Food Detective: Plovgh

by Erick Brenner with Jessica Scheer, both of FamilyCook Productions

When I first became involved in Dekalb Market, a new local shopping venue in Downtown Brooklyn, part of the discussion was building the perfect urban farm stand. As a farmer, I understood the many hurdles facing small farms in establishing themselves in city markets: time constraints, long commutes in and out of the city at ungodly hours, establishing oneself in the flush Greenmarket. For Dekalb’s purposes there would be the added hurdle of stocking a seven-day-a-week operation with “fresh-from-the–farm” produce. The developers of Dekalb Market approached several larger grocers to try fill this void before stumbling upon Plovgh.com.

What initially appealed to me about Plovgh is their purpose: they function primarily as an online Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) alternative and farm-stand.   Their model can work because they understand the hurdles farmers face in meeting their markets and have created an extremely user-friendly process for both farmers and veggie-hungry consumers.  

Through Plovgh’s online interface and physical network of drop-points, Farmers are able to sell their harvest directly to individuals in New York City who pre-order their “share” online each week. Functioning as a multi-farm, multi-community CSA, Plovgh gives farms immediate access to a large and diverse market of customers and provides neighborhoods with access to farm-fresh foods.  Plovgh provides the tools for streamlined marketing and distribution of farms’ production and organizes neighborhood pick-up points where members receive their orders.

Their newly-established CSA pick-up point at Dekalb made all too much sense. They have a physical presence in a container storefront located directly across from Dekalb’s on-site educational farm, where culinary and agricultural workshops are conducted by my colleagues and I at FamilyCook Productions. And in the off season, FamilyCook will purchase it’s produce through Plovgh until our own farm is ready to yield its delicious roots, shoots and fruits.

Plovgh is also partnering with  FamilyCook’s Food 360 program, a “farm-to-fork” culinary job training program that began at Dekalb Market this past fall.   Food 360 is already utilizing Plovgh’s innovative model as a career-mentoring opportunity.   Select Food 360 trainees will learn about the pivotal role of a developing infrastructure to bring  fresh produce to their own neighborhoods by operating the pick-up point.  

As part of the internship component of Food 360, which follows a vigorous four week long training period, two of the current trainees will join the Plovgh team to help continue building their network of farmers and assist with neighborhood pick-ups.  The interns will also be challenged to establish drop-off points in their own neighborhoods using the tools the Plovgh team have developed to simplify the process of linking to farmers, finding a location and promoting its availability within the community.

Moving forward, Plovgh hopes to continue to expand by building relationships with more farmers to increase the diversity of products and produce available, as well as additional pick-up points in the region. They are one of the more innovative links in the regional food system that brings rural farmers to urban tables. For more information about Plovgh, check out www.plovgh.com.

For additional information about the Food 360 program, check www.familycookproductions.com.  
For additional info about Dekalb Market go to www.dekalbmarket.com (Note: the market, closed for the winter months, will re-open in Spring, 2012).

To read more articles in our Food Detective NYC series, click here.