The Produce Moms Podcast

"I can walk out into every field and eat what I've worked for. It's fun to share that product with people."

Drew Ketelsen (10:05 - 10:13)

Family is at the center of HMC Farms, which has been owned and operated by the McClarty Family since 1887. Starting with just 40 acres of land more than a century ago, HMC Farms now grows, packs, ships and sells tree fruit and table grapes. After falling in love with plums and plumcots, HMC has discovered a new proprietary variety and aptly named it - Plumsicle.

As a fifth-generation farmer, Chelsea's roots are deep in agriculture, but the same can't be said for her husband, Drew Ketelsen. The two met in college while Drew was studying civil engineering. After graduation, Chelsea chose to move home to work with the family, while Drew went to San Francisco to begin his engineering career. After two years of dating long-distance, Drew made the decision to follow his heart and join Chelsea. While looking for jobs in the Central Valley, he was given an opportunity to work on the family farm.

"I was looking for engineering jobs when Chelsea's brother and dad said, 'Hey, do you want to be a grape farmer?'" Drew Ketelsen (07:42 - 07:52)

Growing up in Lake Tahoe, Drew knew nothing about agriculture or farming, but the family took a chance and threw him straight in. Just as he started, a table grape partner left the business, opening up an opportunity for him to redesign their table grape business from the ground up. With engineering in mind, Drew had to break out of that "shell" of wanting to map everything out so it was perfect, however his background did help him with the more technical aspects of the business and inspired him to introduce new technology into the field. To Drew, the challenge is what's most rewarding about farm management, and now he is going into his 12th season with HMC Farms.

An ever-growing issue in agriculture is lack of labor, with people moving away from labor-intensive jobs. Less labor means less harvesting, which leads to less of a selection of produce in grocery stores.

Automated harvesting is still in the early stages of development, but in the meantime agricultural innovations like harvest platforms are helping to remove ladders from the field and make the harvest process more efficient. Ag technology is one focus for Drew, utilizing his engineering experience to bring HMC Farms toward more mechanized crops. Moving this direction is vital not only to keep farms like HMC in business, but also to keep the food supply going to consumers.

One of HMC Farms' newest and most exciting fruits is called Plumsicle. It is unlike any other plum or plumcot, with an incredibly sweet fruit punch flavor, and it's only grown by HMC Farms. Plums are a huge focus of HMC Farms. They are, in fact, the only company with a packing facility dedicated solely to plums and plumcots. With so many exiting new varieties and incredible health benefits, plums and plumcots, especially Plumsicle, will soon start to receive the attention they deserve.

"Nothing is being grown in a lab, it's all cross-pollination. There's no GMO's" Chelsea Ketelsen (20:34 - 20:41)

With Plumsicle, almost everyone at HMC Farms had a chance to be involved in the process of getting this proprietary variety off the ground. When choosing the new variety, employees were able to taste test and choose their favorites. Most people in the office contributed options to name the new variety, and ultimately the selection came down to an old-fashioned vote. Both Drew and Chelsea agree that the name Plumsicle is fitting, as they describe it being sweeter than candy (just a healthier option).

"Somebody asked me 'if you can put any fruit tree or vine on your property, what would you do?' and I said 'I didn't grow up in Ag, but I'm 12 years into this and it would be the Plumsicle because it's so amazing.'" Drew Ketelsen (02:24 - 02:42)

HMC Farms is currently in the thick of Plumsicle season, so make sure you head to your local store and grab some before they're gone!

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

"As more sustainable packaging becomes available, the cost will go down. We just really need to invest in that"

Kaci Komstadius (14:23 - 14:34)

While she recycled household products as a child Marketing Manager at Sage Fruit Company, Kaci Komstadius was influenced to take further steps to living a more sustainable lifestyle after seeing how conscious her fiance's family is with reducing waste. After applying it to her home, she then began to take it to her job at Sage Fruit and began researching more sustainable and earth-friendly product packaging for the company.

Owned by multiple growers, packers, and shippers, Sage Fruit Company is a sales and marketing firm of northwest tree fruits located in Washington supplying fruit year-round. While you might see Sage Fruit products in your local grocery stores, their products are shipped and sold across the globe. Memories of picking fruit at roadside stands with her grandparents drew Kaci Komstadius to the company and, as the Consumer Marketing Manager, she's now on a path to provide more sustainable produce packaging.

Growing up, Kaci and her family recycled "easy" items like newspapers and aluminum cans but their sustainability ended there. After seeing how low-waste her fiance's family was, she decided to pay more attention to her usage as well. It then became a passion project for her at home by finding different and easier ways to cut out waste. After just adding at-home compost, her household of two got down to creating just one bag of trash a week.

This began to translate into her job working in crop farming. Kaci began to realize the amount of packaging that was put into fresh produce and she wanted to find a way to make it better.

As much as we want to be good stewards of the earth, the grab-n-go model in grocery stores works quite well. As consumers, sometimes we want to do what's quickest and simplest, and that doesn't always consist of an earth-friendly option.

With that in mind, Kaci set a goal to find a different kind of packaging that is going to allow that "easy" model to still take place, without having a negative impact on the planet.

Any type of change is challenging, and Kaci certainly faced that. More sustainable options are also more expensive. Consumers want to have packaging that is more earth-friendly, but the reality is they may not be willing to pay extra for it. Growers and stakeholders still need to make their bottom line, and more times than not, sustainable packaging might not always fit in. It has been helpful, though, to see many big retailers make a public push for sustainable options like setting goals of "no plastic bags by 2023". This shows they want these options, and that has been a driving force for Kaci to take steps to find them.

"When new sustainable packaging started coming out, I started going through and trying to research what the best option would be because we hear about microplastics that can be just as bad." Kaci Komstadius (10:57 - 11:10)

After loads of research, Kaci and Sage Fruit are currently testing a Bio-Able bag for their organic cherries. Organic cherries were chosen as it's more likely something the demographic of organic consumers are looking for. While these bags aren't technically biodegradable, they do break down two years after production. Kaci found this to be a perfect option for consumers that aren't necessarily composting at home, but are looking for a way to do something better. Even though these bags may be sent to the landfill, they do break down quicker than plastic bags and create biogases. The recycling loop closes, as landfills are collecting these biogases and then selling them to energy companies as a renewable energy source.

The biolabel bag for organic cherries is only the beginning for Sage Fruit Company. While it's a long process, they're continuously working on the first steps on innovation for sustainable produce packaging.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"I could have learned what I did about plant-based nutrition and kept it to myself. But that's not who I am. I need to curate some experiences for folks."

LA Dunn (6:04 - 6:14)

As a city-kid raised in New York, Founder of Black Girls Eat, LA Dunn's parents always made sure she had a green vegetable at dinner. As she got older and noticed some changes to her body, she decided to take her nutrition into her own hands while teaching other women how they can too.

It can be difficult, at times, to find a doctor that can advocate for your health but LA Dunn found one in a rheumatologist when she realized she was having chronic aches and pains. After taking signals from her body, LA began researching more into whole foods and plant-based nutrition. While she assumed this would limit her access to healthy and enjoyable meals, it, in fact, did the opposite.

After taking classes and doing the research, LA changed her mindset on not only how she cooks, but how she shops. Focusing more around plants for meals, rather than meat opened her up to try new things and be adventurous with her food.

With a background in education, LA always hungered to not only learn more, but share her knowledge. After learning what she did for herself, she started sharing it with other women. Discussions turned into shopping trips, and then into cooking and having these experiences together. This is what went on to inspire her to create Black Girls Eat.

"I'm here to alleviate stress, and help create a clear pathway to reach your own goals. When the goal is to eat a little healthier, we can do that together." LA Dunn (21:17 - 21:18)

While back then it was simple to meet in-person and have these discussions about nutrition, COVID-19 made everything take a bit of a turn. As they were unable to gather and shop together as easily, LA began to focus more on virtual learning. With the ability to add more to the website, Black Girls Eat expanded to virtual coaching, and added various partnerships.

Sometimes when we hear the term "plant-based", our minds immediately go to labels like Vegetarian, Vegan or Pescetarian. But these types of labels can be overwhelming and intimidating when looking for whole food nutrition. LA's goal with Black Girls Eat is to be an advocate for her clients to simply eat better and differently.

Accessibility can be a major roadblock when clients consider plant-based nutrition, but LA and Black Girls Eat show that there are budget friendly options that are not also pre-packaged, processed food. Thanks to a partnership with Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture in New York, Black Girls Eat is able to educate clients on the possibilities and ease of urban farming and sustainability.

While they can be picky eaters at times, it can be important to get children more involved as well. By explaining why you're making certain food choices, LA tells her clients this can help with their understanding along with development of their own choices in the future.

There are a lot of things that aile our bodies and making better food choices is something that we can control. While a change might be overwhelming for some, LA wants to be that cheerleader for her clients on their plant-based nutrition journey.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Visit www.blackgirlseat.com to learn more about going from plant-curious to plant-focused with LA.
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"Strong curriculum resources are part of the tool box that teachers reach into and pull out so that they are successful in delivering the lesson for the day. "

John Flanagan (17:30 - 17:44)

Executive Director of the American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences, Nancy Bock, and President of Goodheart-Willcox Publishing, John Flanagan aim to work in tandem to recruit, prepare, and support FCS educators into the future by providing the most up to date and accurate research and curriculum.

Family and consumer sciences covers a broad range of subjects as it's evolved throughout the years and many organizations are working together to support the industry along with bringing in more FCS educators. The American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences is one of these and, thanks to a recent USDA grant, are spearheading the cause. The moment the AAFCS was aware of this grant they jumped in head first to support the effort by attending conferences, contributing staff time, and participating in collaborative efforts.

AAFCS Executive Director Nancy Bock aims to use this opportunity to take advantage of these student's passions and help place them further into a field that will allow them to use these skills. With a drastic shortage in FCS educators, this support system with other FCS organizations will provide resources in bringing in new educators that may not have been aware of the opportunities FCS can provide.

The "norm" of FCS requirements has certainly changed over the years, as the AAFCS was formerly known as the American Home Economics Association. With a name change brought a new perspective on FCS as the AAFCS became a professional network not only for educators but for government, business, and non-profit organizations.

"When you bring FCS students into a boardroom and ask them to speak to CEOs of major companies about FCS, they are on fire. They bring such passion." Nancy Bock (28:41 - 29:01)

Joining FCS in 1977, publishers Goodheart-Willcox has also had to adapt to changes in the FCS field from cooking and home economics to how society's needs evolve. They continue this by providing resources from experienced educators themselves.

But President of Goodheart-Willcox, John Flanagan, doesn't stop there when it comes to supporting FCS education. The publisher makes sure to attend conferences, build partnerships with educators and organizations and even provides sponsorships for awards in student-run organizations like the FCCLA.

"We're passionate about supplying the curriculum resources that help solve today's problems so that tomorrow's future looks brighter." John Flanagan (8:46 - 8:57)

With the pandemic hitting all educators hard, both the AAFCS and Goodheart-Willcox had to adapt. The AAFCS took their research journal online, and Goodheart-Willcox was able to provide 90-day free access to online courses to FCS teachers so their students could then have easy access.

The FCS field is a much more hands-on environment than other fields and materials that Goodheart-Willcox provide are not only textbooks but lab activities, exercises, performance reviews and observations. These resources can then be used by educators to train their students for the real world.

"We have to take action to ensure that family and consumer sciences is required in every secondary school in the United States." Nancy Bock (32:24 - 32:34)

While the USDA grant provides necessary support, there's certainly more work to do and it starts with recruitment. Various FCS organizations collaborate regularly and with content provided by publishers like Goodheart-Willcox, the hope is that the number of educators will grow and students will not only see the opportunities FCS can provide but will feel supported by these organizations.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"We're working hard with the co-op to try and get SweeTango apples into the hands of more direct farm marketers so that consumers can find them in more grocery stores"

John Jacobson (16:46 - 17:08)

Second generation grower with Jacobson's Pine Tree Apple Orchard, John Jacobson knew the SweeTango apple needed to be added to the farm the moment he tried it in 2006. It took a bit of convincing for the remainder of his family at Pine Tree, but after adding 10,000 trees it's become a staple of their offerings.

As a second generation grower, John's family roots (literally) are in apple farming. The original orchard was planted in 1904 on the shore of Pine Tree Lake extending around 25 acres. After working on the orchard for eight years, his father ended up buying it in 1958. Pine Tree Apple Orchard now stretches over 300 acres with apples, strawberries, and pumpkins. To this day, John and all five of his siblings are involved in raising and selling the crop, with family truly at the core of the business.

Not only does Pine Tree Orchard have the farm, but a full-service bakery with dozens of different apple pies, donuts and cider. As summer is somewhat of the "off season" for apples, Pine Tree is now preparing for the season by trimming trees, and topping off the processing season of freezing apples until next season.

The Jacobson's define their farm culture with high quality fruit by choosing varieties that are unique, with an appeal to the market that they serve. Thanks to a partnership with The University of Minnesota's fruit breeding program, Pine Tree is involved in testing of different varieties that the farm provides.

"There's technology that can tell us the soluble sugars that are available and how sweet they are. But there's nothing like walking through the orchard, grabbing a ripe one, eating it and knowing they're really close to being ready to be harvested." John Jacobson (16:46 - 17:08)

Pine Tree Orchards' introduction to SweeTango apples goes back to 2006. John and his father were on their way to another farm in Minnesota when they swung by a friend's operation in Lake City. This friend told them there was a new variety of apples coming up and introduced them to SweeTango.

"I was sold at first bite" John Jacobson (05:26 - 05:29)

After bringing the SweeTango apple home and allowing everyone else in the family to try, John was able to push to add the new crop to the farm. But it's not as simple as adding it and hoping that consumers like it as much as he does.

When adding a new crop to the grow list, it can be difficult to take a risk on what to invest in. As direct marketers, Pine Tree Orchard has the ability to give their customers a taste of what they're working on and gauge their interest.

Once the family was convinced, Pine Tree joined the co-op and began with over 10,000 trees. With significant starting harvesting cost, SweeTango has been quite a successful apple for them so far, with few apples having teh same taste and texture, and coming before honeycrisp season.

Thanks to joining the co-op, Pine Tree has been able to work diligently on getting SweeTango into the hands of more direct farm marketers in the midwest and east coast so that more consumers can access them in grocery stores

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"There's so many opportunities to travel, network, and broaden your horizons. I don't think you can get that anywhere else. "

Hannah Jones (10:46 - 10:56)

Kevin Homan, FCS student at Purdue University in Indiana, Hannah Jones, National FCCLA First Vice President and incoming political science freshman at The University of Kentucky and Kenzlee Camp, incoming FCS freshman at Oklahoma State University are all three students that have been involved in FCS at a young age and are now taking what they've learned and applying it to their separate career paths.

In previous discussions about family and consumer sciences, the main focus has revolved around how current educators got into the field. But what about their students? A recent USDA grant focuses on recruiting, preparing and supporting these educators. The former of the three tent poles is one of the most important as educators aim to get students involved by showing just how far the FCS field can take them.

While family and consumer sciences originated as middle and high school classes to teach students life trades, it's evolved into much more. The student-run Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) organization is one of these major recruitment tools for students across the country.

As the National FCCLA First Vice President, Hannah Jones originally aimed to go into the medical field. With FCCLA, she attended a leadership convention in Washington, D.C. that allowed her and her classmates to advocate for a specific topic. This opportunity to speak directly to representatives about something she was passionate about made her switch gears to now focus on politics and eventually becoming a lawyer.

Kenzlee Camp encountered a teacher in high school at a point when she wasn't sure where she wanted to take her career. Kenzlee could tell that this teacher had a passion and that's when she knew she wanted to do the same.

"My advisors were really big on showing me the model for what a strong FCS teacher should look like. That really impacted me and they invested into my leadership journey. They were huge catalysts in my decision to major in FCS education." Kenzlee Camp (08:34 - 08:49)

Like Kenzlee, Kevin Jones had an FCS teacher that influenced him to go further as an educator himself. His teacher had a knack for restaurant management and encouraged him to make a career out of it. With the assurance of job security, it was a no brainer for Kevin. Now, almost reaching the end of his college career, it's extremely likely he'll get a job fairly quickly after graduation.

Telling students they have career security in FCS sounds simple enough, but how do educators keep them interested and support their endeavours? As all FCS students are virtually in the same classes, Kevin thinks that students supporting each other is a huge factor as they all "grow up" together.

The stigma around FCS as just a culinary arts field just isn't true anymore. It's important to share the story that FCS and FCCLA teach you real world skills that you'll take with you for the rest of your life.

Hannah started in the path of early childhood education and not only learned how to teach children but how their brains work and are affected by every little thing in life. Although an incoming college freshman, Kenzlee has already learned similar practices in her high school education about how people develop. These studies and skills can go on to be applied to virtually any field, not just FCS education.

"A practical lesson I've learned in all of my studies is to remember that you're still growing. You don't have to worry about being perfect the first time. If you mess up, that's an opportunity for growth." Kenzlee Camp (19:05 - 19:18)

The best piece of advice current FCS students have for any that are interested in the field is to not judge the book by it's cover. Even if you don't go into FCS education, the skills learned will set you up for success, no matter what your career choice is.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"We want people to get this premium product, but they're not stretching for it. They're getting it at an affordable price."

Noah Robbins (6:30 - 6:39)

Growing up in agriculture, CEO and Founder of Ark Foods, Noah Robbins saw a need to not only make farmers market vegetables more accessible, but to build a brand around making them enjoyable to consumers again.

The taste of the products Ark Foods provides speaks for itself but we, as consumers, eat with our eyes. Founder and CEO Noah Robbins is taking Ark Foods on a trajectory as a modern-day farming company to create an elegant brand of clean eating that is simple, yet attractive.

With his father as a citrus farmer, Noah grew up in the agriculture field. After graduating he saw there was a need to make vegetables from farm lines more accessible to consumers while encouraging them to eat clean ingredients.

"There was a moment where I thought a lot about vegetables not as the end of the process, but rather the beginning." Noah Robbins (12:26 - 12:38)

The company started with just three acres of land and grew one vegetable, shishito peppers. They became the staple of the company as a snacking pepper with 1 in 20 being spicy, depending on the season. This brought a "fun" aspect to eating them as somewhat of a Russian roulette. Since then, Ark Foods has expanded to building strong relationships with farming partners that they source from for each of their products.

These days, other food companies are trying to cater to a higher end market for clean label ingredients and ethos. Certain foods aren't viable for certain households because of the market prices of fresh-grown ingredients.

Ark Foods is combating this roadblock by allowing consumers to have the same experiences at an affordable price point. Products like their shishito peppers and purple bell peppers, that people may have not tried before, are now possible.

But the goal is to not only make the vegetables themselves accessible but meals, as well. Noah and Ark Foods are working on making people no longer see these as a side item but creating products solely around them. From that mindset, they're always thinking of new products in different ways, such as their cauliflower mac and cheese.

While vegetables may be simpler to consume as adults, the same isn't always said for children. At the start of the pandemic, Noah actually moved in with his sister and brother-in-law and thus spent a lot of time with his niece and nephew. What he noticed is, while they are picky eaters like most children, they were intrigued with the experiences that food brought. They would get excited about a new take on standard food they knew, like pasta. Once they tried these new takes, like veggie and pesto pasta, they couldn't stop eating them and that was the ultimate compliment.

"If kids like it, you know it's a good product." Noah Robbins (10:02 - 10:05)

Recently, Ark Foods has launched a new clean label salad line which reflects their take on the classic salads we know and love. While salads are always a healthier option, toppings and dressings are usually packed with added ingredients and sugar. Ark Foods is always tinkering with new ideas, like substituting croutons with roasted chickpeas and ensuring all dressings have clean, plant based ingredients.

You can find where to purchase Ark Foods products locally on their website and how to get them delivered through Amazon Fresh, Prime Now, FreshDirect, Farm to People and Fridge No More.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"Students can go anywhere in the world, if they are an FCS teacher, and get a job"

Dr. Jacqueline Holland (23:13 - 23:21)

Dr. Jacqueline Holland, Associate Professor and Director of the Department of Family Consumer Sciences at Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland, and Dr. Susan Turgeson, Associate Professor of Family and Consumer Sciences at The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point are both working hard on mentoring students to bring to light the vast amount of opportunities in the FCS field.

When you think of family and consumer sciences you probably time travel to home economics classes in middle and high school. These classes originally taught life trades to young adults such as culinary skills, nutrition, and personal finance. FCS in recent years has developed into much more than that, especially with the addition of the student organization Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA). Through FCCLA, students can further make a difference in their societies, not just as a concept, but as a potential career opportunity.

Dr. Jacqueline Holland and Dr. Susan Turgeson have both been through a myriad of careers that have led them to the field of Family and Consumer Sciences.

After 10 years of different careers, Dr. Turgeson decided it was time to go back to school for teaching. Her early Family and Consumer Sciences teacher covered different subjects she related to and, essentially, promised a job, something few fields can do.

"We typically say that within the state there's at least three jobs for every graduate. Nationwide, it's more like 10. The job market is so strong and it will continue to be that way." Dr. Turgeson (12:00 - 12:14)

As the former President of the American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences herself, Dr. Holland started as a high school home economics teacher and then moved on to a mentoring role after seeing teachers leaving early due to lack of support.

With a decrease in students enrolling in secondary FCS programs, a recent USDA grant focuses on recruiting, preparing, and supporting family and consumer sciences educators.

While it's important to recruit students as early as high school it's also vital to prepare them, as teaching FCS is ever-evolving and will change throughout the years.

As Dr. Holland witnessed during her time as a high school educator, teachers are getting burnt out with the lack of support. Current educators are encouraging students to engage in organizations like FCCLA to keep them interested in the field, along with assuring them a career path moving forward.

"Back in 1996 when I went back to school for Family and Consumer Sciences I was promised a job at the end. I can still make that same promise to my students today." Dr. Turgeson (11:48 - 11:58)

Dr. Susan Turgeson and Dr. Jacqueline Holland both aim to show students how using an FCS education can improve our quality of life, as our world changes year to year.

Service learning in the field of FCS is extremely important to our society. Students that #SayYestoFCS can apply what they've learned in the classroom to their career and community to further make a difference.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"Sharing content all started because of an onion tree. Boring!"Shay Myers (4:10-4:14)

You've probably seen or heard of Shay Myers, third generation farmer and CEO of Owyhee Produce, through his TikTok and Instagram handle @shayfarmkid. He's been educating consumers and showing them behind-the-scenes of his farm on social media, which thankfully helped him harvest this year's asparagus when there was a worker shortage.

How'd Shay get inspired to start growing on social media? He was speaking with a produce buyer one day who was asking questions about how onions are grown and produced. Being so immersed in this knowledge for years, Shay went into a deep dive, in-depth discussion about things like the translucent scale, try leaf, onion roots, instead of just covering the basics. This was Shay's 'aha moment' of understanding that his view of farming and the rest of the world is quite different. From then on, Shay has been trying to educate not just produce buyers who typically come from very urban settings, but with social media on TikTok and LinkedIn, he's trying to fulfill the hunger consumers have about understanding where their food comes from and how it is produced.

"It took me a long time to realize that what I consider farming to be and what the average person that's not associated with farming thought farming was, were two different things and that's really my mission. Shay Myers (3:27-3:40)

So how did Shay use his social media channels and tight knit audience to create one of the most successful "U-Pick" farms the industry has ever seen?

Like most farms, Shay uses a large number of H-2 workers, which are agricultural guest workers who come to the United States to work for up to nine months at a time. The program is bureaucratically challenging, but very rewarding because of the dedicated and highly-skilled individuals that come to work for the farms. Plus, usually the same workers come back year after year. Unfortunately, there was a typo (yes, a typo) in the application this year, creating some major delays. The clerical errors weren't caught until about 5 days after the farm needed their workers, so it was too late to do anything. In fact, the farm didn't get approved until the last week of May when they needed workers starting March 21st (harvest starts between the beginning to middle of April).

Needing to harvest their asparagus without any workers, the farm was in a tough spot. They had enough workers to do some of the picking, but not enough for one of their entire fields, which is about 35 acres. The farm called around, trying to pull workers from California, Washington, Idaho and even Texas, but they were unable to find any more workers.

Did you know labor costs have increased by 40% over the last five years? Although what happened at Shay's farm was a clerical error, there is a labor crisis in the farming industry and we need to do something about it.

Shay decided to get on TikTok and rant about the situation, needing to save 350,000 pounds of asparagus that was about to go to waste and wondering what to do? Somehow the local media channels picked up on Shay's call to have people come and participate in a U-pick on the farm and the following Saturday over 6,100 people showed up to pick free asparagus.

Not only was the asparagus not wasted, but people came from as far as Astoria, Oregon, which is almost ten hours away from the farm! They were expecting around 500 to 600 people, but never over 6,100! The crowds started to get so big that people had to sign up to get in.

It may sound like this was a simple and easy solution that thankfully went viral, but it came with its challenges. FSMA, or the Food Safety Modernization Act, is a strict protocol the farm had to follow to make sure the food is safe. Everyone needed to sign the food safety documents before participating in the U-Pick. If someone didn't sign digitally, when they arrived at the farm, they met with a team member who would also review how to appropriately cut the asparagus, making sure they didn't walk on the asparagus plant, checking for jewelry, and so on.

Can you imagine having to implement that, unplanned, within 24 hours? It was, however, a great teaching moment to show consumers what farm workers have to go through every day to ensure proper safety measures are met.

The good news is, not only were people grateful and thanking the farm for the opportunity, but they were making comments about how they'll never complain about the expensive price of asparagus ever again. With the amount of automation and technology we have today, it's easy to think that things on the farm are done mechanically. In all actuality, very little is done by machines. There are some mechanized plantings, but in terms of harvesting, almost everything in the produce department is still hand harvested.

"A lot of my social content is for people to understand that farming isn't a red barn, an old rusty tractor, a chicken coop with a dozen chickens and a couple of milking cows. It's a lot more involved in that and it's fun and it's cool. It can be exciting. It can be frustrating. It can be scary. And I just like to bring people along with me along that path." Shay Myers (3:40-4:05)

Although Shay was able to find a solution to his worker shortage during his farm's most recent asparagus harvest, there's a labor crisis in the farming industry we need to recognize. There's a shortage of labor availability and the cost of labor is too high, especially when production can be moved to the Southern border and Mexico where the pay is about 10 times less than in America. A fifty cent minimum wage is a lot more affordable than, for example, Oregon's $16.44 minimum wage. There's political issues at play, human ethics issues at play, and, as Shay says, "from a food safety standpoint and a food security standpoint, we certainly can do better."

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!

"I'm definitely optimistic about the future of the restaurant industry. People always have to eat!"

Seth Karm (16:56-16:59)

Salad Savoy, a one-of-a-kind vegetable that grows in beautiful white and violet heads, is the namesake of the company behind some of the healthiest, nutrient-dense vegetables around. The company was hit hard during the pandemic, but is thankfully bouncing back with the help of the USDA and consumers like you looking to cook highly nutritional, delicious, colorful meals at home.

Famous with chefs, but not as well known to the public, Salad Savoy is well-known for their colorful chards, kale and cauliflower, which have been the company focus since 1984. With the mantra of "color, taste, nutrition", Salad Savoy has aimed to break up the wall of green we see in the produce section with items like their gold, orange, pink, red and white Bright Lights® leafy greens, Red Ruby Swiss Chard™, Carnival® Multi-Color Cauliflower and more. They were the first company to bring Lollipops®, a fork-sized vegetable that is a cross between Red Kale and Brussels sprouts, to North America in 2012, which, unlike Brussel sprouts, have to be hand-harvested off the plant… something even the most discerning chef can appreciate.

"A lot of cooking shows these days, like on the Food Network, use the Lollipops as a mystery ingredient. It's funny to see the looks on these chefs' faces because they're somewhat familiar with the item and it's a great challenge to work with." Seth Karm (6:13-6:28)

When the pandemic hit last year, Salad Savoy had plenty of beautiful crops they were ready to harvest and provide the supply chain with, especially getting ready for Easter. In a blink of an eye those crops were all going to be unused. "We leaned on a lot of folks like The Produce Moms with great industry contacts and it was so difficult because at that point in time, people were not going to order any extra items and just going to 'stick with the staples'," says Seth.

As we know, during that time, retail was king since restaurants and other parts of the food industry supply chain shut down. Within two weeks of the pandemic hitting, the company was down to 30% of normal business, in part because of the toll 2020 took on fine dining, an arena where Salad Savoy's products are usually high in demand. So much of the fine dining appeal is the experience it offers -- being catered to, having a beautiful presentation on your plate and table, having a long, relaxing meal with a bottle of wine… that experience doesn't transfer to a to-go container. Fine dining is just now barely creeping back for us in America and Seth says "it's still an awkward situation. It just feels awkward," which we can all probably agree on.

Plus, Salad Savoy provides a lot of their produce to Universities, hospitals, caterers and conventions… all suppliers that weren't in need of produce. Getting creative, Salad Savoy instead was able to provide produce to many of the meal kit companies, like Hello Fresh, and the Farmers to Families food boxes from the USDA. Thankfully, since the beginning of February, business has been back to about 90% of what it was for Salad Savoy. Seth is grateful for the USDA's assistance which they received financially last November. "Without that, we would not have survived," Seth says.

"Chard, kale and cauliflower… it does not get better than that. You've got more Vitamin C, more calcium than in broccoli, polyphenols with colored vegetables, beta carotene on the orange cauliflower, resveratrol in the red tail and purple cauliflower…" Seth Karm (22:08-22:31)

Even though they have less staff, Salad Savoy has learned how to become more efficient with their operations, minimize their input at the field level, and minimize field labor. Potentially, automation might come into place for harvesting crops or analyzing the color of heads of salad. Seth and his team are continuing to look at solutions that save money, like auto-tuning, which is a machine that goes over the plants with a treatment after seeding in a matter of hours, when it takes days using human labor. Even Seth has had to juggle multiple hats, from CEO to sales coordinator to social media manager and food safety expert!

What does Seth have to say for you, the consumer? Remember that, with the pandemic, you need to keep your immune system strong and one of the best ways to do that is to eat Salad Savoy's dark, leafy greens which offer peak nutrition for consumers. If you've been cooking at home, you've been learning more about the food you prepare and what foods, like dark, leafy greens, are nutritionally dense.

How to get involved

• Join The Produce Moms Group on Facebook and continue the discussion every week!
• Reach out to us - we'd love to hear more about where you are in life and business! Find out more here.

If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we'd love for you to help us spread the word!