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40 Under 40: Colleen Hanlon-Smith finds the bounty in Maine farms and food businesses

Co-owner, Daybreak Growers Alliance / Owner, Peak Season Produce / Co-founder, Waldo County Bounty

Colleen Hanlon-Smith, 37

Co-owner, Daybreak Growers Alliance

Owner, Peak Season Produce

Co-founder, Waldo County Bounty

Find profiles of all the 40 Under 40 honorees here.

Significant professional accomplishment: Committing two decades to the same goal and failing better each year. In the last four years, establishing two viable businesses and one nonprofit that support over 100 Maine farms and food businesses and create access to Maine grown foods for thousands of Mainers. Continually striving to grow businesses that are regenerative, not extractive. Daily grateful to have crafted a self-led existence dedicated to purposeful work while living in rural Maine.

Passion project: Slowly making a home out of the 200-year-old Cape I bought at auction eight years ago.

Audacious goal: Being a kind and sane person.

Favorite quote: “Happy the man who, dying, can / Place his hand on his heart and say: ‘At least I didn’t neglect to tell / The thrush how beautifully she sings.’” — Bernard O’Donoghue

Influential books: “O Pioneers!,” by Willa Cather; “East of Eden,” by John Steinbeck; and “The Unsettling of America,” by Wendell Berry

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Favorite movies/TV shows: Nothing noteworthy and plenty shameful!

How do you recharge: Walks in the woods. Alone or with my dog. 

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