Fair Food (now closed): Difference between revisions

Revision as of 11:55, 20 December 2016

Fair Food gives the following descriptive information:

Fair Food is dedicated to bringing locally grown food to the marketplace and to promoting a humane, sustainable agriculture system for the Greater Philadelphia region.

Founding executive director Ann Karlen gives the following descriptive information:

In 2000, renowned Philadelphia entrepreneur Judy Wicks asked me to help her find a way to get more restaurants to purchase from local farms. Judy knew that if her restaurant, the famous White Dog Cafe in West Philly, was the only one buying from these farms, the small family farms would go out of business. My background was in cooking and I passionately believe that everyone deserves to eat the healthiest, freshest food – regardless of their income.

We needed to solve logistical issues in the food chain that would allow for consistent delivery and reliable product so that chefs would be willing to switch vendors and support these farms. In the early days, I acted as the “translator” between the farmer and the chefs, making sure that each constituent understood the needs of the other.

By 2003, Fair Food was successfully advocating for restaurants and chefs to source locally, but the average consumer still had limited access to local sustainably produced meat. As a pilot project, I approached Reading Terminal Market about setting up a weekly folding table to sell frozen local sustainable meats, and was granted a coveted space in their centrally located food court. Demand grew feverishly and, though I never intended to start a retail business, within a few years, the Farmstand moved to a 300-square-foot and then a 750-square-foot year-round stall in the Reading Terminal Market, selling all local meats, dairy, eggs, poultry, vegetables, fruits, and other value-added products.

Even as Fair Food has expanded, our underlying goals have remained the same: we build connections and support systems in the wholesale food marketplace in order to help local farmers and producers bring their product to the public. Fair Food provides the soft infrastructure integral to a local, sustainable food system. This benefits both the farmer by increasing opportunities to sell their goods, and the consumer by increasing access to fresh, healthy, local food. Through this work we have come to serve as a food systems expert regionally and nationally. We currently deliver a diverse array of programs and services to benefit our region’s farmers, food producers, and consumers across the economic spectrum.

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-&nbsp;http://www.fairfoodphilly.org/<br>
+{{toplink|url=http://www.fairfoodphilly.org|name=fairfoodphilly.org}}'''Fair Food''' {{gives}}<blockquote>Fair Food is dedicated to bringing locally grown food to the marketplace and to promoting a humane, sustainable agriculture system for the Greater Philadelphia region.</blockquote>
+<br>Founding executive director Ann Karlen {{gives}}<blockquote>In 2000, renowned Philadelphia entrepreneur Judy Wicks asked me to help her find a way to get more restaurants to purchase from local farms. Judy knew that if her restaurant, the famous White Dog Cafe in West Philly, was the only one buying from these farms, the small family farms would go out of business. My background was in cooking and I passionately believe that everyone deserves to eat the healthiest, freshest food – regardless of their income.<br><br>We needed to solve logistical issues in the food chain that would allow for consistent delivery and reliable product so that chefs would be willing to switch vendors and support these farms. In the early days, I acted as the “translator” between the farmer and the chefs, making sure that each constituent understood the needs of the other.<br><br>By 2003, Fair Food was successfully advocating for restaurants and chefs to source locally, but the average consumer still had limited access to local sustainably produced meat. As a pilot project, I approached Reading Terminal Market about setting up a weekly folding table to sell frozen local sustainable meats, and was granted a coveted space in their centrally located food court. Demand grew feverishly and, though I never intended to start a retail business, within a few years, the Farmstand moved to a 300-square-foot and then a 750-square-foot year-round stall in the Reading Terminal Market, selling all local meats, dairy, eggs, poultry, vegetables, fruits, and other value-added products.<br><br>Even as Fair Food has expanded, our underlying goals have remained the same: we build connections and support systems in the wholesale food marketplace in order to help local farmers and producers bring their product to the public. Fair Food provides the soft infrastructure integral to a local, sustainable food system. This benefits both the farmer by increasing opportunities to sell their goods, and the consumer by increasing access to fresh, healthy, local food. Through this work we have come to serve as a food systems expert regionally and nationally. We currently deliver a diverse array of programs and services to benefit our region’s farmers, food producers, and consumers across the economic spectrum.</blockquote>
-Dedicated to bringing locally grown food to the marketplace and to promoting a humane, sustainable agriculture system for the Greater Philadelphia region.
-Fair Food has been uniting local farmers with businesses and consumers for over a decade. We promote the importance of family farms and create a year-round marketplace for fresh, local and humane food products in the Greater Philadelphia region. We provide an assortment of programs and services that contribute to a strong and sustainable local food system. Supporting farmers, connecting consumers, educating the public and celebrating the joys of local food.<br>
-=== History  ===
-Fair Food was founded in 2001 by Philadelphia entrepreneur, Judy Wicks, to build a sustainable and humane local food economy by spreading the local purchasing practices of her restaurant, White Dog Cafe. Ann Karlen, founding director of Fair Food, began her work by connecting the local farms supplying the White Dog to a larger marketplace of restaurants and stores, while continually bringing in new farmers. With humble beginnings, Ann ran Fair Food for the first four years from an office in Judy’s house, with financial support from the White Dog Cafe and its customers, many other generous individuals, and private foundations. White Dog Community Enterprises, the non-profit affiliate of the business, provided an institutional home and services to Fair Food until it spun off as an independent organization in 2009.
-Fair Food started with the narrow focus of connecting farmers and chefs as a strategy for keeping more farmland in production, and now works with a broad range of buyers, as well as hundreds of producers, from the small-scale diversified farmer to midsize growers who supply colleges, hospitals, and other institutions.
-Over the past ten years, Fair Food has built demand for local food across all sectors of the food system. Along with our partners in the field, our work has created a paradigm shift in the public’s perception about what we eat by shining a spotlight on the men and women who grow our food.
 ==See Also==
 *[[Local Food Guide]]
 *[[Judy Wicks]]
-<br><br>[[Category:Is-Nonprofit_Organization]][[Category:Is-Advocacy_Organization]][[Category:Issue-Economic_Development]][[Category:Issue-Food]][[Category:Is-Membership_Organization]][[Category:Sells-Food]][[Category:Is-Page_Needing_Work]]
+<br><br>[[Category:Is-Advocacy_Organization]][[Category:Is-Membership_Organization]][[Category:Is-Nonprofit_Organization]]
+[[Category:Issue-Economic_Development]][[Category:Issue-Food]]
+[[Category:Sells-Food]]