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Welcome to all our new readers! Per usual, each issue is chocked full to add clarity to how local food moves from production to retail. We convey info on the challenges of growing a food business & learning how to navigate national or international factors.

We clarify & promote retail details, supply chain info, trends, resources, & insights on issues that impact positively or negatively local food sales. Click on the links to dig deeper & remember your input is welcome to amplify your products, services, store displays & new products.

Because Vermont has an "official" local foods definition in ACT 129 we urge you to become familiar with it. We need our stores, distributors & any promotions you do as a VT business to comply with the state local food definition. If it hasn't been a priority yet, it is time for all stores & distributors to tweak their metrics to comply with the state definition. This will make it so much easier when Vermont does its Local Food Count again in a few years,

helping the regional get to 30% local & regional by 2030 as monitored by New

England Feeding New England. 

Read on for new products, store updates, distributor insights, resources & welcomed seasonal changes. 

Free Store Training

Jeanie Wells is an award winning national retail consultant & creator of the Mighty Community Markets training series. We are thrilled to offer a free training for stores on November 8th in Randolph.

Jeanie brings her skills to this in-

person event designed to help stores balance product selection, pricing &

the creativity necessary to drive sales in a competitive environment. It is

just what we need now to build & rebuild community stores.

Jeanie is joined by James Morrell by of Columinate Consulting & Annie Harlow of the VT Grocers Project.

Space is filling up, register now for a spot. OR if it is filled, get on our waiting list! (smallbites802@gmail)

It Takes a Village

Buffalo Mountain Community Market came into being during the height of the pandemic. The store is a melding of two stores to meet the diverse needs of its rural community. The historically significant coop changed with the times, growing from a small store into a much larger one. It happened as the Quality Market, also a staple of the community, was set to close. The Coop did its due diligence with market studies, consultants, & lots of community meetings to see what might become of both the coop & the space.

The community now has a store with a mix of local & national natural, organic, & standard conventional products. Located in Hardwick center, it survived the July flood & worked hard to keep shelves stocked despite the road closures & other disruptions.

Always willing to develop professional skills Buffalo Mountain continues its positive impact on local food sales, staff engagement & meeting the needs of the community. Key buyers were sent to the natural products Expo East in September. And this rural market is one of many stores in Vermont that will be attending the upcoming training with Jeanie Wells through the VT Grocers Project.

Buffalo Mountain is following end cap guidelines. Keeping it simple, mixing local & national products around a theme. This is breakfast in the NEK!

Change in the Air

The Old Brick Store in Charlotte is under new ownership & kicking into gear as the neighborhood spot. Local foods are delivered through several area distributors including Pumpkin Village Foods

JJ Hapgood in

the heart of Peru is shifting. The old store was revitalized with a full restoration in 2013. It then became the soul of the community & a favorite spot for locals & travelers to meet up for fine food & conviviality. It is time

for a change in ownership, one that will be as enthused to carry on the legacy of a valued store & café.

At the crossroads of 17 & 22 A, the Addison Four Corners

Store recently celebrated its bicentennial. For the past 22 years Herb & Terry Glidden ran the store. Now, it is changing ownership from one generation to the next with son Joe taking it over. By staying in the family it will continue the tradition of fantastic smoked & homemade food, eclectic clothing, & a chocolate stand making for a truly unique experience. Catch the story at WPTZ

Jones the Boy a wholesale bakery in Bristol is giving up its retail location but will continue to service its wholesale accounts with their

cookies.

Promotions: October

It's no longer summer. Everything is changing. The glorious leaves tell of the transitions still to come. Stores promote comfy meals, cozy beverages, & time with friends around delicious baked goods & slow cooked dinners.

It is also a time to promote great

hiking foods for a day on the trail or grab & go for leaf peeping in the

later valleys. One of Vermont's finest for such adventures is Patrick's Green Mountain Twisters. They

are sourdough hand tied, small batch, divinely soft & salty pretzels sold DSD to stores including Hunger Mountain Coop & through Lesser Distribution.

VT Farm to Plate & the Agency of Ag have partnered with Rocket in VT with super short video promotions of products, farms, & stores. Rocket's snippets crisscross the state & feature our wonderful food, our makers & our hidden spots to explore. His store visits, food festivals, orchards stops & Maple 100 highlights help spread the word & promote our food economy.

October of course is "orange

food season" here in the 802! Squash & pumpkins are everywhere for

good reason. Produce departments love this time of year when it is so bright & abundant.

Here's a Produce Tip: when pricing pumpkins create a range

of pricing rather than price per pound. You can create a PLU price for each 'range' to track the number of pumpkins sold. Jack o' Lanterns sell best when sold with flat rates. If you are curious about pumpkin price trends across the country, check this out.

Keep Your Eyes on These Brands

Butterfly Bakery of Vermont got First Place at the 2023 Hot Sauce Expo for "Best Label Artwork" for their Taco Vibes Only hot sauce. They received the coveted Screaming Mi Mi Award! BBVT hot sauces are now sold around the world, still utilizing the same locally grown peppers, balanced 20 years ago. Contact them for wholesale shipping details.

Sherpa Foods

has launched a new SKU! Maple Flavor Momo Sauce. Each of their sauces is a unique blend of heat & flavor for the right dose of spicy. Shipments of this new product launched to coincide with VT Maple 100! One more notable thing, they now are shipping to over 900 Home Goods Stores. 

Asian Homestyle Cooking has deep roots in the NEK of VT crafting a wide array of traditional

meals. Owner Jin Li is working on expanding sales to stores in Vermont & the region. Keep your eyes on this growing brand!

The Wild Fern Bread

Music to Our Ears

There is something wholly unique about Heather's baking. Maybe it is the passion of her finding her calling. Maybe it’s the music that is played when she is baking, or the quality ingredients or maybe it’s just the vibe of the little roadhouse bakery in the Route 100 valley in Stockbridge. The combination is more like it. Maybe its just the magic of The Wild Fern.

Locals rave on her baking, cafe

cooking, & her live music. She is a professional musician as well as a

stellar baker. A baker of pastries, breads, bagels, pizza dough & pizza,

& amazing desserts with seasonal whimsy. Heather sells pre-order with direct-to-consumer pick-ups on scheduled days, DSD to The Swiss Market, Pittsfield General Store & Romas Butchery.

 Helpful Organizations

Here are a few organizations & tools helpful to stores & to their vendors

Independent Natural Foods Retailer Assoc works with, & has tools for, inde stores.

Cooperative Fund of the Northeast works with all types of coops to help fund projects.

VT Specialty Food Assoc. & the VT Agency of Ag commissioned a Tradeshow Handbook VSFA Agency of Ag with Rival Brands to help vendors sell to buyers effectively & align their scale of the business.

Harvest of the Month has a rich array of resources to help stores & farmstands promote products.

Good Food Foundation & Awards has annual competitions a mercantile showcasing products supporting stores to bring on independently produced products.

Hot Pepper drop from Quill Hill Farm to Butterfly Bakery of VT...Future Taco Vibe Only Hot Sauce? Notice too the pallet used to stage the delivery & the multiplier effect of local food in action!

Distribution: Deep Roots

Founded in 1985, Deep Root Organic is one of the oldest co-ops of organic vegetable growers in the United States. The co-op exists to promote local, sustainable, & organic agriculture through its small, family owned farms. Due to the size & the variety of the member farms, they offer a wide range of products available throughout the year.

Stores in Vermont & as far away as the mid Atlantic support the coop with purchases of their products.

The team connects the farmer & the customer, delivering the best local organic produce & value added products to retail establishments, co-ops, restaurants, & institutions.

This time of year the crops sold are just about every kind of root crop imagined along with fall cauliflower, broccoli, herbs, & greenhouse tomatoes. Many of the farms were impacted by the July flooding but luckily the Coop overall is able to deliver a wider range of products & is doing ok, all things considered.

Moving Local Food: Pallet Jacks

Growing your food business means new tools are needed to streamline shipping & handling. In case you missed the last issue we touched on pallet building. Now we address choosing a pallet jack & safely moving them onto trucks or in warehouses.

Here are a few tips from a recent

inquiry from food folks: Beware of jacks that have only 36-inch forks (or prongs). The standard size of pallets is 48 X 40 inches.

Buying manual or electric either way, name brands can save you money in the long run. BT Lifter, Lift Rite, & Crown (brands that were recommended to us).

Lifting capacity & fork height are two considerations when making your

decision. Some lifts sit a bit higher which can matter when loading into tight spaces.

Safety: operator should always ask everyone who is helping if they are "clear before lowering". Otherwise, it can result in broken toes. If taking a jack on your delivery truck, consider a 4"x4" block or pallet jack parking tray to secure the jack during transport to keep it from moving.

Be extremely careful rolling pallets

downhill, the physics of weight & slope make it an 'accident waiting to

happen". Wear steel toed shoes when working with pallet jacks; most

injuries are to toes. 

Liftgates: often operated in tight quarters require the pallet jack handle to be turned 90 degrees, this can cause instability of the pallet & pitching of the contents. It can end up that the pallet crashes off the liftgate. This results in damaged products & delays in getting products to distributors & stores.

Packing items on pallets & moving

the pallets onto trucks & in warehouses requires planning, attention to detail, & following safety procedures. Be mindful of doing it in the safest way possible.

There are many videos & tools to help

you as you expand your scale to include distribution making it easier at cross docking or receiving at its destination. Check out the many resources including this one.

Farms, Orchards & Woodlots

Bins, crates, & boxes used by farmers for harvesting & in building displays are available from Clifford Lumber in Hinesburg. This 4th generation family operation connects our working lands. Made from Vermont wood & are sold to our farmers & orchards.

At Champlain Orchards, they make their own bins from wood from clearing trees in their sugarbush.

Vermont Pallet & Skid is a business located in Norwich, Connecticut with no ties to Vermont, except that Grampy started the company here long before it moved out of state. They do not buy our wood, but they do use our good name.

MNFC has a VT made wooden bin, stocked with local squash & was moved into place with a pallet jack.

Joe's Brook Farm farmstand in Saint J is all set for a strong October

Farmers as Retailers

Root crops are the stars right now along with apples & squash in every shape, size & brix content.

Apple season has not been Vermont's

finest, but orchards have been engaging PYO & customers with events. Cider aficionados have noted a distinct lack of "umph" or that full

earthy balance of tart, sweet richness & sugar. It lacks the depth of

flavor we generally count on when apples are freshly picked & pressed. That said, sales are strong across the state because, well it is fresh cider season!

Pumpkin sales continue to keep up, &

will every day closer to Halloween, with families popping into farmstands for their jack o' lanterns & ‘sugar pies’. They will also be grabbing beets,

carrots, turnips & if lucky, fall broccoli & cauliflower too.

Farmers are augmenting their produce with products available from the VT Farmers Food Center in

Rutland & the ACORN Food Hub through online ordering platforms.  Both nonprofits are making farm based & craft-produced foods available.

In between sales, farmers tidy up

their retail stands as the season winds down.

Gorgeous cauliflower from Clear Brook Farm in Shaftsbury

4 Seasons of VT Cheese

Every season is cheese season in Vermont, but each has its favorites. As another shift is upon us, more stores are offering mac & cheese in many varieties. Stores are end-capping Cabot's boxed Mac & Cheese. Melty cheeses are getting prominent display spots because quiche, gratins, & other cool weather recipes call for it. This is the time of year when cheese departments change up displays, reintroducing varieties simply by relocating them.

Cheese display tip: Keep the work & display areas clean. Also, build a display landscape of heights & provide similar cheese of similar flavor profiles close together; this can make it easier for shoppers. Always label your VT cheese (& cheese mongers should be familiar with ACT 129 VT local food definition!)

Gathering Together: Nov 16-17

If you are a new or long-time reader of Small Bites, consider registering for the Farm to Plate News which covers many intersecting topics for a broader connection to work across the state. Post (& explore) jobs & events reaching a new audience of farm, food & forest connected people. Farm to Plate readership extends beyond Vermont to all areas of the country too!

Join local food folks at the Farm to Plate Annual Gathering at Killington on Nov 16 & 17th. Be on the pulse of all things connected to our VT food economy! Pre-register here. No-cost registration is available to all farmers, farmworkers, food workers, small food business owners, legislators, and anyone that identifies as Black, Indigenous, or a Person of Color. Students who are not supported by their degree program to attend the Gathering may register at no-cost. Please select No-Cost Registration. 

Food Producers...

Trade Show Grants Available

VAAFM Trade show grants are available for 2024 . The grants are useful for emerging brands to learn the language of sales & gain confidence & proficiency to get brands in front of more buyers, at stores & distributors.

And check out the tradeshow guide

Community Connections

Brownsville Butcher & Pantry has posted a number of fabulous events that connect their community. Always the center of activity, the store is known for their service, not only selling food, but connecting people as a third place to meet & catch up while enjoying local products.



East Calais General Store renovation is done! The East Calais Community Trust is holding an official Ribbon Cutting on Friday, Oct 27 at 11 am. Sen. Welch & other dignitaries will be on hand as well & representatives from numerous granters & funding sources along with the community.

What it Means: VT "Local"

Vermont is the only state in the northeast with a local food definition. Stores & distributors need to fall in line & be in compliance when promoting your 'local' sales.

The VT Agency of Agriculture, Food, & Markets, the State Attorney General (which oversees consumer protections), & the legislature agreed on a uniform definition to protect producers & consumers.

Small Bites comes to you via USDA grants. Created for farmers, food manufacturers, distributors, & grocers to increase VT food sales

We support the New England State Food System Planners Partnership

Contact: Annie Harlow

smallbites802@gmail.com



Unless otherwise noted, photo credits are from company social media, websites or Annie Harlow

Special Thanks to: Kara @ Deep Root, Peter @ Butterfly Bakery, Nurbu @ Sherpa Foods, Ben @ Champlain Orchards and The VSFA & VVBGA listservs!



All info is subject to change; thank you to all who contributed to this BIG issue