[goodwithagun]

Does anybody have experience running a CSA? I'm considering it the year after this. Just a small one, maybe around 10 shares. I'd like to know FReeper perspective on it.

I apologize: I've asked this question before and I'm not trying to be repetitive. I'm just posting it hoping that random passers by might see it when they haven't before!

Otherwise, cold and rainy here. I've marked up the Baker Creek catalog and I'm almost ready to order.

[Kay Ludlow]

I have a neighbor (more like absentee landowner) who tried the CSA thing, thinking it would help him get the approvals he needed to put a high-density development on the rest of the land. He did get a professional manager, free labor by giving classroom credit for university students who would come work the CSA, but here in PA, he still couldn't make it go. His agreement said that locally purchased produce could be substituted if necessary, so he ended up buying much of his produce at Wegmans, marking it up to cover his costs, and he still didn't make enough to stay open...

[Arkansas Tider]

I did allot of research in 2012 about starting a CSA, some of the reasons I decided on market farming are: crop failure, you are under contract to provide a certain amount and kind of produce. Having people work on your farm that haven’t a clue could be more destructive than beneficial. Overhead costs are much more with a CSA, boxes and baskets not being returned or returned damaged or stained.

Through the farmers market, I have developed a select group of well to do folks that I allow to pick their own, only on Sundays 2-4. Most pay many times what the produce is worth, they are paying for the experience of picking their own. I have a DR that brings his family out almost every weekend, picks 10-20 bucks worth of produce and hands me a Hundred on the out.

[greeneyes]

Persistence is good. I have had zero experience with this, but feel free to ask again as someone else may eventually see it and reply.