Athens Locally Grown:  Availability for February 15

It is a very light week this week, as the recent freezes are combining with the normal dip in productivity as the overwintered items run out before the spring items come in.

We do have some new items this week, including baby cabbage heads from McMullan Family Farms (our sole entry in the greens category for the week).

We also welcome a new grower to Locally Grown this week. Double B Farm is located in Oxford, Georgia (to the south-west of Athens), and started operations last season. Their spring veggies are still to young to harvest, but they are offering dried and powdered shitake mushrooms from their own cultured logs, honey from hives located throughout Madison county, and wax, candles, and soaps made from thier own beeswax. You can see a photo of their shitake logs in the “Our Growers” section of the website.

We’ve also got milk, buttermilk, and cream from Milky Way Dairy, soaps and candles from Songbird Designs, milled products from Mills Farm, and jams, jellies, and pickles from TaylOrganics.

Finally, I’d like to draw your attention to the “Weblog” portion of the website. Some entries, such as the weekly availability announcements and breaking Locally Grown new, get emailed out to all the accounts, but it’s also a space where I’ll post links to upcoming events, news stories, and other items you might find of interest. Those will appear on the website only, so take a look at the weblog when you’re visiting the site to place your order.

Thanks for all your support, and we’ll see you on Thursday from 4:30 to 7pm at Gosford Wine!

Athens Locally Grown:  The Myth of Grass-Fed Beef

Julia: Hi, do you have any grass-fed beef?

Butcher: Hmm, grass-fed? I don’t think you can feed grass to cows.

Athens Locally Grown:  Climate Change Speaker Series

Furman University and Upstate Forever are kicking off their new speaker series on climate change next month with a presentation by Jim Kunstler on “Climate Change and the End of Oil: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century”. The talk is from 7:00 to 8:30pm on Wednesday, March 14th.

Furman University is right up the interstate from us in Greenville, SC. It’s not that far—I’ve made the drive in an hour (granted, my wife was in heavy labor at the time).

For more information, visit this link.

Athens Locally Grown:  Availability for February 8

The cold nights and overcast days have slowed the growth of the greens in the gardens, so you’ll see that we don’t have as much this week as we did last week. While Athens just got a bit of slush, Hartwell got several inches of sleet and snow, and that’ll make for a slow week.

Still we do have one new item: the first arugula of the season. On top of that is broccoli greens, some more lettuce, beets, shelled pecans and walnuts (and whole walnuts for those of you with strong crackers). There is also soap and candles (Ansley has been busy adding new photos to the website), milled products, baked goods, and processed foods.

If any of you have friends in Atlanta who are jealous of your source for locally grown foods here in Athens, you can now point them toward Moore Farms and Friends, who are starting taking orders this week using this website, with four pickup locations in Atlanta. Their website is http://moorefarms.locallygrown.net—pass the word!

Athens Locally Grown:  Pickups Postponed until Tomorrow

The roads through NE Georgia and into South Carolina are unsafe to drive this morning, so we will postpone customer pickups until tomorrow (Friday).

I am still contacting the growers to confirm the new schedule, but at this point we do expect to be at Gosford Wine from 4:30 to 7pm tomorrow. If this changes for any reason, I will call those customers with orders to let them know.

If you don’t think you’ll be able to pick up your orders on Friday, drop me an email or give me a call (706 248 1860) and we’ll try to make other arrangements for you.

Thanks!—eric

Athens Locally Grown:  Bad Weather Tomorrow

The weather forcasters are calling for sleet and freezing rain tonight and through the day tomorrow. It might not be so bad in Athens, but they’re saying it’ll be worse in Northeast Georgia and into South Carolina, with the high temperature barely making it above freezing.

Of course, that’s where almost all of your food is coming from this week. I’d say there are at least even odds that it will be too dangerous to go pick things up, but we won’t know for sure until noonish tomorrow.

If that’s the case, we’ll postpone pickup unitl Friday afternoon—same place, same time. If we do postpone, I’ll send out another email, or you can check the weblog section of the website, or you can call me at 706 248 1860.

Thanks, and stay warm! -eric

Athens Locally Grown:  Availability for February 1

I heard nothing but good things from you on the new website last week—the switchover was very smooth. I have made a few minor improvements this week, including an RSS feed for the weblog and tweaks to the product listing.

I’ve made some adjustments behind the scenes as well. Most notably, I finished the ability for your accounts to carry balances. There have been times (including last week) when I go to pack up and find a bag of produce that should have gone home with someone. I can now issue you credit, which will be applied to your next order. Likewise, if you come to pick up and forget your money (it happens), I can carry your amount due forward. One thing this means is you’ll soon be able to pre-pay as much as you wish and then “draw down” your balance as you order, and not have to worry about money on Thursdays at all. Using PayPal, we’ll even be able to take charge cards. More on all that later…

This week looks much like last week, with the addition of dairy products. We’re visiting Split Creek for their excellent goat cheeses, milk and fudge. We’ll also swing by Diamond Hill for their raw Jersey cow’s milk. We’ve also go lettuces, beets, mustard, broccoli greens, and other items fro McMullan Family Farm, Mills Farm, Songbird Designs, and TaylOrganics.

Thanks for all your support, and we’ll see you on Thursday from 4:30 to 7pm at Gosford Wine.

Athens Locally Grown:  Availability for January 25

Hello, and welcome to a new era for Locally Grown!

Today we start taking order on the new website, athens.locallygrown.net. If you’re reading this in your email, you’ve already created an account and you are ready to go. If you’re reading this on the website and haven’t already done so, you’ll need to create a new account before you place your order.

We do have a few new items this week. Michael McMullan has shepherded lettuce through the recent ice and now has beautiful heads of red and green buttercrunch lettuce to offer you. He also has baby beets with tops, two varieties of mustard greens, broccoli greens (and maybe, possibly, some heads will be ready by Thursday), pecans, and beef.

We also have milled products from Mills Farm, freshly milled and baked items from Whole Earth Granary, soaps from Songbird Designs, and processed foods from TaylOrganics.

If you have any troubles with the new site, don’t hesitate to let me know, either by replying to this email or calling me at 706 248 1860. It’s a bit different from the old site, but hopefully superior in every way. If you find that’s not the case for you, I’d love to hear about it.

Thanks for all your support! We’ll see you on Thursday from 4:30pm to 7pm at Gosford Wine.

Athens Locally Grown:  Ready to Go Live!

Starting next week, Athens Locally Grown will switch from the old website to the new—athens.locallygrown.net

Many of you placed test orders on the new site last week to help “kick the tires”. If you didn’t and want to try it out, I’ll allow test orders until Saturday of this week. On Saturday, I’ll cancel all the test orders (you’ll get an automated email explaining the cancellation) in preparation for taking real orders Sunday night.

Thanks to everyone who provided feedback! There are bound to be some issues as we make the transition, but hopefully they’ll be minor and merely cosmetic. If you have any troubles at all, please contact me via email (eric@locallygrown.net) or phone (706-248-1860)!

Also, if you’re reading this on the website (a copy also got emailed to all current account holders), you’ll need to create an account here on the new site before you can place an order. I could not automatically move accounts from the old site to the new, so you’ll have to take the first step. I’ll be sure to synch up your membership expiration information.

Thanks again for all your support!

Athens Locally Grown:  Testing the New Ordering System

This message is both on the new Locally Grown website http://athens.locallygrown.net and being emailed out to those customers who have created accounts on the new site.

We’re not quite ready to switch to the new site, but everything from the customer’s point of view is in place. I’ve still got to do some work on the back end to help the growers organize their harvests and packaging, but we’re getting very close.

This message is a demonstration of how the availability emails will be sent out when we do go live. The new website has a “weblog” section, which is a page of locally grown news, information, links to other interesting information, etc. Each Sunday after I update the availability, I’ll post a new entry and it will get mailed out to everyone, just like this. I’ll post other entries from time to time, and the most important ones will also get emailed out. If you’re reading this right now in your email’s inbox, then everything worked.

Even though we’re not quite ready to switch to the new site, I would like for you to take a look at the ordering system if you have a few minutes. Go to “The Market” page, and you’ll see that I’ve begun transferring over the available products. If you’re logged in, you’ll be able to add items to your cart and place an order. Can you give it a try and let me know what you think? It’s a little different from the old site, but hopefully easier, more understandable, and just downright better. I’d like to hear your comments good or bad so I can fix something that you all think is just no good before we switch over. Please understand that these orders will not be filled! I’d just like for you to try it out and let me know what you think.

Thanks!