Mobile market: Jordan's Farm is one of many seeking new ways to get their goods to buyers
Photo/David A. Rodgers
Penny Jordan of Jordan's Farm in Cape Elizabeth prepares to take its newest venture -- a mobile farm stand -- on the road
The school bus parked at Jordan’s Farm in Cape Elizabeth is big, blue and round, gleaming in the sun like a plump berry. Brightly painted and outfitted with shelves and a cooler, it was — on a recent day — getting ready to hit the road as a mobile farm stand.
The Jordans’ plan is to drive the bus, stocked with bell peppers, peas, zucchini and other fresh vegetables, directly to local businesses and senior housing complexes.
“We read that the number of people going to farmers’ markets was plateauing,” Penny Jordan says, standing in the middle aisle of the bus, bathed in a soft green light from the murals decorating the interior walls. Jordan, who helps run the family farm, explained that even as the local food movement was making people aware of the environmental benefits of eating produce grown close to home, market growth was stalling.
“All the research was showing us to go to people,” she says. “People want to buy local. More and more people want to know where their food comes from and know their farmers.”
The Jordan’s Farm bus highlights a desire among farmers to innovate on the old theme of lugging goods to sell at a market once or twice a week. These days, more farmers are using ingenuity or technology to widen their market reach.
For example, farmers in western Maine have this summer begun selling their goods on an online site set up by the Western Mountains Alliance. From Friday to Monday, customers can buy, using PayPal, many different types of local food — from vegetables to coffee — at www.westernmainemarket.com. After receiving the orders, farmers package the food and deliver it to one of two distribution sites in Farmington for pick-up on Tuesday.
Twenty-six farms and 140 customers have signed on to the website, Tricia Cook of Western Mountains Alliance says. “They’re making more sales than they would otherwise,” she says. “It’s a different, new market for them.”
The site cost about $11,000 to set up, and requires ongoing administrative costs, which are covered by a 15% slice taken out of every sale. Eventually the plan is to expand the model to other Maine communities.
“It can be www.westernmainemarket.com slash anywhere in Maine essentially,” Cook says.
Jordan’s Farm, which encompasses more than 100 acres and is run by fifth- and sixth-generation family members, grows produce on about 50 acres. Making its food more accessible via the bus will increase customers, Jordan says, as well as be a handy advertisement for the permanent farm stand on Wells Road. Jordan expects the bus to increase retail sales overall by 10% to 15% and bring in between $2,000 and $3,000 in revenue a week.
Snagging the retired bus from the local school system for a deal, Jordan says the farm’s total investment in the mobile market has been about $3,000. Two staff people will run the operation: a driver and a sales person. At the moment, the bus has the go-ahead to park at Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield in South Portland from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. twice a week. It also will visit three independent living centers for seniors.
Jordan says as soon as the bus is registered, it will be ready to go.
She adds that she would also like to eventually increase the number of participating businesses and expand the bus fleet. Keep your eye out for larger-than-life moving vegetables. Although the bus is painted to look like a sun-drenched farm on wheels, “I wanted this one to be painted like an eggplant,” Jordan admits.
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