How to reach markets?

I remember the last time I was living on a rural farm in Boon County and one of the biggest challenges was reaching markets, getting food to the people who want it.  The old farmer who was living there suggested taking a basket of beans down to the main road and trying to sell them to passers-by.  I'm not sure he wasn't just trying to get some peace and quiet.  "There's got to be a better way!"

I'm imagining some sort of online platform (I'm a computer nerd. Sorry about the computers by the way, they were not supposed to suck so badly.) some sort of website where people who are growing food (in what amounts to odd lots from the POV of the mass industrial ag system) can go to connect with people who want the freshest organically- and regeneratively-grown food they can get, you know, chefs and gourmets and foodies...  It would be sort of like Craigslist but for (small-scale, local, ecological) food.

Ideally it would let buyers select what they wanted to buy from you before you even plant it.  I.e. Alice wants 200lb of a certain variety of tomato, she can "book" them in advance and then growers can-- I dunno, bid on it?  --and then plant them knowing they're already sold.  Obviously there would have to be mechanisms in place to adjust to ongoing circumstances, weather destroys the crops, the restaurant goes out of business, etc.  But that's what computers are for, eh?  I would set it up so that everything is open and visible, so people can adjust based on feedback.  There's no reason to hide anything in this case.

There's got to be something like that already, no?


There could also be a "backstop" service for produce that can't be sold or given away: alcohol fuel production!  Anything with any sugar or starch in it can be made into fuel and byproducts (which are good feed: yeast = protein.)  I haven't run any numbers (yet) but I imagine a minimum payment of $0.50/lb or something?  Meaning that whatever you grow and can't sell and don't want to compost (or whatever) on your farm you could sell to the fuel service for at least that much (more if it's something high in sugar or starch).

I could see this paired with an aerial drone delivery service that cuts time/cost of delivery.  Fuel the drones with the alcohol?  (Really we want fuel cells.  Burning alcohol is not as energy efficient.)

Some folks in my area talk with the produce manager at the local grocery to have them offer fresh produce.

Then there are local Farmer's Markets.

Have you looked into CSA:

For over 25 years, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) has become a popular way for consumers to buy local, seasonal food directly from a farmer.

https://www.localharvest.org/csa/

Aid in the development of new and additional farmers' markets, roadside stands, and community support agricultural programs.

https://www.fns.usda.gov/sfmnp/senior-farmers-market-nutrition-program

I am looking forward to learning other suggestions.

I'm not sure if it's available in your area, but Market Wagon fits the first part of your post. https://marketwagon.com

Short video about the concept: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2c6Y-O-_P0

Another short video from a vendor's perspective: https://youtu.be/xJq6hvQIXsE

Perhaps you could pitch some of your other ideas to them. =)

Local Harvest is another option: https://www.localharvest.org/store  

They both only hit the first note of your post.

I'll be following to see if there are other similar concepts.

@Anne Miller Those are good suggestions, and I like the CSA model, but I don't think it would work for me because we're there aren't enough prospective customers around my place.  The fellow who taught me Permaculture was grossing about $250k/year on a couple of acres, but he was also on the SF peninsula. If I recall correctly, his customers came to him to pick up their boxes.

@Isabelle Walter  MarketGarden.com is almost what I'm looking for (although they are not in my area) but their way of doing it leaves something to be desired from my point of view.  For one thing, there's nothing there about regenerative ag?  For another, this is a closed proprietary system.  In my opinion, as a computer nerd, this is just another misguided attempt to get between people and their computers and "extract rent" as the kids say.  I couldn't find any information about how much they charge their vendors.  That's a red flag right there.  They also don't provide an email address or phone number to contact them, instead you have to fill out and submit a form.  That's another red flag.

From the Permie point of view this is just more of the same: the philosophy of the firm is about control and extraction, not coordination and return-of-surplus.  They are fundamentally conflicted in my opinion.

Also, as a savvy computer nerd I browse the web with Javascript deactivated.  JS is almost always only used for evil, so I leave it off.  As with almost all sites these days, this site uses Javascript to let the big tech companies spy on you.  It uses googletagmanager.com so it's part of the so-called "surveillance capitalism" *regardless* of anything else they do or how "green" they or any of that.  They are reporting on you to Google.  Then when I activate JS for marketwagon.com (the menu doesn't work without JS) it also pulls in ads-twitter.com and facebook.com, so it's fully integrated into the big boys.  They're telling Google and Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg everything you're doing.  I don't know about you, but that makes me uncomfortable.

Sorry to sound so negative.  Like I said MarketGarden.com is almost what I'm looking for, just not like that.

The link you gave for LocalHarvest https://www.localharvest.org/store was 403 Forbidden but their home page is interesting https://www.localharvest.org/ but it doesn't actually say what it is?  Is it a market site or just a way to connect with farmers?

(They also use  googletagmanager.com.  Everybody does.  It's a scourge I tell you!)