
cooperaon, focusing parcularly at the level of CSA
manager interest in engaging in a specic range of
cooperave acvies. The survey did not aempt to
explore an exhausve list of potenal business funcons
but rather focused on selected cooperave acvies
observed in earlier CSA site visits. Specically, the
prospecve cooperave business acvies addressed
in the survey included adding specialty food products,
supplemenng inventory as needed, shared delivery
pracces, shared educaonal resources, low-income
voucher programs, health and wellness voucher programs
,6
and regional recruitment fairs.
Among those CSAs that were already engaged in mul-
farm acvies, the most common mul-farm acvies
already being pursued included supplemenng new
specialty products (27.8 percent) and supplemenng
inventory when short (21 percent). Relavely small
numbers of CSA reported cooperang on recruitment
fairs (15.9 percent), low-income voucher programs (14.4
percent), and shared educaonal programs (11.4 percent).
Interest in pursuing selected mul-farm collaboraons
was relavely high for several of the mul-farm acvies
listed in the survey – parcularly health and wellness
vouchers and low-income voucher programs, where
the most common response was “very interested.”
Shared educaonal resources and shared recruitment/
promoonal fairs also indicated having at least possible
interest (or current mul-farm parcipaon) from about 85
percent of the managers. In addion, joint markeng with
other producers was on the increase, as noted elsewhere
in this survey (see table 12).
Acvies where there was demonstrably less interest
in mul-farm cooperaon included shared delivery and
supplemenng delivery when short (response was “not
interested”). Interest and parcipaon in these selected
mul-farm acvies is summarized in table 20.
6 See also Greg Jackson, Amanda Raster, and Will Shauck (2011) for an extended discussion of the health insurance rebate iniaves in
Wisconsin.
23
Table 20. Please indicate your interest in cooperang with other producers on aspects of your CSA
Acvity
Not
interested
Possibly
interested
Very
interested
Already
doing this
N
Adding specialty products I don’t carry
104 161 44 119 428
24.3% 37.6% 10.3% 27.8%
Supplemenng inventory when short
166 124 48 90 428
38.8% 29.0% 11.2% 21.0%
Shared delivery
196 149 57 27 429
45.7% 34.7% 13.3% 6.3%
Shared educaonal resources
68 193 119 49 429
15.9% 45.0% 27.7% 11.4%
Low- income voucher programs
77 136 155 62 430
17.9% 31.6% 36.0% 14.4%
Health and wellness voucher programs
76 139 188 28 431
17.6% 32.3% 43.6% 6.5%
Area CSA promoonal recruitment fairs
63 178 120 68 429
14.7% 41.5% 28.0% 15.9%
24
Discussion and Conclusions From the
CSA Manager Survey
T
his study represents an important documentaon of
trends in the CSA business model. The CSA concept
has been around for many years. Markets, technology, and
markeng strategies, however, have changed, including
new opportunies to connect with demand for local food
and for farmers to innovate through new products and
new forms of collaboraon. The tradional CSA consumer
has become more diverse, moving beyond a focus on
cered organic products and close engagement with
the farm.
The data further reveals substanal regional dierences
in how CSAs are operang and performing. While most
managers point to steady shareholder growth, expected
connued CSA sales growth and protability, and strong
demand in their markets for local products, there is
evidence of variability in this outlook regionally and based
on where the farm may be located.
The CSA business model has evolved signicantly,
as entrepreneurs and market forces have opened
opportunies for the implementaon of the model
in ways quite unlike the early CSA operaons. New
products, season extensions, mul-farm collaboraons,
new shareholder groups, markeng collaboraons with
dierent organizaons, innovave aggregaon and
delivery strategies, new urban producon connecons,
and health and wellness alliances are among the current
trends reshaping the CSA business.
25
The Changing CSA Business Model –
Six Case Studies
T
he CSA markeng model connues to be adapted
to t many market circumstances. There is room
for a diversity of strategies – single farm, mul-farm,
co-operavely owned, and even non-farm owned. There
is room for a diversity of market targets, including the
tradional shareholder who prefers organic produce, but,
increasingly, the focus is on using the CSA as a way to
facilitate consumer access to local foods in general. Farms
and groups of farms are becoming increasingly innovave
nding ways to reach non-tradional market segments
with CSA shares. This includes incorporang e-commerce,
adding products through season extensions, adding
shares for alternave product lines beyond tradional
produce, and working with urban, health/wellness, and
community development partners to access lower income
shareholders. The Madison, WI, FairShare CSA Coalion
has ulized wellness plan vouchers to substanally
expand demand for shares among local farmers and has
collecvely promoted and provided quality standards
crical to maintaining the program. Denver, CO, area
CSAs have pursued many of their own innovaons with
CSA farmers by creang peer-learning opportunies and
collaborang with city planners and urban markets. Non-
farm aggregaon models to deliver CSA shares have been
emerging as well, including the Fair Share Combined
CSA in St. Louis, MO, where a small food retailer built a
CSA business around a shared vision for local foods with
area farmers.
These case studies more deeply illustrate observaons
noted from the naonal survey on CSA business
innovaons and markeng trends. The study doesn’t
propose to document every possible innovaon in
products sold using the CSA model or provide the full
scope of business hybrids that are in some way related
to the original CSA concept. Rather, the study provides
documentaon of innovaons and opportunies
recognized across a number of CSA communies that could
potenally be adapted to other farms or communies
with a shared vision. There are many excellent examples
of CSA innovators. These parcular cases were selected
to illustrate some of the changes taking place and to look
with the case subjects at the trajectory of the CSA concept.
The compeve landscape is also changing. In some
cases, this is a posive for farm-based CSAs; in other cases,
it presents a threat. These ideas are examined across a
variety of business models and markets.
A case-based approach can be parcularly useful for
gaining producer and agency perspecves on innovaons
in the CSA markeng model. We selected a set of CSAs
naonally that represented tradional single farm models;
cooperaves/mul-farm CSAs; low-income, consumer-
targeted CSAs; and mul-farm innovaons targeng
unique consumer segments with a unique health and
wellness markeng partner. We also included CSAs
associated with urban market innovaons, and a for-prot
food hub concept that ulized a CSA aggregaon and
distribuon model. These cases were selected to provide
diverse market and geographic perspecves. Through a
variety of agency contacts, we coordinated interviews with
key informants aliated with each CSA or CSA community.
CSA Interview Question Themes
The approach used to collect data through the case studies
involved a baseline of themes of inquiry. We adapted
these to some extent depending on the context, but
applied the basic themes to each case. The approach
for this study is to use a case-based approach to idenfy
challenges and opportunies for various models and
markets for CSAs and to use the case observaons as
a foundaon for a naonal survey of CSAs to quanfy
generally some of the things observed in specic cases.
CSA managers, support agencies, Extension and
government agencies, customers, and farmers were
interviewed with a view toward gaining a beer
understanding of their percepons of the changes and
markeng/instuonal innovaons corresponding with
their CSA.
26
The study themes led us to frame the following interview
themes, posed in various ways to the corresponding
producers, community of producers, and support agencies
in order to document the variety of approaches to
organizing CSAs for various market environments. The
interview themes follow:
1. How has your CSA changed over me? How do you
dene CSA, and how does that impact the mission
and markeng plan for your farm?
2. What have you observed to be the relaonship
between your CSA and other market channels, and
how has this changed?
3. What are your CSA growth opportunies?
4. What do you see as the disncve advantages
for a CSA over other markeng methods? What
advantages have you observed for your farm?
5. Are there opportunies for CSAs to collaborate to
pursue markets or manage risks? What are some of
your ideas?
6. What improvements or changes might occur that
could create future opportunies for your CSA?
What current/future eorts in local food markeng
in your region could create opportunies for other
CSA eorts?
The cases are based on producer and market partner
conversaons and are wrien conversaonally. We
provided summary observaons for each of these themes
drawing on each of the interviews.
27
CSA Case Study 1
CSA SNAPSHOT: Elmwood Stock Farm
Georgetown, KY
Tradional Single Farm Model CSA, Cered Organic
Elmwood Stock Farm possesses many disncve
characteriscs: it is one of Kentucky’s largest CSA
operaons, is among the State’s largest cered organic
farms, and is a mul-generaonal, Bluegrass-region farm
that has successfully diversied from tobacco and beef
producon. Sound management and extensive experience
in direct markeng make Elmwood Stock Farm a prime
example of a farm adopng a large-scale CSA to deliver
cered organic and sustainably grown food to a diverse
clientele while maintaining farm protability.
Farm: 375-acre farm (360 acres cered organic)
diversied from family beef/tobacco operaon
Year CSA Started: 2005 (40 shares)
Current Size: 400+ shares for 2013
Market: Lexington, KY, metro area
Share Structure: Summer, Fall, Winter shares; beef, egg,
poultry add-ons
Notable Products: All CSA products cered organic;
strawberries and raspberries; winter shares include farm-
brand processed products, like catsup, and frozen berries.
A
nn Bell, markeng and customer relaons director
for Elmwood Stock Farm, served tea on a midwinter
morning in the farm’s kitchen. It is here where the
produce harvest crew eats lunch during picking season.
“It’s one of the benets we can oer them,” she said.
A lunch kitchen in the middle of their produce packing
shed is no surprise; Elmwood is a family aair. Bell and her
brother, John, are the eighth generaon of Bells to farm
near Georgetown, KY. Their father, Cecil, maintains an
Angus herd and oversees the farm’s hay producon. John
Bell grows produce, row crops and cale and manages the
farm’s labor. Ann Bell focuses on retailing produce through
the farm’s CSA and farmers market sales. Ann’s husband,
Mac Stone, oversees their pastured poultry and sheep
producon. The farm employs at least one addional full-
me employee year-round.
Direct markeng and diversicaon, and especially
managing the farm’s labor supply and costs, have driven
this CSA’s development. “The CSA matches our labor,” said
Ann Bell. “We have over 400 summer shares, 22 weeks
from mid-May to mid-October.” The farm has 100 fall
shares (September/October) and around 30 winter shares.
To make it all happen, the farm employs 12 full-me
harvest workers and 4 to 8 part-me seasonal workers.
The total labor is similar to what the farm employed
when it grew more wholesale produce and tobacco, “but
now we’re using our harvest labor over fewer acres of
vegetables,” said Ann Bell.
28
Table 21. Changes in Elmwood Stock Farm Produce Producon
2005 2015
Total Acreage 60+ produce
37 vegetable; 1-3 berries
and high tunnel
CSA 5% 50-55%
Farmers Market 30-35% 30-35%
Restaurant, Specialty Grocer, Mul-farm Buying Club 15-20% 10%
Wholesale –Local Producers Co-op (through 2012) and Supermarkets 50% 5%
Managing labor costs, for example, spurred Elmwood to
nd more ways to add value to lower grade produce. In
turn, those value-added products have helped extend
their CSA season. “Just over 50 percent of our produce
will be #1, prime for the farmers market and CSA,” said
Bell. “So we’re always looking for ways to use our #2s
because we already have the cost of harvest labor in
them.” Cases of catsup and marinara sauce with a new
Elmwood Stock Farm label, processed at a nearby small-
scale processor, are stacked in the kitchen this winter day.
These tomato products are included in the CSA winter
shares, and will help the farm cover the higher harvest
and growing labor costs associated with maintaining 100
percent cered organic producon. Season extension
opportunies are extremely important in order to maintain
a relaonal connecon to shareholders. Arion is a
common problem for many CSAs, but Bell is convinced
that providing short fall meat share opons, using high
tunnels, and launching processed products using their farm
brand help build loyalty by allowing them to keep a longer
presence on the market.
CSA Market Discovery
Elmwood came to a CSA as an experienced produce
grower, but that experience was in convenonal, wholesale
vegetables. Twenty years ago, the farm was producing
some 60 acres of vegetables, most sold through a local
co-op or delivered direct to grocery stores. In the early
1990s, Bell returned to the family farm and began selling
vegetables at the Lexington Farmers Market. By 2005,
direct markeng accounted for a minority of the farm’s 65
vegetable acres but was contribung half the prot from
the produce enterprise.
“Wholesale resulted in a loss each year in some crops,
and that pulled the overall net down every year,” said Bell.
The reliability of the prot margins in direct markeng
kept Elmwood seeking to grow its direct market channels.
Having connected with CSA praconers through the
Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group (SSAWG)
and other farm meengs, the Bells decided to launch a CSA
in 2005. The 40-member CSA became 120 shares in 2006
and grew to 400 members by 2010.
The Bells emphasize that their CSA has not resulted in
dramac increases in net farm income, but it has allowed
them to ensure that the costs of vegetable producon
will be covered. “There’s not a lot of increase in net over
the ‘good years’ of wholesaling because expenses of
producon for retail are higher,” said Bell. “However, there
is predictability and consistency from year to year (for
the CSA and farmers market), which does equal increased
net income over a several-year period. The [net income]
reality meets the expectaon more oen now.”
For Experienced Growers
Elmwood sees the CSA as a progression of both producon
and markeng experience, and Bell said the model is not
for beginners. “Farmers market is the best (entry to direct
markeng) because it’s the best learning opportunity – you
get the direct feedback, you know how big to pick your
okra, you know what the customer’s wanng, you can
try out dierent sizes and variees, and you learn from
the other vendors…if you don’t feel like going, you don’t
have to, and you get immediate payment. So for anybody,
starng, to me that’s where they need to go.” She also
noted that the growth of farmers markets takes the burden
o growers to organize and develop the markets while also
learning how to sell locally.
29
Premature entry to a CSA model can be a disservice to
both farmers and customers. Bell expressed concern
about the management intensity and producon risks
associated with subscripon programs. “I don’t think
anybody should do CSA unl they’ve grown a couple years.
I think you’re doing a huge disfavor by taking their money.
You’ve made a commitment that nobody, including
yourself, knows you can fulll,” she said. One of the main
hesitaons for involving other farms in the markeng of
their CSA is the lack of control over quality and supply
coming from another producer.
The growth of Elmwood’s cered organic meat
enterprises illustrates how the farm has discovered the
CSA complements the farm’s sales of other products at the
Lexington Farmers Market. Beef add-ons for CSA members
are limited to ground beef and roasts. By liming CSA
meat shares to those cuts, “we’ve retained the exibility
that we needed to have in markeng the whole animal,”
said Bell. Farmers market meat sales are also higher
margin, and Elmwood has seen recent higher demand for
organic meat. By liming CSA meat shares to 75 annually,
the farm helps ensure enough organic beef is available for
all customers.
Bell noted that oering the CSA meat shares does translate
to higher CSA gross sales, but not necessarily greater
protability for the farm’s meat enterprise. “Expenses of
selling meat through CSA are higher than expenses of meat
at market or freezer meat,” she said. It is more expensive
to deliver individual coolers of CSA shares than to pull the
meat out of a mobile cooler at the farmers market, where
the farm is already selling vegetables.
The greatest growth point for their CSA, in Elmwood’s
Central Kentucky locaon, is that their products are local
and cered organic. “Cered Organic has helped
the increase in our CSA interest,” said Bell. “Many CSA
members do not nd a farmers market convenient, so CSA
is the opon for purchasing local organic [food].”
Elmwood has one nal eld, 15 of the farm’s 375 acres,
that is in transion to cered organic. The farm grows
sustainably managed cucumbers, eggplant, and squash in
that eld. “We let our CSA and farmers market customers
know of this disncon,” said Bell. “We expect this to
transion to organic in 2014 or 2015, as all of Elmwood
has been in a long-term transion from convenonal to
organic, more acreage each year.”
Season Extension
Greenhouses formerly growing tobacco transplants now
produce the organic transplants Elmwood needs. A high
tunnel, won from Bell’s entry at a trade show contest, is
used for strawberries and tomatoes. Again, labor cost
management has driven the CSA’s expansion into year-
round oerings. Storage crops, like hard squash, potatoes,
and sweet potatoes, help anchor the CSA’s winter shares.
“We haven’t done as much with season extension as we
might,” said Bell, “because we try to match it with our
labor.”
Shareholders
With 420 summer shareholders, there is bound to be
turnover. Elmwood has some annual arion, but does
not have a problem lling its shares. “We have heard of
some area CSAs that have had trouble lling shares,” said
Bell, “but our customer base has stayed full so far.” She
aributed that to the farm’s cered organic status.
Cered organic turkeys for the CSA.
30
Keeping their CSA at full capacity involves more than
markeng and communicaon with customers; it
requires oering a consistent, high-quality product. Their
cered organic products appeal to many dierent kinds
of customers in the greater Lexington area. The most
common value aspects shareholders have communicated
with Bell include -
• Desire for local organic food
• Convenience for fresh local product—“They can
pick it up in (town); they don’t care about ever
coming to the farm; they like the idea of what
they’re doing.”
• Peer trial/word of mouth—“Some are doing (CSA)
because their friend does it in another city, and
they like the idea.”
• Health issues—“Their doctor has told them this, so
they’re trying to do everything they can at the last
minute.”
• Eang local, connecng to the farm
• Religious reasons from all sorts of faith perspecves
—“And some customers are non-religious.”
Dierent faith-based groups are highly engaged in
the local food community as part of their views on
food jusce, the environment, and food access for
the poor.
“Very few (customers) have all of those things,” said Bell.
“They’re oen compeng interests within our whole
community of shareholders.”
“And then there’s some that I wonder how they can aord
it. A big part of their budget is being spent on this. But
that’s because it’s a dierent priority in their home, and
they’ve been with us for years.”
Communication and Customer
Connection to Farm
Bell handles all the communicaon and markeng for the
CSA. The farm’s newsleer remains central, and a blog
oers more instant updates. “I didn’t realize going in
about how big a deal the newsleer is, how much they rely
on us (for preparaon and recipe ps),” she said.
One of their challenges is matching newsleer and blog
content with the content of the CSA boxes. The CSA oers
share delivery on 4 days at 12 dierent locaons, including
at the farm and the Elmwood farm stand at the Lexington
Farmers Market. That means dierent kinds of crops may
end up in dierent shares from day to day, with dierent
content required for preparaon and cooking instrucons
in the newsleer.
In addion, some members may want to start thinking
about how they are going to use their share before they
pick it up. Bell es the farm’s content on blogspot.com
with its Facebook page and ancipates customer needs as
much as possible.
Elmwood was among the rst Central Kentucky farms to
have a website, and blog-style entries connue to anchor
the farm’s communicaon. “We didn’t get on Facebook
quickly because we thought it would pass by, but that
didn’t happen!” laughs Bell. She is now largely bypassing
Twier but is starng to post some on Pinterest.
In addion to communicang share use and farm news,
social media is more important for aracng new, younger
customers. “A lot of people that are recently married,
usually when the wife’s expecng…then that becomes a
reason to eat beer,” she said. “And I realize that there
is a kind of customer that will be aracted through social
media.”
Elmwood also hosts an annual farm day exclusively for its
CSA members. Some members--a small minority said the
Bells—are very interested in being connected to the farm,
even showing up unannounced. On the other hand, many
Ann Bell promong the CSA at the
farmers market.
31
members would rather not have to travel up the farm’s
gravel driveways to pick up their food. “Some are (CSA
members) because they live here and work somewhere
else and they don’t like their car geng dirty when they
come in the gravel driveway, but they like having the
organic food that we grow,” said Bell.
Regional Efforts, Multi-Farm
CSAs and What is a CSA?
At many levels, Elmwood has vested interests in developing
the Kentucky local food economy. Elmwood is Kentucky’s
largest cered organic farm. Mac Stone is also director
of the Center for Sustainability of Farms and Families at
Kentucky State University (KSU) and former manager of
the KSU research farm. “I train our (farm’s) compeon,”
Stone has said. Elmwood is a prominent member of the
Lexington Farmers Market, and the farm was a longme
member of the Central Kentucky Growers Cooperave, a
wholesale vegetable cooperave that closed its doors in
2012.
For Elmwood, the key opportunies for cooperaon
include eorts that develop avenues for many growers
with dierenated product. This preference may, in part,
be aributed to the farm’s size and scale of producon,
supporng all or part of the three family households and
more than a dozen employees.
Bell said the preference for developing avenues for
dierenated products relates to some of her concerns
with “mul-farm CSAs” that deliver orders or shares lled
with product from many dierent farms. In Kentucky,
she said, these eorts have so far been contained to the
Louisville and Lexington metro areas and more resemble
online buying clubs than CSAs.
“CSA is not the reality of what (the current mul-farm
model in Kentucky) is doing,” said Bell. “Most of this is
being done sight unseen, and they’re operang out of a
warehouse and not o the farm.”
In Kentucky, the mul-farm model includes two groups
that take orders from customers and ship fresh and value-
added farm products from a warehouse seng. “We
sell to both of them when we have excess product,” said
Bell. “But we also don’t want to be compeng against
ourselves.” She is concerned that both groups consistently
use “CSA” in their markeng. “If there was another
name for those type of enes, I think it would be more
7 A detailed study on the Grasshopper, Inc., closure of what was formerly the largest mul-farm CSA in Kentucky was completed by Brislen, Woods,
Meyer, and Rou in 2015.
realisc about what is happening,” said Ann. Blurring the
denion of CSA in the customer’s mind, she said, creates
a challenge for farms that sll oer CSA, in some form or
fashion, true to the original CSA concept of shared risk
between producer and consumer.
Growth Opportunities
Retaining current customers is the main strategy for the
future of Elmwood’s CSA. The cered organic meat
business is growing, and despite the high producon costs
that accompany cered organic meats, the Bell family
sees that as a way of improving future farm prots.
Elmwood Stock Farm also believes it could benet from
advocacy and educaon specic to CSAs in the Central
Kentucky area, much like the well-developed eorts
that Bell cited in the Madison, WI, market (case 4 in
this report). Bell suggested CSA fairs and regional CSA
cookbooks as eorts that could benet Central Kentucky
CSAs.
Another key ingredient in CSA success in Central Kentucky,
she said, would be eorts to coordinate a pool of potenal
employees and farm workers. She said this could
potenally be ed to beginning farmer eorts to help
those interested in using direct markeng and small farm
producon assume management or ownership of farms
from older owner-operators.
Elmwood sees favorable policy developments for CSA
parcipaon, especially related to health and healthy
eang, as very desirable. Ann said insurance CSA cost-
shares similar to the Wisconsin program would be
wonderful, but she also realizes many more local farms
oering CSA opons would be needed to oer such a
service to new customers.
Several CSAs in the area disconnued in 2013
7
. A few
others have just started. Grasshoppers, a large mul-farm
aggregator in Louisville with a CSA base, had expressed
some intent to move into Lexington, but just recently
disconnued its venture altogether, cing challenges with
scale and operang margins. Grasshoppers transferred
its client base to Green Bean Delivery, another local
foods distributor selling in the area. The subscripon and
delivery model connues to evolve for Elmwood. They
have maintained a somewhat tradional CSA model but
have grown it and adapted it with addional products and
longer markeng season.
32
CSA Case Study 2
CSA SNAPSHOT: Penn’s Corner Farmer Alliance (PCFA)
Pisburgh/Western Pennsylvania
Mul-Farm CSA Model
8
Timeline:
1999
Formed markeng co-op to restaurants;
$16,000 in sales
2003 Started CSA; 10 grower members
2007 Hired Neil Stauer as general manager
2008-2011 +20% sales growth annually
2012
Added ower, winter CSA program; started
processing tomatoes; four full-me
sta; acquired 3,800 sq. . Pisburgh
warehouse, oce, cooler space
2012: Share types: 509 8-week spring shares; 630 24-week
harvest shares; 237 biweekly winter shares; 15 ower shares;
~30 egg shares
Shareholder Growth Trajectory: 2007 - 200; 2008 - 400;
2009 - 500; 2010 - 600; 2011 - 700;
Current Size: 36 farms, including 10 farms from an Amish/
Mennonite cooperave (Clarion River Organics)
CSA Members:
~700
Other Outlets: Direct-to-restaurant, online ordering
“Farm Stand”
Sales: $1.4 million in 2012; about 20% annual sales growth
2008-12
Future Plans: Connuing CSA; expand Farm Stand online
ordering; dabbling in providing locally sourced foods to
universies, private schools; developing gi basket line;
adding to value-added food line; encouraging high-end
cheese making in the region.
8 The authors would like to acknowledge the authorship contribuon for the Penn’s Corner Farm Alliance case by Miranda Hileman, Extension
Associate, University of Kentucky, but also part of the Hileman Farm operaon in Apollo, PA that parcipates in Penn’s Corner.
33
P
am Bryan is bemused by the beginnings of Penn’s
Corner Farm Alliance. “All I wanted was something
to help me sell lamb to restaurants in Pisburgh!” said
the owner of Pucker Brush Farm in Shelocta, PA, 50 miles
northeast of Pisburgh. She and a handful of other small
farms got together in 1999, forming a markeng co-op
to sell into Pisburgh. That rst year, they sold a total of
$16,000 in product. “We thought it was the best thing
ever,” said Ken Marshall, also a member of the original
group and now board president of the Penn’s Corner Farm
Alliance (PCFA).
The co-op had sales of $1.4 million in 2012 with 36
member farms. Revenue has grown about 20 percent
annually during the past ve seasons. “We had no idea
it would ever be like this,” said Beth Marshall, Ken’s wife.
“And it was the CSA that has really driven the growth.”
CSA Market Discovery
From its incepon unl 2006, Penn’s Corner remained
a markeng co-op that sold product exclusively to
restaurants. The development of the Penn’s Corner CSA,
to reach consumers in the 2.4 million Pisburgh metro
area populaon, arose as the co-op brainstormed ways
to grow income while capitalizing on growing consumer
appetes for local food.
“We (the co-op) started o with no money when we
formed to sell to restaurants,” said Ken Marshall. “We
weren’t going to put in any capital and instead would take
turns doing everything…and that didn’t work. Then we
were going to work o 5 percent commission, then 10
percent...and that didn’t work. Then we went through a
series of co-op manager candidates…and it’s a crazy job.”
The original members of PCFA remember lling orders
for restaurants in Pisburgh, loading them onto a truck in
Indiana, PA, and making the hour-plus drive into the city.
“Then someone would call that night because the order
was a dozen eggs short, and we’d have to drive to deliver
a dozen eggs into the city!” remembered Marshall. “It
was a tremendous variety of products and an informaon
nightmare.”
Members of the group were acve in the Pennsylvania
Associaon for Sustainable Agriculture (PASA) and
somewhat familiar with CSA markeng. The Marshalls had
tried establishing a CSA at the farmers market where they
were a vendor in Pisburgh, and thought it could work for
the co-op. So they launched a CSA in 2003.
“We had no idea how hard it would be, just geng shares
together!” said the early members. They assembled CSA
boxes at Indiana, PA-area farms, then delivered them along
with the restaurant runs. Marshall, a rered R&D manager
and engineer, designed a spreadsheet to help manage the
co-op’s restaurant orders. “It was clunky, but it took away
75 percent of the chance for screw-up,” he laughed.
Upon a recommendaon from one of the chefs buying
their product, they interviewed Neil Stauer for the job
of co-op manager, to develop the CSA, in 2006. “We had
$2000 in the bank that we had borrowed to x the co-
op’s truck,” said Bryan. “When we interviewed Neil, we
thought he just might work…so we told him we could hire
him for 2 months at $1,000 per month!”
Having a full-me manager that understood chefs,
consumers and farmers was a key point in the co-op
developing the CSA program. “Having a manager took the
[responsibility of markeng] o of us,” said Marshall. By
2010, Penn’s Corner had three full-me sta members,
and added another full-me employee in 2012.
The co-op’s current full-me CSA manager, Karlin
Lamberto, said that the CSA market has matured in
Pisburgh, but there are sll opportunies for Penn’s
Corner to grow. “We’ll have a pickup locaon (in 2013)
at the Steelers training camp,” she said. “We also see
working more closely with companies and private schools
interested in local products.”
The Porch Restaurant in Pisburgh, PA, a Penn’s
Corner Client.
34
The co-op has also streamlined its operaons, increasing
the eciency and ease of building CSA shares, when it
acquired a 3,800 square foot warehouse, oce, and cooler
space in 2012. “Having one locaon to assemble all the
CSA shares has been very helpful,” said Lamberto. “It gives
us some centralizaon—we can be pung together shares
for another delivery run while the truck driver is delivering
to others.”
Penn’s Corner has about 45 delivery locaons throughout
the Pisburgh metropolitan area, including their 20 CSA
drop sites, something that Penn’s Corner CSA customers
say is very helpful. “I like to be able to tell my friends that
there’s a delivery locaon near them,” said one three-year
Penn’s Corner CSA member. “I do value the community in
seeing other shareholders, and the Penn’s Corner sta, all
around town.”
Relying on Experienced Growers
Originally all cered organic or naturally grown, the co-op
reached out to other fruit and vegetable growers in the
Indiana County (PA) area in 2003, recognizing the need to
supply a consistent stream of high-quality product for both
the restaurant and CSA channels.
“What grew the co-op was the CSA,” said Beth
Marshall. “There is a limit as to how far you can take the
restaurants.”
Finding experienced growers can be dicult, said Penn’s
Corner sta. Some growers do not want to pay the
commission required to maintain the co-op’s sta and
facilies. “We’re up to 25 percent for commission. Some
people claim that’s too high and they can’t aord it and
take it on their own. But I don’t think I can take orders,
deliver, collect and do all that’s needed for 25 percent,”
said Ken Marshall. Seng a commission rate that will
adequately provide for the co-op’s operang expenses is
absolutely crical. Other CSA growers with less experience
have not been realisc about the margins required to
support distribuon. This includes good management that
can help growers sort through producon planning, deal
with distribuon logiscs, manage other PCFA sta, and
help with the markeng. As PCFA has grown, it has added
key sta to focus aenon on the expanding business
funcons.
Another problem, early on, was that some new members
would actually undercut the co-op’s prices to sell to
restaurants. New co-ops need to guard against that, said
Pete Beccari, a Penn’s Corner member since 2007. “Make
sure there is a rule that once the cooperave is selling to
a restaurant, that individual growers from the cooperave
are not allowed to undersell the cooperave price to the
restaurant or chef. That will kill a cooperave,” he said.
But some of the Penn’s Corner members also operate their
own independent CSAs, including Clarion River Organics,
a cered organic 12-farm Amish cooperave in Sligo,
almost 2 hours from Pisburgh. Ten farms in the Clarion
River Organics co-op are also individual members of Penn’s
Corner.
Clarion River Organics, in addion to markeng
partnerships with Penn’s Corner for the Pisburgh
market, also sells into the Clarion and Erie markets in
northwestern Pennsylvania. Clarion River Organics also
has a CSA delivering into the Pisburgh market, the same
territory as Penn’s Corner. “There was a lile bit of tension
with Penn’s Corner about us taking our own CSA into
Pisburgh,” said Nathan Holmes, Clarion River Organics
distribuon manager. “But we nd that our two CSA
businesses don’t overlap much.” And, according to longer
me Penn’s Corner members, being able to source from
Clarion River Organics has helped provide and stabilize
product volume.
New growers are encouraged to join Penn’s Corner and
have the benet of drawing on the experience of the
founding growers. PCFA has a $1,000 iniaon fee for
prospecve new grower members that can be spread over
3 years. Penn’s Corner retains the right to inspect each of
its aliated growers, and co-op members must individually
maintain a $2 million product liability insurance policy
beyond PFCA coverage. They recognize they are building
and protecng a valued local foods brand for the mutual
benet of all the growers involved.
Quality Essential
“We prey much beat the bushes to nd growers,”
said Ken Marshall. “You have to get someone with the
right size operaon, who is consistent.” All of the PCFA
members are selling through farmers markets, on-farm
stores, or other direct markets.
Several of the growers have their own CSAs, and they all
have their own market outlets as well. “The advantage to
Penn’s Corner is for the small grower,” said Beth Marshall.
“I always say that if your farm is big enough to buy your
own (refrigerated) truck, then you don’t need Penn’s
Corner,” added Ken Marshall.
35
In short, the mul-farm CSA model provides a welcome
outlet for many of the smaller farms in the region. The
greater scale and scope has helped them to do many
things as a co-op with local food markeng into Pisburgh
individual producers could not do. Kevin Jaronski, a new
Penn’s Corner producer in 2012, said the CSA is crucial
to growing his free-range egg farm in Sarver, PA, 30 miles
from downtown Pisburgh. “Mul-farm CSAs are a
win-win situaon for the buyers and the farmers,” said
Jaronski, who said selling was not his strong point and that
he is very sased with the prices that PCFA could get for
his products.
Learning the value of having the co-op “sell,” the CSA was
an important lesson for the original members. “One of
the hardest lessons [we growers had to learn] was that
we didn’t have me to do the selling,” said Beth Marshall.
“We really rely on the sta,” said Ken.
But the key to the co-op’s growth is product quality. “You
have to have really, really good quality,” said Ken Marshall.
All Penn’s Corner members received GAP training in 2012,
and food safety connues to be emphasized.
Season Extension and
Value-Added Processing
Penn’s Corner members are all involved in their own
season-extension eorts, from high-tunnel greens
producon to inspected apple cider processing. Two
key season-extension iniaves at the co-op level have
included tomato processing and the biweekly winter CSA,
with 237 shares sold during the winter of 2012-13.
The co-op recently started outsourcing processing of its #2
tomatoes to Stello Foods, a specialty food manufacturer
founded in 1990 in Punxsutawney, PA. Prior to this, many
growers had no market for #2 tomatoes, and simply
composted them. In contrast, during 2012, the co-op’s
prot from canned products exceeded $10,000. The
products included:
• 3,650 pounds of chopped tomatoes in quart jars
• 3,076 pounds of tomato juice in 10-pound cans for
restaurant sales
• 2,508 pounds of tomallo salsa in small jars for CSA
shares
Handling crops for processing admiedly presents the co-
op with a new set of challenges, said Ken Marshall. “You
are obviously not able to pay a high price for crops that will
be processed,” he said. “And there is a lot of coordinaon
needed between growers to get enough of a batch size
to make processing [economically] worthwhile. But our
members can see the value in sending some product
for processing.” Overall, the co-op has found that the
inclusion of processed products to their CSA product line
is a convenient way to boost grower income, provide some
less perishable product opons to their shareholders,
complement their exisng fresh product selecon,
and enable small producers to oer new items to the
Pisburgh market at a relavely low addional cost.
Expanding both the range of products oered and the
length of the markeng window helps Penn’s Corner
remain compeve. “The main change I’ve seen (in CSAs)
is a change in the number of opons that CSAs oer,” said
Karlin Lamberto. “It started out oering a winter share,
then adding on an egg share opon and a ower share
opon. For the rst me, this year (2013), we’re oering
an every-other-week share during the regular season.”
Relationship Between CSAs and
Food Service Businesses
Penn’s Corner original focus was restaurants. While the
co-op’s growth has primarily emerged through the CSA,
PCFA sta—as well as the chefs it sells to—do not see the
restaurant and CSA markets as mutually exclusive.
Penn’s Corner oers a variety of
processed product opons to their shareholders.
36
Diversifying the mix of products for the CSA shares has also
allowed some growth in the restaurant sales, such as the
10-pound cans of tomato juice packed for local restaurant
use in 2012. “I put a lot of trust in Penn’s Corner,
knowing that they stand behind their products,” said
Kevin Hermann, Execuve Chef at The Porch at Schenley,
a restaurant located by the Schenley Park “green space”
between the University of Pisburgh and Carnegie Mellon
University campuses.
Hermann regularly serves PCFA products, and the
restaurant also serves as a delivery point for the CSA. “To
me, it’s all connected to having more people eang local
food,” he said. “I can’t wait unl I can get high-quality local
cheese through Penn’s Corner.”
Treve Hooper is owner and chef at Legume, one of
Pisburgh’s notable white tablecloth restaurants. He
said the informaon Penn’s Corner provides him about
its farms is important. “I like the informaon about the
farms,” he said. “I like being able to put Penn’s Corner on
the menu.”
CSA Growth Opportunities
Growth opportunies abound for this mul-farm CSA as
they build on scale and diversity of fresh and processed
products dicult for one producer to supply. They are
able to capture eciencies through collaboraon beyond
what would be happening if the 35 farms marketed and
delivered separately. The PCFA strives to keep the local
farm connecon authenc because they recognize this
is a key part of the value proposion they provide. The
alliance has discovered opportunies to leverage their
CSA drop site network to facilitate a la carte purchases
and manage more aordable delivery to other Pisburgh
clients outside the CSA.
“One of the reasons that people go with CSA is that they
want to support local farmers,” said Beth Marshall.
Extending the opons for that support, such as the egg
share and a new cut ower share, is important for PCFA.
“Another thing we would like to do is to get people who
can’t necessarily aord a CSA share into the CSA,” said
Beth.
“We have seen leveling o on the CSAs, but I think that
might be temporary too,” said Beth. “If we’re going to
grow the CSA, we’re going to have to have more products.”
They are reconguring drop sites and CSA distribuon.
In other words, becoming more ecient at moving all
the CSA shares and products can help streamline the
operaons—and improve customer sasfacon. The new
PCFA warehouse, leased in 2012, provides about 5,000
total square feet crucial to that end.
“It’s not much to look at, but our building we got last year
is a major step forward,” said Ken Marshall.
Food safety and quality assurance are also seen as
important to the CSA growth. “We already have a tracking
system, and that is good for looking ahead to food safety
issues,” said Beth. “All of our farms are going to be exempt
from the proposed food safety (FSMA) legislaon,” said
Beth. “But Penn’s Corner is not exempt,” she explained,
since Penn’s Corner exceeds the size and sales thresholds
to be exempted in FSMA.
They are also looking at some processed foods that put
a Penn’s Corner label on products to put on the shelves.
These less perishable and branded processed products
keep the Penn’s Corner name in the market place longer.
But producon and markeng of these products needs
to be done intenonally. “Our members are glad to nd
an outlet for seconds,” said Beth. “But it brings its own
challenges—when you’re processing seconds, you need a
lot of very perishable tomatoes.”
Penn’s Corner oers a cheese
share opon in their CSA.
37
One of the fastest growing distribuon channels for
Penn’s Corner is the on-line Farm Store. E-commerce
and social media have become very important means for
communicang informaon about products, individual
farms, and events. The Farm Store was put in place as
almost an add-on for the site primarily directed to CSA
shareholders and wholesale buyers. Individuals can order
products oered by Penn’s Corner producers through the
Farm Store a la carte without necessarily having to be
CSA shareholders. Product ordered through this venue
is distributed along with the CSA weekly deliveries to
one of the 20 drop sites around the Pisburgh area. This
arrangement has helped keep marginal distribuon costs
for the added product very low and the products are
accessed with relave ease by individual consumers.
Advantages of Being a
CSA and How the Business
Model is Shifting
Penn’s Corner farmer members have a pragmac view of
what constutes a CSA. For them, CSA means geng local
products from local farmers to local consumers. “Paying
at the beginning of the season is important for us and our
cash ow,” said one member.
“My reason for being in it is to sell the stu,” said Ken
Marshall, Board President. “If you don’t have the
organizaon, you can’t sell your stu.”
Neil Stauer, Penn’s Corner’s General Manager, said that
CSAs have changed from an emphasis on the farmer to the
consumer. “When CSAs were rst around, it seems like it
was more like customers saying, ‘We really believe in you,
the farmer, and how can we make this work for you?’”
he observed. “Now, it seems like it has shied and the
farmers are saying, ‘How can we make the CSA work beer
for you the customer?’”
Stauer connued, “Penn’s Corner focuses primarily on
the farmer. We make sure that what we’re selling and the
prices we’re charging make sense for the farmer. From
there, we go and try to nd customers who are willing to
support what the farmer needs,” he said. “CSA is now one
of a diversied mix of markeng channels for the co-op.”
The value of connecon to farms is indicated by some
PCFA shareholders. “I like to send my dollars to farms,”
said one CSA member. “Penn’s Corner is like the bridge to
the local farm.”
It is sll undetermined overall how much of a direct
connecon Penn’s Corner CSA members wish to have
with the local farm. The co-op has promoted a picnic at
an area farm and other “meet the farmer” events but has
been disappointed by the lack of turnout. There is also
the challenge of coordinang farmer schedules with CSA
shareholder schedules.
Branding can be a unique challenge for mul-farm
CSA enes like Penn’s Corner. Locavores who place a
parcularly high value on connecons with local farmers
are removed one step relaonally and by brand. It’s
dicult to cross-promote farm estate brands directly
associated with a specic farm and the collecve products
from the cooperave. Sll, in the case of Penn’s Corner,
the improved supply connecons with restaurants (more
products available for a longer period and less interrupon
of supply) along with the eciencies of joint CSA delivery
seems to outweigh the benets of the direct connecons
typical of individual farm CSAs or other direct markeng
venues. The tradional cooperave business model seems
to be working relavely well in this case.
CSAs and E-Commerce
Simon Huntley, Small Farm Central
Not only is Simon Huntley a Pisburgh-area CSA
shareholder, but he also provides website design and
product management soware to hundreds of CSAs
and direct farm marketers across the country. The
Pisburgh operator of smallfarmcentral.com provides
a unique perspecve into how CSAs can harness
technology, and he said that most CSAs including
Penn’s Corner sll need to get to know their members
beer.
“We denitely see lower CSA retenon rates among
non-true believers, people new to the whole concept
of local foods,” said Huntley. “We sll need to teach
many CSA members how to cook, and I think there
will be value in using technology to get feedback
on dierent items in each share.” To that end, his
company launched a “CSA Farmhand” plaorm
in June 2013 that allows CSAs, large and small, to
easily provide specic instrucons and recipes while
receiving member feedback on share items.
Huntley suspects many newer or “non-core” CSA
members will be willing to pay a small premium for
such content, and he hopes to pass that income
along to the CSAs themselves. “My company exists
to help create protable small farms, and I think the
technology can help us create some more income for
CSAs through (content management),” he said.
38
Farmer Dave’s on-farm retail market in Dracut, MA,
north of Boston.
CSA Case Study 3
CSA SNAPSHOT: Farmer Dave’s
Northeast Organic Farming Alliance-Massachuses
Boston, MA
Low-Income CSA Program
Farmer Dave’s CSA is a Boston, MA-based program that
endeavors to bring CSA shares to residents of low-
income neighborhoods. By combining stakeholders
from the housing, public health and sustainable
agriculture sectors, Farmer Dave’s seeks to meet the
shared aim of the farm and these urban partners:
improved access to organic food, “with a consciousness
of reaching low-income and marginalized people.”
Expanding to mulple sites in its second season, the
program has thus far leveraged a team of commied
individuals and agencies to create a successful model
for delivering CSA shares into low-income Boston
neighborhoods.
Farmer Dave’s Sliding-Scale CSA
Business Model
F
armer Dave’s CSA, in Dracut, MA, is about 30 miles
from the low-income neighborhoods being served.
The farm is operated by Dave Dumaresq, a Dracut nave
who returned to farm in Dracut in 1997 aer serving as an
organic crop extension educator with the Peace Corps in
Ecuador. He also completed winter educaon assignments
in sustainable greenhouse in the Republic of Georgia from
2011 to 2013.
With more than 20 CSA delivery points in Dracut and the
greater Boston area, Farmer Dave’s is able to oer some
economies of scale that benet low-income consumers.
The farm started delivering CSA shares to a specic low-
income clientele in Lawrence, MA, in 2007. “The key there
was that we were oering the CSA to the low-income
populaon but not solely for the low-income populaon,”
said Dumaresq, who adds that having customers with
various income levels all picking up their CSA shares at the
same locaon makes the program seem more egalitarian.
Groundwork Lawrence, the farm’s community partner,
assists with program administraon.
The local administraon and support has been crucial
for the farm to deliver CSA shares into the low-income
programs in Roxbury and Boston. Ginger Turner, Farmer
Dave’s CSA Manager, said the administraon provided by
the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (EBNHC)
helped them enter a market smaller than they might
normally. “Alison (Smizer) has built in the exibility in
that program for people paying with SNAP to order shares
weekly,” she said. The EBNHC makes sure each of the CSA
shares is used and paid for—administraon that the farm
could never jusfy. “The way the low-income program
works for us is having these community partners,” said
Demaresq. “They’re already there, they’re on the ground,
and they’ve been able to put in the me and eort to do
the outreach.”
Dumaresq said he usually needs 50 shares to jusfy a
delivery into a community. “It’s dicult for us to start
in a community, but once we start, we tend to stay
there because our prices are lower than other CSAs,” he
said. The weekly share price in 2012 was $21.50, and
that lower share price likely helps Farmer Dave’s to be
involved in low-income programs. Though Dumaresq is
deeply commied to organic and sustainable producon
pracces, Farmer Dave’s CSA is not USDA cered organic.
Dumaresq, who has an excellent handle on his producon
costs and market, believes there is plenty of room in the
Boston market for a CSA model that ulizes subsidized
shares and adapts to allow weekly payment to work, and
the farm’s growth indicates such. Community partners
that understand both farmers and prospecve members
is the key to making this work. Dumaresq and Turner
39
have observed a higher arion rate in the low-income
CSA members they have served in Boston and Lawrence,
compared to other members. “Somemes we’re providing
food they’ve never seen before, like broccoli rabe,” said
Turner. “That’s not very popular in East Boston.”
Dumaresq believes that low-income people might be
more willing to enroll in a CSA program if payments could
be spread out so that a smaller amount is paid per week,
possibly from April to October. “But the Supplemental
Nurtrion Assistance Program (SNAP) doesn’t want
anything paid unless the product is being received,” he
said. And because he relies on the community partners to
handle payments and then cut the farm a lump check, he
has to work within dierent accounng systems. “At one
site, we receive all their SNAP payments as one check at
the end of the season because that’s how they’re set up,”
he said. While that is far from the CSA model of upfront
payments to migate risk, “You do what you have to do to
make it work.”
Whether low-income or more tradional CSA market
channels, Dumaresq said the CSA is not leaving the Boston
market any me soon. “I see it as here to stay,” he said. “I
think the rate of growth is denitely down, because it used
to be in and hip,” he said. Turner, the farm’s CSA manager,
agreed that growth is slowing from past years. “But once
you explain the CSA model, it resonates with potenal
customers,” she said.
To keep his CSA sustainable, Dumaresq has focused
producon on perennial fruit and herb crops to supply
future CSA shares and retain CSA members. For
Dumaresq, the CSA model will connue to be central to
the farm’s markeng plan. “To a certain extent, [CSA]
has been a trend, but it’s not going to disappear,” he
said. Making CSA work for low-income residents in urban
Boston neighborhoods is fully in the spirit of the mission
of CSA, but it helps to have partners that can make it work
nancially.
In sum, the program in Boston markeng CSA into low-
income urban communies is successful because of the
commitment to health and wellness educaon from
urban community and food relief partners. Sta me
and nancial cost-sharing lower the barriers to make
distribuon into these non-tradional markets more
feasible.
Reaching Low-Income CSA
Shareholders With Urban Partners
“This program just wouldn’t work if we didn’t have the
quality of partners that we have,” said Drew Love, Low-
Income CSA Program Coordinator for Northeast Organic
Farming Alliance-Massachuses (NOFA/Mass).
Loading up the
week’s CSA shares
for delivery.
40
Key success factors for this CSA innovaon include:
1. Culvang key agency partners that have a shared
mission to help urban consumers gain access to
local, fresh food as aordably as possible, in a way
that also makes it economically compelling for the
CSA supplier farms
2. Developing and facilitang payment mechanisms
that work with cash-ow limits of low-income
buyers
3. Exploring CSA access health benets with local
health care partners, and
4. Providing program evaluaon that can frame the
juscaon for public support.
Begun in two low-income Boston neighborhoods in 2012,
the program has a wide range of cooperators. In East
Boston, MA, cooperators include:
• Alison Smizer at the East Boston Neighborhood
Health Center
• Maria Infante at Project Bread, a hunger advocacy
group
• Ginger Carver, Farmer Dave’s CSA Coordinator
Cooperators in the program’s Roxbury, MA, locaon, at
Madison Park Development Corporaon, include:
• Lisa Moris at Trinity Property Management, LLC
• Elizabeth Gonzalez Suarez at Dana Farber Cancer
Research Instute
• Julie Rawson, Many Hands Organic Farm
Local contacts in both neighborhoods work with Drew Love
of NOFA/Mass to educate potenal parcipants about
CSAs while publicizing the availability of subsidized CSA
shares for the season. NOFA/MASS coordinates share
deliveries, while housing authority sta or wellness center
sta conduct local educaonal programs about how to
use the shares. Sta at the Madison Park Development
Corporaon are especially acve in incorporang the CSA
program into other health and wellness iniaves that
have been launched within that community.
In order to make the CSA shares manageable to facilitang
partners and aordable to shareholders, the markeng
of the CSA has had to be adapted. With the support and
cooperaon of numerous neighborhood partners from
the targeted communies, there have been a few other
key steps to making this program work by overcoming
tradional barriers to lower income consumers:
• Weekly share payments and Electronic Benefits
Transfer (EBT) acceptance
Community partners help collect weekly share payments
and process EBT payments for programs like SNAP that
can be used to make weekly payments rather than one-
me seasonal payments.
9
The community partners help
manage the cash ow and collecon at the local level that
would otherwise be impossible for Farmer Dave’s. Maria
Urban CSA shareholder targets reached by NOFA and
local housing and authority partners.
9 CSAs can be licensed to accept SNAP payments, but payment must be made upon delivery of the product and SNAP funds are limited to the kinds
of fees and services they can cover. Details on SNAP guidelines for CSAs are summarized at: hp://www.fns.usda.gov/sites/default/les/CSA.pdf.
41
Infante of Project Bread said that the exibility of week-
to-week share ordering and payment was key to starng
the CSA program in East Boston. “Flexibility is important
for the low-income demographic,” she said. “Weekly
payments make it easier (for low-income customers) to
understand the buy-in.”
Weekly CSA commitments are harder to organize but are
key to this clientele, said organizers at both locaons. Ali
Smizer, who works in the EBNHC Let’s Get Movin’ program,
said, “In the past, where we were not asking as much of
the members nancially, they would somemes forget,
because they weren’t paying a lot.” Smizer provides acve
leadership with the City Health Center and with schools,
including aer-school acvity and feeding programs.
Smizer’s center is one of 35 such centers in the greater
Boston area. These programs provide excellent venues to
explain the nutrional benets of products delivered with
CSA shares. The pilot program in Smizer’s center looked
promising for expansion, but it would require addional
producer and urban agency partner coordinaon.
• Partial share subsidies
Both locaons oered paral share subsidies in 2012. In
East Boston, where the share price was $21.50 per week,
Let’s Get Movin’ provided a $6 weekly subsidy in 2012; CSA
members would pay the remaining $15.50 weekly. Smizer
said the constant commitment was key. “When you come
every week and you understand the value of what you’re
purchasing, it becomes a weekly roune.” Project Bread is
commied to nding ways to connue providing a similar
subsidy in East Boston into the future.
In Roxbury, the Dana Farber Cancer Instute subsidized
nine full shares, used to provide CSA shares to peer
educators for healthy eang. “We used the CSA as an
incenve to get people on board with the peer leadership
program,” said Lisa Moris, social worker and community
educator for Trinity Property Management which manages
the properes oering CSA.
The strategy of starng small, with peer educators, seems
to have worked in Roxbury. An addional 7-12 shares
were oered in 2012, and 10 more shares were added
in 2013. “What we know is that if there are community
ambassadors of health and wellness that are focused in a
holisc way around this issue of preventave care, we tend
to have beer outcomes,” said Moris. Peers help with
recruing, cooking demonstraons, delivery, and anything
else that can help build the success of the program. Moris
noted that the area around the properes served by Trinity
Property Management had relavely few fresh produce
market opons and the CSA boxes were being delivered
into a real food desert.
• Administrative support for share ordering and
payment processing
Administrave support, both in ordering shares and
processing EBT payments, was crical for linking the
program to farms. Since there is a farmers market at the
East Boston Neighborhood Health Center, weekly CSA
payments could be processed using the market’s EBT
machine. At the Roxbury locaon, parcipants lled out
SNAP vouchers and returned them to Many Hands Organic
Farm, the CSA provider in 2012. Payments for the CSA
shares were later deducted from their SNAP accounts.
Having the ability to work closely with neighborhood
partners is a key success factor for CSA producers
seeking to sell CSA shares to these kinds of low-income
households. Ginger Turner, CSA Manager at Farmer Dave’s
CSA, said the administrave help with processing the EBT
payments on-site is essenal for making low-income CSA
payments work for the farm. “Ali Smizer in East Boston
will swipe the SNAP card for those members, collect the
funds—just like she would take cash or check from another
member—and then she cuts us a check for the whole
amount.”
Such administrave sta me is crucial to the program
working for farmers already making many deliveries, said
Dave Dumaresq, owner of Farmer Dave’s CSA. “It’s their
sta me, and they’ve commied to using their sta me
to making that happen,” he said.
• Program evaluation
The community stakeholders, the health care community,
and the farms have undertaken program evaluaon,
each with a slightly dierent agenda. At the me of
the interviews, this was sll a very new eort and the
approaches to evaluaon were just being developed. The
results of these evaluaons are central to maintaining the
engagement of program partners.
42
Project Bread in East Boston conducted program
evaluaon with focus group members recruited from the
number of low-income consumers that had purchased
the CSA shares. Evaluaon of the CSA program in the
housing units in Roxbury was incorporated into the overall
evaluaon of the eecveness of the community peer
leaders. Demonstrang impact through increased use
and access to fresh and local produce is seen as key to
connuing the program.
Meanwhile, health researchers in the Dana Farber Cancer
Research Instute focused on measuring the apparent
health outcomes of CSA patronage. They were excited
about budding evidence of improved access to nutrious
food available through this partnership and were exploring
opportunies to measure longer term physical changes
(e.g., body mass index (BMI), blood pressure, cholesterol,
and blood sugar) and food behavior choices resulng from
individuals in the East Boston community parcipang in
a CSA.
CSA pick-up in East Boston.
For NOFA/Mass, the success of the program is measured in
how the program is duplicated in other communies and
how it expands the market for local food. Jack Kiredge,
NOFA/Mass Policy Director, operates Many Hands Organic
Farm in Barre, VT, with his wife, Julie Rawson, NOFA/
Mass Execuve Director. Many Hands provided CSA
shares for the pilot program in Roxbury in 2012; in 2013,
a larger farm closer to Boston provided shares. “There
are business opportunies that will be created by some
of these programs, and NOFA/Mass welcomes new
entrepreneurs supplying local food,” said Kiredge.
43
CSA Case Study 4
FairShare CSA Coalion
Madison, WI
CSA Farm Coalion to Reach Health and
Wellness Demand
Madison Eaters Revolutionary
Front – The Beginning
E
ight people interested in developing a more vibrant
local food system around Madison, WI, met in
late 1992 to discuss an idea new to the upper Midwest:
Community Supported Agriculture. The group, “Madison
Eaters Revoluonary Front,” or MERF, included no
farmers.
10
“What was unique was that we contacted a whole slew
of farms to see if they were interested in trying CSA,” said
John Hendrickson, a member of that original group and
now outreach coordinator at the University of Wisconsin’s
Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems.
Eight Madison-area farms decided to try CSA in 1993.
Rather than remain as a core group for a single farm, each
MERF member “adopted” a farm, establishing eight core
groups around each CSA. The CSA farms all cooperated,
through the coalion. “From the get go, the idea was that
these CSA farms would work together,” said Hendrickson.
The Madison CSA coalion, rst known as “Madison
Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalion,” or
(MACSAC), is now called FairShare, and now includes more
than 50 CSA farms as members. Much of the growth
in farm membership has been the result of expanded
demand, an increase in shared markeng services, and
economic gains linked to cooperaon around selected
business funcons. Kiera Mulvey, FairShare Execuve
Director, said FairShare provides its member farms with
strategic benets in educaon, markeng, and promoon.
“We can do this collaborave markeng and then bring
it down to the individual farm,” Mulvey said. FairShare
member farms are also able to access highly specic legal
and accounng help parcular to CSAs provided in local
workshops.
This case study focuses on FairShare’s Health Insurance
Rebate program for Madison-area HMO members, a
program the coalion’s members consider key to the
growth of CSA in southeastern Wisconsin. We’re also
summarized FairShare’s other collaborave acvies,
emphasizing the advantages of the coalion’s broad
membership and geographic/cultural locaon.
Cash Flow by Cookbook
From the rst eight CSA farms in 1993, the Madison Area
Community Supported Agriculture Coalion’s synergec
combinaon of consumers, advocates, and producers
remained commied to open sharing of informaon about
CSA. The goal was to advocate local, sustainable food
producon in the Madison area. “From the beginning,
there was the idea that CSA farms were more than just
vegetables,” said John Hendrickson.
10 Hendrickson, John. “FairShare Community Supported Agriculture Coalion...A Retrospecve.” hp://www.csacoalion.org/about/history/.
44
Sll, one of the key developments in the group’s early
years was the development of a vegetable cookbook,
“From Asparagus to Zucchini,” a resource to help CSA
shareholders use their CSA shares. The rst edion was
a three-ring binder with recipes. “There were tons of
volunteer hours that went into developing that cookbook,”
said Hendrickson. A bound, second edion soon evolved.
The cookbook, now in its third edion, is ordered by CSA
farms all over the country. A second cookbook, Farm Fresh
and Fast, was published in 2013.
“The cookbook sales provide something like $70,000 in
annual operang capital for FairShare,” said Tony Ends, a
FairShare Board member who, with his wife Dela, operates
Scotch Hill Farm, located between Madison and Chicago.
Community Connections
While developing resources like a cookbook to benet
member farms, the coalion’s membership grew slowly.
When Laura Brown became the coalion’s coordinator in
2005, she did not ancipate that the charge of promong
CSA shares for MACSAC’s 12 member farms would lead to
developing a health insurance rebate program that would
smulate the Madison market for CSA shares.
The idea for the Eat Healthy Rebate program originated
through a community connecon. One of MACSAC’s
board members, Kathryne Auerback, was also markeng
director for Physicians Plus, one of Madison’s three Health
Maintenance Organizaon (HMO) providers. “To me, the
CSA rebate program did not seem like a big deal in terms
of geng approval from the HMO,” said Auerback, now an
instructor and program consultant for the Sustainability
Leadership Graduate Cercate Program at Madison’s
Edgewood College. “The CSA rebate just seemed like the
right thing to do to help improve health in various ways for
people, farms, and our community, and (Physicians Plus)
had the agility to do it.”
Physicians Plus is one of the Madison-area HMOs that
University of Wisconsin and Wisconsin State employees
may choose from annually as their healthcare provider.
The area’s healthcare system is regional, with a low
penetraon of naonal providers. “Local providers had
the agility to create and launch this kind of community
program more easily than a naonal provider might have,”
said Auerback and Brown, as the other three regional
providers sought to oer the same benet as Physicians
Plus.
The rebate program had a so pilot launch in 2005.
11
Two of the coalion’s member farms, Vermont Valley
Community Farm and Harmony Valley Farm, were the
inial providers for the program at Physicians Plus. “We
launched it as a pilot to work out any issues before
promong it more broadly,” said Auerback. “One thing we
changed was that, in the beginning, some of the rebate
went directly to the farm. We modied the administraon
to simplify the process for everyone, and to reduce any
administrave burden on the farmers,” she said.
The year Physicians Plus HMO took the CSA benet “live,”
it was the thrust of their markeng. “It was the main story
we were telling in all our markeng and promoon,” said
Auerback. “It got a lot of incoming media interest, and we
saw a rise in enrollment.”
11 The rebate is coordinated between the insurance provider and the wellness program of parcipang rms. Employees are oered a rebate
voucher based on household size that can be redeemed through parcipaon in any FairShare CSA. The voucher provides for part of the season
share cost for the shareholder and is provided on a reimbursement basis. Addional details on the health insurance rebate program can be viewed
at the FairShare site: hp://www.csacoalion.org/about-csa/csa-insurance-rebate/.
Table 22. FairShare (FS) Health, Rebate Program Growth
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Esmated total rebates issued 96 972 1,282 3,550 6,100 6,800 7,300 7,200
Approximate # of total shares
available via FS farms
2,000 2,800 3,500 4,500 6,950 8,650 8,733 9,700
45
The impact on area CSAs was even greater. “Aer that
rst year, the farmer members sold out their shares,”
said Auerback. Barb and Dave Perkins, who operate the
1,250-member Vermont Valley Community Farm, said that
the entrance of other HMO companies was key. “Every
year, suddenly there was compeon between providers,”
said Barb Perkins. “We saw our membership grow, and
the rebate program really helped.” Rebates issued leveled
out at 7,300 in 2011 and 7,200 in 2012 even while the
number of CSA shares available from FairShare farms have
increased. Growth in the program and the impact of the
voucher program on total shares in the area are noted in
table 22.
Health Rebate Program Keys
One of the keys to the program’s success, said Auerback,
was the coalion’s ability to vet farms to qualify. “We
(Physician’s Plus HMO) did not want to be in the business
of determining which farms were bonade CSA farms
using sustainable pracces,” she said. FairShare’s ability to
vet farms was viewed as key by Physicians Plus, she said.
Another key success factor was having a crical mass of
CSA opons and a choice of farms for voucher holders in
dierent parts of the community through the coalion’s
networks.
Kiera Mulvey said that the principle of streamlining
administraon for both benet providers and farms
extends beyond the health rebate program. “Our Partner
Shares (low-income rebate) program is primarily funded
through a “Bike the Barns” benet ride between member
farms,” said Mulvey. “But processing and administering
the 200 Partner Shares is sta-intensive, and I doubt that
many farms would nd the me to do it on their own.”
Unl 2013, all four Madison-area HMOs provided a CSA
rebate ($200 for a family, $100 for an individual). One
HMO disconnued the CSA program in 2013 in favor
of an alternave health-tracking program. Interviews
with FairShare member farms indicated mixed views on
whether that development could portend a scaling-down
of the rebate program.
Mike Noltnerwyess, a Madison-area nave and a h-
year CSA operator, said he is “lucky” to be farming
near Madison. He said the health rebate program has
undoubtedly increased demand for CSAs. “I think I
would sll ll my shares (without a rebate program),”
said Noltnerwyess who, with his wife Cassie, operates a
300-member CSA. Like most of FairShare’s other members,
they also retail at farmers markets and wholesale some
organic produce. “If the rebate went away, there would
have to be some eect (on the CSAs), he said.”
The qualicaons for a farm to receive the CSA rebate
are set by the insurance company. As of 2013, two
Madison-area HMOs also accepted CSA reimbursement
from another, smaller farm coalion, FRESH. “The HMO
that limits its rebates to FairShare farms has told us it’s
doing that because it doesn’t want to make things any
more complicated,” said John Binkley. The 28-year-old
farmer at Equinox Community Farm is a member of both
FairShare and FRESH, the smaller of the two groups. The
main dierence between the two groups is that FairShare
now requires its members to be USDA cered organic or
transioning to USDA cered organic, while FRESH does
not have this requirement.
Outlook and Producer Perspective
on Health Rebate Program
Producers and insurance providers agree that FairShare
plays a crical role in the health rebate program’s success.
“As more companies came on board, we connued to
serve as an intermediary and encouraged the companies
to be as similar in their programs as possible,” said Mulvey.
A transion by the insurance providers to online signup
for the CSA reimbursement helped both FairShare and
the HMOs to streamline administraon. “We transioned
in 2007/08 to work even more with the markeng
departments,” said Mulvey. “The downside is that the CSA
rebate may not be as integrated into the HMO wellness
program,” she said.
Some of the providers that parcipate
in health rebate programs.
46
That lack of integraon bothered some FairShare members
from the beginning, said Laura Brown. “The voucher
program was tremendous,” she said. “But many farms
felt they were geng members that weren’t good CSA
members,” added Brown. That is, new members aracted
by the health rebate were not as invested in knowing the
farm and the farmer and are less likely to exhibit loyalty to
a certain CSA. “You wouldn’t think that people would shell
out $600 for a CSA membership and not know the farm
name,” said John Binkley, “but we’ve heard that story from
dierent farms more than once.”
In general, FairShare and its members see that lack of
connecon as both a departure from the original CSA
values and an opportunity to “put the community back
in CSA.” That may be seen in perspecves from four
FairShare’s younger farmers:
Kristen Kordet, owner of Blue Moon Community Farm
and a FairShare board member, said her CSA’s 88 percent
retenon rate is ed more to her emphasis on building
member community than any health rebate incenve.
“I’m somewhat unique in that all my members pick up at
the farm, and they build their own shares by selecng their
own produce,” said Kordet. “But that is my preference: to
be very connected to my CSA members. CSA has allowed
me to farm in this way.”
Dennis Fiser and Anne Drefahl are FairShare members
from Jeerson, about 30 miles from Madison. They are
focused on growing their CSA, Regenerave Roots, through
markeng to their local area. “Our goal is to really provide
food for the people in this (Jeerson) community,” said
Anne. But the CSA rebate program does help that eort.
“A lot of our CSA members work in the Madison area, so
they’re eligible for the rebates,” said Dennis. But these
second-season farmers see more benet for them in the
networking available through the coalion. “Just knowing
the other farms, having people we can talk to about CSAs,
that’s huge for us,” said Anne.
Mike and Cassie Noltnerwyess operate Crossroads
Community Farm, a few miles from Madison. Mike noted
that the CSA program has, in his view, spurred the growth
of so many CSAs in the Madison area. He thought that
their 300-member CSA would sll ll without the rebate
program, and he also sees huge benets from FairShare
beyond veng for the rebate program. Specically, he is
involved in helping develop communicaon from members
about producon pracces and other on-farm issues.
Other Functions of FairShare
The health rebate program and the cookbook connue to
be major acvies of Madison’s FairShare CSA Coalion.
Kiera Mulvey, the Execuve Director, said the group is
connuing to focus on other strategic, educaon and
markeng/promoon acvies. There is also a great deal
of benet to the experse within the coalion, with much
informaon sharing from the coalion to farms and farm-
to-farm.
“Our strategy is mainly to coordinate the experse that is
out there,” said Mulvey. “We have 50 farmers, and 30 of
them have more than 10 years organic growing experience.
So we’re really focused on grower-led producon-
based workshops.” FairShare has also started having its
members submit annual “fact sheets” of new ideas that
they adopted and that worked. Business development
resources for CSAs have been made readily available
through Wisconsin Department of Agriculture programs.
Consequently, FairShare focuses on producon educaon
and facilitates a few social networking events for the farm
members each year.
Strategically, FairShare has shared a part-me sta
member with Dane County Extension. Laura Witzling
works as Instuonal Food Market Coalion Coordinator.
Housed in Dane County’s Extension oce, half of her
appointment is focused on, and funded by, FairShare. “I
work with instuonal buyers to determine sources and
new markets for local products,” said Witzling. Carrie
Crossroads Community Farm CSA, is a member of the
FairShare Coalion in Madison, WI.
47
Edgar, Dane County Extension Department Head, said
Witzling’s appointment allows both Extension to leverage
resources and benets the large number of CSA farms in
the county.
FairShare also provides a sta member to administer
the Partner Shares (low income) program, some 200 of
the total 9,700 CSA shares available in the Madison area
in 2013. “You really need a sta person to administer
Partner Shares,” said Kiera Mulvey. She also cauons that
the group’s acvies, including the unique health rebate
program, take advantage of many of the characteriscs
within the region. “Just because this worked in Madison
doesn’t mean it will work other places,” she said, qualifying
her comment by nong that instuonal support could
signicantly help to replicate the program in other regions.
Both FairShare sta and farmer members said that the
advantages to the coalion are very strategic. “We have
the capacity to leverage a lot more,” said Kiera Mulvey.
It is easier to represent a public benet than individual
farm benet, and that allows FairShare to gain access to
innovaons like the health rebate program.
FairShare also connues to market and promote the CSA
model in the Madison area. “We can do this collaborave
markeng and then bring it down to the individual farm,”
said Mulvey. “The non-prot exists to educate and tell why
CSA is good,” she added. The farms then benet as more
members sign up.
Future of FairShare CSAs
Southeast Wisconsin is unique, east of the Rockies, for its
concentraon of CSA shares and number of farms focused
on CSA markeng. But transions and future trends seen
by the FairShare CSAs are similar to those in east coast
markets. “We’re seeing a lot of people adding value to
their shares,” said Mulvey, nong oerings of bakery
goods, cheese, coee, and even organic fruit from North
America in o-season shares. Meat is another emerging
product in the FairShare CSAs: beef, pork, chicken and
some lamb.
The FairShare Coalion provides a unique mul-farm CSA
iniave that creates shared business funcon but also
strives to maintain the uniqueness of each CSA farm.
Wisconsin CSAs are also building their capacity for ulizing
technology with Internet signup, ordering add-ons, and
other products. The Milwaukee market is viewed by
some FairShare members as underserved, and although
the Chicago metropolitan area market may also be
underserved by CSAs more compeon exists there from
other subscripon and produce delivery services.
48
Innovaons in Denver Urban and Urban Fringe Markets
Denver, CO, area
CSA Case Study 5
CSAs and Urban Agriculture
C
ommunity Supported Agriculture operators in the
Denver, CO, area regard their market ripe for new
and expanded CSA operaons but remain concerned
that growth needs to be strategic, given land, water,
and market infrastructure constraints. Auent, health-
conscious consumers in the Fort Collins, Boulder, and
the eastern suburbs of Denver have contributed to a
mulplicaon of CSA and local food distribuon in those
localies. Meanwhile, CSA is playing a role in markeng
plans for urban farms sproung in downtown Denver.
This case will summarize two CSA approaches in Denver:
an urban farm in downtown Denver and a farm focused on
CSA producon on city-owned land in suburban Arvada.
It also presents a summary of a broader set of key issues
facing CSA operators in Denver, based on a focus group
conversaon with CSA operators from the greater Denver
area in April 2013.
Granata Farms,
Downtown Denver,
Elaine Granata
Granata Farms may be at the epicenter of urban farming
in the Rockies. Reclaimed, repainted shipping containers
house the wash and packing facilies for Elaine Granata to
deliver food to 20 CSA members and a host of restaurants
and local grocers. Granata’s CSA farm is located on the site
of a demolished Denver Housing Authority (DHA) public
housing site. “The soil was awful,” she said. She has a
mulple-year lease with the agency, has constructed an
extensive series of raised beds, and she said her farm is
likely not to move. Granata benets from support from
the Denver Housing Authority (DHA) and said the agency
has given every indicaon her farm site will connue
even aer the back half of the lot is developed into new
housing. “We’re being painted as an amenity to new
housing,” she said. But while agency and community
Granata Farms in the shadow of the Denver, CO, skyline.
support may oset some capital costs, urban farming has
its risks. “Vandalism is real,” she said, grimly recalling an
incident where someone defecated in her tomato beds.
“I’ve had several power tools stolen, and the greenhouse
had a $1,600 equipment the one me.”
Granata shares the site with a greenhouse ower grower
and another CSA, run by a non-prot with local youth
providing labor with a vocaonal development mission.
“It is challenging, when I’m selling raspberries for $4.50
and the non-prot has them for $2.50,” she said. “I think
it creates confusion to the public about what this food is
worth.”
Pricing discrepancies are nothing new to CSA operators.
Farmers across the country have noced lower CSA prices
from those operaons that are less tuned to their costs
of producon, which are operang CSAs more for lifestyle
or hobby purposes, or are simply less business savvy.
Grananta is far from a hobbyist. Like several other Denver
urban farmers interviewed, she is well in tune with her
49
costs of producon. “I made $6.35 an hour last year,” she
said, “but I also view what I’m doing as having considerable
community benet, and it is a model for what urban
farming can be.”
Granata said her CSA customers are more likely to connect
with her because of desire to connect with their food and
to let their children know where food comes from. “I’m
not sure that the (urban farm/community) mission speaks
to many of my shareholders. A lot of them will say they
want their kids to know where the food comes from. I
would say maybe half of them get the local food thing…the
others, it’s a commitment to their kids.”
Her CSA is the focus of her farm. “The restaurants
understand that I have a CSA and that’s my priority,”
she said. “I rarely have to recruit for the CSA. I have a
90-percent+ renewal rate. I pamper my people at some
level. I am there (in-person) for (each) distribuon, and
I tell them the name of the tomato and I give them a
recipe.”
Now in her 12th year as a CSA operator, she sees her
hourly wage improving from its 2012 level. “A part of my
mission is to make a living wage as an urban farmer,” she
said.
Star Acre Farms, Arvada, CO
CSAs and Planned Urban
Development Initiatives,
Jackie Raehl
New farmers in the West can nd accessing water a
challenge as great, or greater, as accessing land. “My rst
farm was basically a three-acre plot of land in someone’s
front yard,” said Jackie Raehl, co-founder of Star Acre
Farms. “It was irrigated with ditch water.”
Access to more land and more reliable water, in part,
aracted Raehl to a call for proposals for a CSA farmer to
lease land on a 15-acre city park site in the city of Arvada,
a suburb about 10 miles northwest of downtown Denver.
“The city already leased land for hay and grazing,” said
Jessica Prosser, the city’s sustainability coordinator. “We
thought ‘why couldn’t we lease some land for vegetables
and see how it goes?’”
Raehl’s proposal was accepted and, with a business
partner, she began Star Acre Farms. The four-acre CSA
farm is located beside a four-acre community gardens site,
directly behind a large suburban development in Arvada.
The site is part of Arvada’s city park system, and much of
the site’s general maintenance is funded through that city
department.
For Raehl, operang a CSA on city-owned land has brought
her CSA to the next stage. “The biggest quesons we got
(at their rst CSA site) were: can we come see your farm?
Do you guys have classes? Can I bring my kids?” she said.
Her Arvada site is built around community parcipaon;
some terms of her lease with the city even spulate
community outreach and involvement in exchange for
favorable lease terms. “That’s how the city was able to
address some legal concerns with leasing parks land to
a for-prot business,” said Blake Angelo, Colorado State
University Extension.
Being on city land has its benets. The farm pays the
city’s internal water rate, a 30- to 40-percent discount
over municipal rates. And the city has helped establish
some permanent infrastructure on the farm, including a
building to be used as a farm stand with a cooler. “We
found the freezer in city property that was not being used,”
said Raehl. She also said that the city adversing the
farm as part of its parks program has been benecial. The
farm also partners with the adjacent community garden,
providing plants and seedlings for sale to the gardeners.
Star Farms leasing land in a planned suburban
community outside of Denver, CO.
50
But the public-private partnership also brings challenges to
the CSA farm. “It’s a 3-year lease, so we haven’t invested
in a lot of perennial crops yet,” said Raehl. Because the
farm is located on city park land, there can be issues
related to access that disrupts the producon site. “People
come around, they might bring their dogs, they might
not understand the dierence between the farm and the
garden,” she said. “We do oer tours and ways people
can come out and see the farmer and do volunteer days so
that they can feel that it’s their farm.”
Raehl believes that the sense of community ownership is
crucial for the farm’s success at its current site. “We’re
trying to cut down on our farmers market aendance and
then kind of expand our farm stand oering here,” she
said. “We really want to be the super local farmer for a
(customer base) one to two mile radius from here.”
Issues for Denver Metro CSAs
Community Supported Agriculture operators in the Denver
and Colorado Springs areas faced a major opportunity
in the spring of 2013. The country’s largest CSA, the
4,500-member Grant Family Farm CSA, went bankrupt
during the winter of 2012-13. That created a potenal
pool of thousands of “CSA orphans” in the area.
12
In early April 2013, 10 CSA farmers, as well as 2 local
food processors who oer a preserved foods CSA share,
gathered at a Denver restaurant to lend their perspecves
on accomplishments and challenges for the area’s CSAs.
Farm sizes ranged from an acre to a large orchard operator
whose CSA shares accounted for 10 to 15 percent of sales.
While only one farmer who aended marketed solely
through CSA, all the operators said that they viewed their
CSA as a major growth opportunity for their farm and
business.
Partnerships Viewed Essential
to Growth
Farmers noted several ways that CSA farms are engaging
in formal and informal partnerships, especially to help
expand and diversify the products oered through CSA
shares. A common way was oering Colorado-grown fruit
from the State’s orchard region located some distance
from metro Denver. Key to that relaonship, said the
orchard representave, was providing value to the CSAs
that provide delivery of the fruit share. “We understand
that our partners spend me and eort in obtaining those
members for us, so we share a prot with them.”
Partnering with farmers outside of direct markeng is
another approach one CSA used. One farmer recalled
how a neighboring beef farm was really struggling. “We
asked him if he would grass-feed a beef for us, because we
were strictly vegetables. And now he’s doing more, he is
branding through the CSA. It’s really been helpful to him,
and it’s been benecial to us because now we can oer
some things that we just aren’t able to grow.”
Many of the farms represented had either processed
products or encouraged their CSA members to patronize
MM Local, a Denver company processing local farm
products. “We put a scker on every jar, that tells the
name of the farm that grew the produce in that jar, so
people have a connecon,” said company personnel. The
company said a major poron of its sales come from a
CSA-type share sold annually.
12 The Grant Family Farm CSA is a complicated legal story that, according the Denver Post, led three bankruptcies and has had a series of on-
again, o-again eorts to try and jumpstart one of the naon’s largest organic CSAs, a diversied products cooperave aiming to provide shares
throughout the greater Denver area. (Miyoga, 2013). The mul-farm was sll acve, targeng organic produce, poultry and eggs through CSA and
wholesale distribuon in 2015.
One way CSAs expand is to oer fruit from orchard
regions to metro areas, sharing the prots with CSAs
that provide delivery of the fruit.
51
Unconvenonal partnerships with landowners who
provide a farmer with access to land and water are also a
part of several successful Denver CSAs. One farmer ulizes
producon from about 20 urban yards. Other farms,
such as the two proled in this case, ulize city or agency-
owned land which was otherwise underulized, so it was
in less direct compeon with development interests.
Peer-to-Peer Learning: Building
Farmers Programs
All of the focus group farmers had parcipated in the
Building Farmers program, a local variaon on the USDA
Beginning Farmers and Ranchers program; some had
served as instructors. “Building farmers is like a business
school for farmers,” said one. Parcipants give especially
good reviews for the peer-to-peer learning used by the
program. “To hear from someone who has been in the
eld and done that is really helpful,” said one alumni.
Younger CSA farmers in the group agreed that learning
from more experienced CSAs is crical, even for
those coming to their CSA with prior farm and garden
backgrounds. “I think (Building Farmers) is really
important, because farmers used instuonal knowledge
that was passed down through families, and very few of
the people I see starng farms have any sort of knowledge
that they grew up with, or very lile,” said one young
farmer.
Changes in CSAs over Time
Producer CSA experience in the focus group ranged from 4
years to more than 20 years. Obvious changes in CSAs, they
said, included the move toward more producer delivery
as well as a wider consumer exposure to the CSA concept.
“We have come to the point where we don’t really try to
sell the CSA too much. We feel like in this area there is a
prey big understanding of CSA,” said one farmer. Other
farmers noted that more educaon about what CSAs are
is sll needed. Any consumer educaon that can come
from outside the farm such as that from university and
government agencies, said some, is welcome.
There were mixed responses to whether CSA shareholders
have changed in what they value over me.
• “I feel like it’s almost unlimited the number of
customers we could sell to. It’s more a maer of
how many relaonships we can support.”
• “Customers are not looking so much for a sense of
ownership but a sense of belongingness.”
• “You have to have a foundaon where you are
returning a fair value, because from that point then
you can have a real relaonship. People that stay do
have absolutely a feeling like a member of the farm,
a part of the farm.”
Relation to Other Market Channels
Most farms were involved in one or more farmers markets,
and those markets contributed to the growth of the CSA.
One producer noted the markeng funcon their farmers
market stand provides for their CSA: “I really feel like the
farmers market served as a place for people to sample our
product before they got to the point where they invested a
larger amount of money.”
The CSA market channel, noted one producer, eases
transacon mes and costs for the farmer. “We have
dried toward increasing the CSA aspect of our farm
because it’s more convenient for us, we have found.” For
larger farms, CSA is an important diversicaon tool. “We
strategically diversify our markeng. We rely on farmers
markets, CSA, wholesale, and then we process as well.”
Farmers markets give potenal CSA customers a chance
to sample farm products.
52
Producers also note the interacon between wholesale
producon, whether for larger grocers or small
restaurants, and the CSA. “The way that wholesale comes
together with CSA is really nice, because we can grow a lot
and we can grow more of something than we think we can
sell through the CSA. We have a producon buer, but
we made a commitment early on that CSA would always
come rst.”
Relaonship was emphasized by the producers. One
newer CSA producer said, “Most of our relaonships are
at farmers markets. And somemes we would sell out of
things and then customers that were so loyal for so many
years would come up. So I wanted a way to say, ‘I will
always have it for you.’ And the CSA format provides that.”
The CSA also oers growers some exibility. “The CSA
is a chance for me to do some experimenng,” said one
producer, laughing. “If I want to grow something new
and I’m not sure that other markets are going to buy it, I
think, “well, I can always give it to the CSA.’ It’s clear to me
that the CSA is always the priority, but I also grow certain
variees for my (wholesale) customers too.”
Perspectives on the Future of
Denver-Area CSAs
Many CSA producers are commied to the cultural and
community benets they believe CSA brings to their
customers. “We recreate the culture, creang community
around food,” said one producer, who talked about
their perceived need for CSAs to be more integrated
with providing food to underserved and underprivileged
populaons.
Meat, eggs, and dairy were seen as products where
CSAs in the Denver area could grow. “It has signicant
growth hurdles, with processing and all that, but there
are signicant growth opportunies in meat that are sll
untapped,” said a grower.
Regional collaboraon between CSAs is also seen as
a growth area for the future. Groups like FairShare of
Madison, WI, could help with markeng the CSA to new
consumers, said one Denver-area producer familiar
with Madison. “FairShare is a place that you know as a
consumer you’re going to be joining a CSA that has a track
record. That kind of veng is super important.”
Collaborave eorts could also benet growers who need
specialized supplies or pieces of equipment. “We need a
potato plow once per year,” noted one farmer. In addion,
a CSA community could help coordinate donaons to
community groups and food banks. One farmer noted a
common frustraon: “There are days when I have extra
everything, and it’s at the height of the season when
everything is so busy, and I don’t have that one person to
call to say ‘Can you come over today and pick up these
four coolers worth of food that I have to donate, because it
has to be emped right now, because I have to empty my
cooler to put the new stu in.”
Finally, growers noted that there may be a shi in the way
that CSA farmers are viewed by larger produce operaons.
“We actually have direct connecons with a lot of people
that bigger farmers do not,” noted one farmer. That
could be used to benet the enre Denver and Colorado
community of farmers on issues where farms large and
small nd common ground, issues like land and water
accessibility.
53
CSA Case Study 6
variety or overabundance. “Fair Shares, being a Combined
CSA (CCSA), gathers food from a plethora of farmers,
oering fantasc diversity with lile risk,” they say.
The business was developed with both nancial
sustainability and development of a local food culture (in
Greater St. Louis) in mind. “Membership in Fair Shares
is a commitment to the farmers so they have the security
of knowing what we ask them to grow will be sold. We’re
sharing their risk and their bounty, and we’re encouraging
more farmers to grow food (vegetables), instead of
commodity (corn, soy).”
Building Suppliers and
Shareholders
Hale and Choler remember plenty of skepcism as they
approached area farmers in 2007 to gauge interest in
supplying products for the type of combined CSA they
envisioned. “The rst season, we were barking up all
these farmers’ trees and it seemed like they were thinking,
CSA SNAPSHOT: FAIR SHARES COMBINED CSA (CCSA)
St. Louis, MO
Mul-Farm Sourcing by Entrepreneurial Non-Farm
Food Retailers to Deliver CSAs
Distributes local food in weekly and bi-weekly shares to
members in Greater St. Louis, MO
Year CSA Started: 2008 (started at 170 shares, reached
225 in 1 month)
Current Size: 350 shares in 2013; 2014: 450 shares
Share Structure: 46-week full share ($52.75/week); 26-
week half share ($54 per week); also oers “Gardener”
share for shopping a la carte to former members; items
available a la carte; various installment plans (up to 10
payments); share value is $50 per week (plus tax)
Notable Products: Many value-added local products;
sources local meat from variety of farms; fresh pasta; non-
Genecally Modied Organisms and gluten-free items.
An Innovative Local Food Retailer
I
n 2007, St. Louis naves Sara Hale and Jamie Choler
shared a CSA membership. While shopping at the
Maplewood Farmers Market to supplement their CSA
share, the sisters – also acve in the Slow Food St. Louis
group – wondered if there could be a way to more easily
combine a “market basket” of local food products. The
following year, with 170 rst-me members signed up,
Sara and Jamie launched Fair Shares, a CSA providing fresh
and preserved local food to its members. The business
now serves 400 members and stas 6 employees.
“In a way, what we’re doing is really self-serving,” laughs
Sara Hale. “We’ve found all this great food and now we’re
sharing it with others.”
At its core, Fair Shares is a local food aggregator and
distributor. Sara Hale and Jamie Choler note that is
dierent from the tradional CSA model, where members
share the risks as well as the benets of the farmer. Fair
Shares notes on its website limitaons, such as limited
54
“You girls don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Hale.
“And now they’re giving up farmers market and selling
directly to us so that they don’t have to stand outside for
four hours on a Saturday morning.”
While the business does not provide money before the
season to farmers, they are paid upon delivering goods
at the 2,700 sq. . storage and distribuon point located
at the conuence of I-44 and Kings highway, right outside
Washington University’s medical complex in St. Louis.
That likely helped dispel the inial farmer skepcism. “It’s
a lot of paperwork, because we pay them each week when
they bring us the food. And they love that,” says Hale.
Sara and Jamie were not new to starng businesses; Hale
worked for St. Louis’ Schlay Beer for 16 years, helping to
grow the rst new brewery in St. Louis since Prohibion.
Choler, a social services professional in the health industry,
was interested in geng people to eat beer. Hale and
Choler had started a small, natural-bath product business
when the idea for a combined CSA hit. “I quit my job to
work on it full-me, and Jamie worked part-me from
November unl the season started in April 2008, when we
were then both on over-me” said Hale. Their sister, Lindy
Sullivan, has worked for Fair Shares since 2008.
They sold 170 memberships before the rst season began,
growing to their rst-year goal of 225 members within
the rst month of being open in 2008. Like a tradional
CSA, the sisters discovered relying on local sources
opened them up to risks unknown by commercial produce
wholesalers. “2008 was a ood year,” remembered
Hale. “It seemed like all we had the whole summer were
zucchini and squash. It’s a wonder anyone came back!”
She adds, “And I had to forget all my Excel spreadsheet
(product ow) projecons.”
Sll, the ming was good. Interest in local food was
increasing in the St. Louis region in 2008, and the midtown
area where the sisters were based was especially ripe
with interest. “I think what helped make Fair Shares
so successful is the local connecons that had been
developed over the years, with knowing the farmers
through Slow Food, and all the resources through
connecons at the brewery.” says Arianna Aerie, who is
married to Choler’s son, Kevin Warner. Aerie and Warner
joined the Fair Shares sta in the 2010 season, aer
moving to St. Louis in 2009.
Changes in Customers, Business
Hale and Choler note that the business is now quite
dierent from their original intent, which was to benet
lower income families. “We really thought we were
going to start this and be a 501(c)(3); we thought we
were going to be a non-prot and really help some low-
income families get good food,” said Hale. Choler, who
had observed dietary challenges among some of her social
service clients, said this did not occur. “We had a number
of families that were going to come and get their free
shares. But they just stopped coming. They didn’t know
how to cook the food.”
In order to maintain a viable organizaon and business,
Hale and Choler had to shi from their original aim of
bringing local food to those who could not aord to
eat locally. They also discovered a market reality that
discovered them: only a minority of CCSA customers
wished to be connected to the farms growing their food.
“Everything that we put into the shares has the farm name
on it,” says Hale. She says that, while there are some
customers who do care about where the food is grown,
there are not nearly as many customers as they thought.
That’s not to say all customers don’t care; one, says Choler,
tells them, “This is like having your best friend do your
grocery shopping for you.”
Fair Shares CCSA makes sure the name of the farm
is on every item in a share so customers know
where their food originated.
55
Kevin Warner says they have seen the kinds of members
change. “It’s like the lazy locavore sort of thing,” he says.
“The rst members were really into doing their own
canning, cooking, connecng with the food. There’s a
whole dierent populaon we’re serving now, there’s been
a big shi. Which is weird to deal with, because they’re
not as tolerant of things that aren’t perfect.
Growing Local Food Culture
While Hale, Choler, and their employees were at rst
surprised at the relave lack of interest among their
customers in connecng with their farmers, promong
that connecon remains central to their business. “We
do what seems like thousands of hours of research each
year into where our products are coming from,” says
Warner, “and our members know that we’re doing the
legwork for them.”
That has beneted some farms, creang improved
relaonships between Fair Shares and its farmer-vendors.
“A number of our customers shop at the farmers markets
and they do make the connecon, and the farmers love to
hear that they’ve bought (that farm’s) products through
Fair Shares,” said Hale.
Becoming a sort of clearinghouse for local products – a
food hub – has also helped Fair Shares advance its goal
of increasing locally produced products. “Our fresh pasta
supplier is now using our local eggs,” said Hale. “That’s
more money from that pasta that is staying in the local
economy.”
This helps Fair Shares in St. Louis meet its original goal.
“We want everyone to eat this food,” says Choler. “And
one of the ways we’re progressing is we’re geng
farmers to grow food for us that was just not available
before,” says Hale. “We have more and more farmers
asking ‘What do you want us to grow for you? We’re going
to start this, we’re plowing out this eld…what do you
want us to grow?’”
Producer Perspectives
Fair Shares CCSA, in St. Louis, sources local food products
from farmers, market gardeners and food manufacturers
of varying sizes. Within an hour, on a Tuesday in October
2013, the CCSA received a box of coee from a local
bouque coee roaster; several boxes of shiitake and
oyster mushrooms; standard commercial produce boxes
packed with tomatoes, squash and other items from a
100-acre vegetable and livestock farm west of St. Louis;
and two boxes of winter squash from a 1 ½ -acre market
gardener nearly an hour and a half away. Sellers of all
sizes are aracted to Fair Shares immediate payment and
willingness to work with food producers of various sizes.
With his family, Rusty Lee raises 20 to 30 acres of
vegetables on their farm in Truxton, MO., 60 miles
northwest of St. Louis. The farm’s vegetable sales
are about 60 percent wholesale and 40 percent retail.
The farm used to focus enrely on wholesale tomato
producon and diversied into retail in 2008. Lee Farms
now operates a farmers market stand in Lake Saint Louis
and has its own 132-member CSA.
The farm is cered by PRO*ACT – a third party quality
assurance cerer that facilitates food safety programs for
foodservice distribuon. Its wholesale accounts include
a distributor on St. Louis’ Produce Row, and it supplies
produce to St. Louis’ Whole Foods stores. The 100-acre
farm also raises livestock and poultry, leasing addional
crop acreage to grow corn and soybeans for livestock feed.
A St. Louis arsan tofu-maker customer requested the
farm supply non-GMO tofu soybeans in 2013; Leey planted
two acres. “We’re able to try smaller markets like that,”
he says.
Fair Shares CCSA receives product from producers
varying in size from gardeners to large-scale farms.
56
Interesngly, Lee Farms has operated its own CSA since
2008, when it started selling to Fair Shares. “We were all
at the same CSA meeng that winter!” says Lee. Neither
he nor Fair Shares sta said compeon is created; this
may be mainly due to their focus on dierent trade areas.
“I was kind of surprised at the popularity of our CSA in our
local area,” says Lee.
For Lee Farms, Fair Shares is a niche customer, sort of a
high-end wholesale account. “I consider Fair Shares part
of our ‘retail’ sales, because the prices paid are sll at that
level,” says Lee. He coordinates his Tuesday deliveries to
Fair Shares with St. Louis drops for the farm’s CSA shares
and deliveries to other St. Louis accounts.
Lee says that prices paid by Fair Shares have adjusted
downward since 2008, as more local growers have supplied
the business with product. “But it’s sll worth it for us
to sell here. The prices are sll above regular wholesale
prices, and I’m already coming into the city to make
deliveries,” he says. Lee also appreciates the delivery-
day payment. “That’s very dierent from your typical
wholesale deal,” he notes.
Bob Lober has grown vegetables for sale to St. Louis-area
restaurants since 1996, at St. Isidore Farm in Moscow
Mills, MO, about an hour’s drive north of St. Louis. He
focuses on specialty, heirloom crops and extends his sales
season by supplying crops like leuce and beets. Formerly
an informaon technology consultant, Lober has devoted
his full me to producing about one-half acre for sale to
restaurants during the last 11 years.
Fair Shares is Lober’s only current customer that is not
a restaurant. He says he has appreciated being able to
increase the product volume sold to Fair Shares since CCSA
began in 2008. “They take a lot of dierent products and
are fair in pricing,” says Lober. Delivery-day payment is
also a plus, he says, especially for smaller and beginning
farms.
Keys to Success
Hale and Choler both reected on what they would
consider to be the keys to success for this type of retailing
operaon – these would include the following:
• Partnership with farmers – gathered feedback on
product sourcing and payment, structured how
requested
• Local es – local roots gave credibility and
promoonal clout in St. Louis, MO, area
• Backup farmers, for when regular suppliers have
crop failures or fall short
• Good member services—allowing swaps/trades of
non-produce items to accommodate families who
are vegetarian, vegan, gluten free, etc.
• Good relaonship with Eat Here St. Louis, local
wholesale business supplying local food to
restaurants/chefs. Pool orders on items requiring
bulk quanes or across-state shipping.
• Knowing the numbers. “We’re not making CEO
salaries here. Our markup started at 25 percent,
then 30 percent and now it’s 32 percent. And our
health insurance is eang good food.”
• Deciding distribuon based strictly on member
demographics. “When we started, we let the
members decide (where the pickup would be).”
Tips and Considerations for
Enhancing CSA Success Through
Strategic Business Practices
CSAs are diverse in their business models and generally
adapted to their surrounding markets and business
opportunies. It’s very dicult to oer simple formulas
for success that apply everywhere. Interesng paerns are
emerging however as observed in the naonal survey and
case studies that might be useful to consider as part of a
strategic business model for CSAs moving forward.
Production and Product Mix
• Season extension technologies add scale, scope,
and market presence. Protected agriculture
systems can also improve consistency of quality for
weekly deliveries.
• More value-added products are being added as
complements to tradional fresh produce oerings.
Such products can beer ulize overproducon and
seconds while contribung farm- branded products
that shareholders can hold longer.
• Product line diversicaon beyond fresh produce
(eggs, meat, owers, etc.) can be used as either
higher value shares or separate specialty shares to
add value and appeal to shareholders.
57
• Sourcing specialty items from trusted partners
can be used as a means to supplement product
oerings when these partnerships can sll support
the CSA mission. Quality and consistency need to
be managed carefully in these circumstances.
Marketing
• The CSA requires considerable markeng and
relaonship building skills as an advanced
direct markeng opon, in addion to complex
producon planning – not really lending itself
very well to farmers just starng out with direct
markeng.
• More CSAs are using paral shares and payment
opons, moving away from the single early-
season payment as a means of beer accessing
shareholders with their own cash ow challenges.
• Complementary product lines can be developed for
CSAs that help product development designated to
other direct to consumer or retail customers.
• Partnerships with community groups that are
focused on food access, nutrion, youth, urban land
use planning, or food educaon/food jusce can be
used to create important markeng relaonships to
reach new consumer groups. Many agencies have
the exisng personnel resources and funding in
place that can be leveraged to reach non-tradional
CSA clients.
• Partnerships with wellness programs to pursue
voucher and other CSA promoons have substanal
potenal for building shared markeng objecves
locally.
• A number of fee-based e-commerce service
providers are available specically for CSAs adopng
on-line payments, more advanced logiscs, and
other web-based business funcons that are
important to CSAs.
Distribution and Logistics
• Some CSAs can pursue collaboraon to consolidate
packing, grading, cooling, and delivery. While
maybe not formally organizing to the extent of
Penn’s Corner or FairShare, infrastructure resource
sharing can sll be pursued to manage post-harvest
and distribuon costs.
• CSA drop points can be leveraged for spot farm
market “a la carte” purchases ulizing on-line
ordering for both exisng shareholders and
interested local patrons.
• Peer-to-peer CSA farmer learning can help new
farmers realize eciencies sooner and idenfy
feasible target markets and distribuon opons.
• Many CSAs have idened local food retail partners
(restaurant, farm markets, food co-ops, etc) willing
to help nd various logiscs soluons.
• Innovave food retailers and food hub concepts are
increasingly available and open to partnering with
farms to distribute shares and help with some of
the intermediate markeng services.
Communications and Customer Service
• Most CSAs are very acve already with social
media. E-commerce applicaons are increasingly
being developed to help beer service shareholders
with supplemental purchases, product informaon,
food pairings, and other services that could be
considered part of a larger customer relaons
management program.
• Newsleers and other communicaons that
highlight unique aspects about the farm, farm
acvies, and other community-building eorts are
sll highly valued by shareholders.
58
References
Biodynamic Farming and Gardening. 2012. “Community Supported Agriculture: An Introducon to CSA” hp://www.
biodynamics.com/csa.html.
Bougherara, Douadia, Grolleau, Gilles, & Mzoughi, Naoufel. 2009. Buy local, pollute less: What drives households
to join a community supported farm? Ecological Economics, 68(5), 1488-1495. doi: hp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
ecolecon.2008.10.009
Brislen, Lilian, Timothy Woods, Lee Meyer, and Nathan Rou. 2015. “Grasshoppers Distribuon: Lessons Learned and
Lasng Legacy,” University of Kentucky Experiment Staon Special Report Series, SR-108, 26 p., January, hp://www2.
ca.uky.edu/agc/pubs/SR/SR108/SR108.pdf
Brusch, Megan and Ma Ernst. 2010. “A Farmer’s Guide to Markeng Through Community Supported Agriculture
(CSAs)”, Center for Protable Agriculture Publicaon PB 1797, University of Tennessee Extension, December.
Ernst, Ma and Timothy Woods. 2009. “Community Supported Agriculture (CSAs)”, New Crop Opportunity Center
Markeng Bullen, University of Kentucky, August. hp://www.uky.edu/Ag/NewCrops/csareport.pdf
Galt, Ryan E. 2011. “Counng and mapping Community Supported Agriculture in the United States and California:
contribuons from crical cartography/GIS”. ACME: An Internaonal E-Journal for Crical Geographies 10(2):131-162
Galt, Ryan E., Libby O’Sullivan, Jessica Becke, and Colleen Hiner. 2012. “Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is
thriving in the Central Valley”. California agriculture 66(1):8-14. hp://californiaagriculture.ucanr.org/landingpage.
cfm?arcle=ca.v066n01p8&fulltext=yes
Henderson, Elizabeth, & Van En, Robyn. 1999. Sharing the Harvest: A Cizen’s Guide to Community Supported
Agriculture. White River Juncon, Vermont: Chelsea Green Publishing Company.
Huntley, Simon. 2014. “The 2014 CSA Farming Annual Report”, hp://www.memberassembler.com/hub/csa-report
Jackson, Greg, Amanda Raster, and Will Shauck. 2011. “An analysis of the impacts of health insurance iniaves
on community supported agriculture in southern Wisconsin”. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community
Development. hp://dx.doi.org/10.5304/jafscd.2011.021.002
Lass, D., G.W. Stevenson, J. Henrickson, and K. Ruhf. 2003. “CSA Across the Naon: Findings from the 1999 CSA
Survey”, Madison, WI: University of Madison-Wisconsin, Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. hp://www.cias.
wisc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/csaacross.pdf
Lass, Daniel, Ashley Bevis, G.W. Stevenson, John Hendrickson, and Kathy Ruhf. 2003. “Community Supported
Agriculture entering the 21st century: results from the 2001 naonal survey”, University of Massachuses, Department
of Resource Economics sta paper. hp://www.cias.wisc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/csa_survey_01.pdf
Low, Sarah A. and Stephen Vogel. 2011. “Direct and Intermediated Markeng of Local Foods in the United States,”
USDA-ERS Economic Research Report No. ERR-128. November 2011. hp://www.ers.usda.gov/publicaons/err-
economic-research-report/err128.aspx
Miyoga, David. 2013. “Grant Family Farms comes back with new CSA called Grant Farms”, Denver Post, July 3, 2013.
hp://www.denverpost.com/ci_23595232/grant-family-farms-comes-back-new-csa-called
59
Oberholtzer, Lydia. 2004. “Community Supported Agriculture in the Mid-Atlanc Region: Results of a Shareholder
Survey and Farmer Interviews,” Small Farm Success Project, hp://www.winrock.org/wallace/wallacecenter/documents/
wc-CSAReport.pdf, July 2004.
Strohlic, Ron and Crispin Shelley. 2004. “Community Supported Agriculture in California, Oregon and Washington:
Challenges and Opportunies.” California Instute for Rural Studies. hp://www.cirsinc.org/Documents/Pub0504.1.pdf
USDA. 2009. 2007 Census of Agriculture, Selected Markeng Pracces, Table 44. May. hp://www.agcensus.usda.gov/
Publicaons/2007/Full_Report/Volume_1,_Chapter_2_US_State_Level/st99_2_044_044.pdf.
USDA. 2014. 2012 Census of Agriculture, Selected Pracces, Table 43. May. hp://www.agcensus.usda.gov/
Publicaons/2012/Full_Report/Volume_1,_Chapter_1_US/usv1.pdf
Woods, Timothy, Ma Ernst, Stan Ernst, and Nick Wright, “2009 Survey of Community Supported Agriculture Producers,”
Ag Economics Extension Series 2009-11, University of Kentucky, July, 2009. hp://www.uky.edu/Ag/NewCrops/
csareport.pdf
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Photo Credits
Cover
USDA
Cover
USDA
Cover
Fair Shares CCSA
Cover
USDA
Cover
Neil Stauer
Page 3
Rachel Homan
East Boston Neighborhood
Health Center
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USDA
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USDA
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USDA
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USDA
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USDA
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USDA
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Tim Woods
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Tim Woods
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Tim Woods
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Neil Stauer
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Tim Woods
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Lydia Vanderhill
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Karlin Lamberto
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Tim Woods
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Tim Woods
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Tim Woods
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Tim Woods
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Rachel Homan
East Boston Neighborhood
Health Center
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Rachel Homan
East Boston Neighborhood
Health Center
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FairShare CSA Coalion
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Tim Woods
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FairShare CSA Coalion
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Tim Woods
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Tim Woods
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