PICK UP LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040. Pick up every Saturday between 10-12pm.
Google Map

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

PICK UP LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040. Pick up every Saturday between 10-12pm.
Google Map

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

PICK UP LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040. Pick up every Saturday between 10-12pm.
Google Map

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

Market News

A couple of things before I get into the third issue of how the market works, with this week focusing on the growers.

Ancient Awakenings is back this week, but will be off next week selling every other week from now on.

Cheese Raw Cheese order was placed on Monday from Meadow Valley Farm in Indiana and should arrive by Saturday. I ordered a few extra in case anyone would like some, just let us know when you come in.

Butter I called to place the order for Raw Butter but wasn’t successful. The demand is more than the supply so we may have to wait a bit longer to get more of the butter.

NEW PICK UP LOCATION Beginning Saturday, January 31st, You’ll be able to choose to pick up your order at Cherry Street Brewery in Vickery Village from 1:30-2:30pm.
Important to note: Checks or Credit cards accepted only. We have to have a mobile meat license to be able to transport meat and fish therefore PLEASE DON’T ORDER MEAT OR FISH if you are picking up at Vickery.
Place your order online as usual and add the item “Vickery Location” to your order. We will gather your items and deliver them to Cherry Street Brewery for you to pick up.

Now back to the growers…The decision to let a new grower into the market is always made by me alone. There’s no committee, and no formal application process. We have a closed market, and it’s not open to just anyone to sell through. A good number of our growers also go above and beyond to only bring “the best of the best”, and that pushes the de facto standards even higher. Here’s a summary of what it takes to be able to sell through The Cumming Harvest:

• All growers must use sustainable practices and never use synthetic fertilizers or pesticides. I’ll come back to this later.
• All growers can only sell what they themselves have grown, made, or otherwise produced.
• All growers must be within about 100 miles of Cumming.
• All growers must be willing to be part of our TCH community, and not think of us as just a dumping off point.
• All animals raised for meat or eggs must be pastured or sustainably wild-caught
• Prepared foods must use organic ingredients if at all possible, and locally grown ingredients if at all possible
• All proper licenses, when required by law, must be obtained

“Sustainable practices”. There’s no set definition of that, and there’s really a sliding scale. There is a generally accepted definition of what is “conventional” agriculture, and that includes the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, and confined and grain-fed animals. Those are easy to exclude. At the other end, there is the USDA Organic Certification and Certified Naturally Grown certification. Few small diversified growers can meet the expense of USDA certification, but a good number of our growers are CNG certified. This program uses the USDA rules as a starting point, made a few things more strict, and uses a system of growers certifying other growers to keep things honest. If a new grower does not have a certification, then I talk to them, get information about them, and visit their farm in person when necessary.

In short: the growers have satisfied my standards, and I personally have approved them for inclusion in TCH. However, I want you to not just take my word for it. All the farmers welcome visitors to their farms, just call them and set up an appointment. We occasionally have a “meet the farmer” table on Saturday’s so you can talk with the growers yourself face-to-face. We encourage them to take photos for their online photo album, to describe their practices, and to take care with their product listings. We want to facilitate communication between you and them, so when you place an order, they see your name and email address in case they need to clarify a request or offer a substitution, and likewise for most of our growers you can see their contact info when you view their grower profile (while logged into the site) so you can get clarification from them when needed.

I often wrestle with some of those edge cases. Doug’s Wild Alaska Salmon was one such case. The salmon and halibut they sell was caught in Alaska, but Doug and his family live here (well, just over the line in South Carolina). They own their own small boats, and catch the fish themselves. Their practices are certified sustainable by a reputable organization up there, and their products are high quality. They’ve worked out the logistics of getting fish to you every week (by keeping a supply at the market in a freezer they own). I have in the past talked with dairies from across the state, fisherman from Savannah, olive growers from Savannah, and other people making items we just can’t get from growers located right here. Often, the logistics of getting their items from there to here on a regular and timely basis is what breaks down, but I hope that over time we’ll be able to expand the items at our market without compromising our community of growers located right here.

Hopefully that explains how our growers get into TCH, what standards they have to meet, and so on. It’s a very important topic, perhaps the most important one for our market, but much of it goes on behind the scenes. I know you’ve put your trust in me, and I take that very seriously, If you’d like to talk with me in person about this or any other aspects of TCH, I’d love to do so. Just pull me aside when you come by to pick up your order.

LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040.
Google Map

PICK UP HOURS
Saturday from 10-12pm.
106 Colony Park Drive, Suite 100 Cumming, GA 30040
Please contact me if you have any questions, problems or suggestions. EMAIL ME

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

We thank you for your interest and support of our efforts to bring you the healthiest, the freshest and the most delicious locally-produced foods possible!

Market News

A couple of things before I get into the second issue of how the market works.

Ancient Awakenings unfortunately will only be able to do deliver to the Cumming Harvest market every other weekend for the time being. This weekend they are out of town, but will be back next week and then every other week there after.

Indian Creek Angus has added a half and quarter cow to the market this week.
1/2 Hanging Weight, 429lbs – Bone In Steaks (Rib Steaks, T bones, and Sirloins). It also includes ground beef, cube steak, boneless stew, roasts, short ribs and soup bones. Approximately 139 lbs of beef.

1/4 Hanging Weight, 429lbs – Bone Out Steaks (Ribeyes, Filets, NY Strips, and Sirloins). It also includes ground beef, cube steak, boneless stew, roasts, short ribs and soup bones. Approximately 64 lbs of beef.

Both of these are listed online.

2B Whole is selling this week, gluten free breads, cakes, cookies and donuts.

My Daily Bread is offering a sale on some of their Jam and Jelly, now only $5. They also have their Sourdough and Multigrain bread loaves on sale for $6.50.

Farm Fresh Foods is taking this week off, she’ll be back next week.

Cheese and Butter I will be sending in a group order of Raw Cheese from Meadow Valley Farm in Indiana and of Raw Butter. The cheese is between $7.25-$8/lb and comes in Monterey Jack, Pepper Jack, Havarti, Jalapeno Cheddar, Colby, Gouda, Baby Swiss, Mozzarella and Sharp Cheddar. Place your order online.

Farmer of the Day We have a new vendor coming to the market, Snack N Joy, offering a line of gluten free items. She is currently a “grower” with Mary Beth at Joyful Noise Acres and is currently a vendor in the Atlanta area with Whole Foods Markets. Her gluten free items are milled in small batches with nutrient rich organic grains into flour which are then baked into muffins, cookies and breads. Organic fruits and nuts are used whenever possible. Preservatives or fillers are never used and all dairy is from cows not treated with rBST.

Now, back to the market detail…last week I reviewed legal issues and how the money is transferred. This week we’ll go over finances. This is pretty lengthy and much of it is copied from our mother market manager, Eric Wagoner, at Athens Locally Grown. He’s got this market thing down since this is his 15th year. We’ve been in business going on 5 years this coming August and even though I should have it down, I still need to refer to the mother ship from time to time.

First off, we’re legally an LLC, and the market is owned and operated by me. You may have heard the market described as a co-op but it has never legally been one even though it’s run in a cooperative spirit.

We’re not a non-profit, either, but we’ve structured things so that over time the market can just barely cover its own expenses. Just like all of our member farms are sustainable growers, the market itself needs to be sustainable. So how do we cover its expenses? One small way is through the memberships you pay. The $25 a year you give to the market is enough (to put it bluntly) to cover most of the costs of having you as a customer: banking fees from depositing your checks, paper and ink for printing, web hosting fees, and that sort of thing. There really isn’t much left and I’m happy to provide those that ask, a copy of our budget. We currently have 190 paid members out of the 1552 active accounts on the website.

By far the bulk of our funding comes from the growers themselves. They pay a 10% commission on their sales through the site. This money covers the storage we use, the tables and shelves used to spread out and organize your orders, the food allowance we offer our volunteers, rent and utilities, etc. During the slow parts of the year, the sales are usually not enough to cover our weekly costs, but in the busy times (late fall and early spring, for us) there is extra. If we plan things out well, it pretty much all evens out in the end.

Last year, the total sales and memberships combined through the market amounted to $168,509.00. 90% of the sales went straight to our growers, and the rest went to a food allowance for our volunteers ($50 a week), rent ($120/month), web hosting ($5,140/year), transportation, insurance and various small business expenses. The “profit” gets counted as personal income on my tax forms, and comes out to roughly $3000/year.

The growers get paid out of the shared cashbox for their previous week’s sales when they drop off their items, during the hour before we open the market. Then, you arrive and pay into the cashbox for your order. We used to then rush to the bank to deposit the money to cover the checks we just wrote to the growers, but now the growers get paid the following week (money you pay via credit cards takes up to a week to reach our account). As explained elsewhere on the website, you are really ordering directly from and paying the growers yourself, but our shared cashbox system makes things convenient for you and them. (Imagine if you ordered from ten growers having to write ten checks when you picked up your items!) This shared cashbox system has so far satisfied the tax man, but it does mean that if you place an order and then never arrive to pick it up, we’re left holding the bag. For that reason, you are responsible for paying for orders not picked up, and that amount is automatically added on to your next order for your convenience.

So, in probably far too much detail, that’s how we operate financially. Our market might be more expensive to run than a traditional “booths and tables” farmers market, but that price buys a system that’s simple, time-saving, flexible, and in my opinion, just better. There’s no money in the bank, but the market is paying for itself and that’s my primary financial goal. If you’d like to talk with me in person about this or any other aspects of TCH, just pull me aside when you come by to pick up your order.

LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040.
Google Map

PICK UP HOURS
Saturday from 10-12pm.
106 Colony Park Drive, Suite 100 Cumming, GA 30040
Please contact me if you have any questions, problems or suggestions. EMAIL ME

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

We thank you for your interest and support of our efforts to bring you the healthiest, the freshest and the most delicious locally-produced foods possible!

Market News

Lizzie’s Pantry is listed online this week for January. She only lists once per month. The pancake mix and all purpose flour is my favorite. If you have a mill, she also offers several non-GMO seeds and grains.

Welcome to 2015, and another year of The Cumming Harvest. This will be our 5th year in operation, and we are looking forward to many more. Many of our growers are have slowed down for the winter, delivering every other week or otherwise reducing their availability. Many others, however, are still going strong thanks to greenhouses and other season-extending methods. Now that the holiday season is behind us, we’ll be going every single week.

Each year, I devote the first few mailings of the year to the behind the scenes operation of TCH. This week, I’m going to talk about the many legal issues surrounding our market. Even though many people call us “the co-op”, TCH is legally a market owned and operated me, so I can have a place to sell items I occasionally offer from my own garden. There’s no board of directors, no shield corporation, no pot of grant money. It’s just me, and while that keeps things very simple, it also exposes my family to a ton of potential liability. There are several things I do specifically to minimize that risk:

The growers list their own items and set their own prices. When you buy from them, it is from them, not from me, and not from The Cumming Harvest. The Cumming Harvest never takes ownership or possession of the food. The growers drop it off, and you pick it up. Everything at the market has a customer’s name attached to it when it arrives. TCH does not repackage any items, or buy in bulk for redistribution. When you pay, you’re paying into a shared cash box for all of the growers. This lets you write a single check or swipe your card once for convenience, but you are really paying all of the growers directly and individually. Your money goes in, and the software keeps everything going spits out checks for each of the growers you buy from. The growers give a small percentage of their sales, 10%, back to the market to cover the many expenses of keeping the market going. I’ll cover the details of finances another week. TCH never buys from a grower and resells the items to you. Although I do take group orders and purchase from out of state items that we can’t get in GA. Things like butter, cheese, cod liver oil, etc. When a grower sells items that need licenses from either the state or the federal government, TCH verifies that the proper licenses have been obtained.

In the following weeks, I’ll get more into the nuts and bolts of finances and other aspects of how we work. Many of the decisions I make for the market are based on how the founding market, Athens Locally Grown, is run. The ALG market manager is also the web developer for the website and is in their 15th year of running. We hope to be around for that long too. :)

LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040.
Google Map

PICK UP HOURS
Saturday from 10-12pm.
106 Colony Park Drive, Suite 100 Cumming, GA 30040
Please contact me if you have any questions, problems or suggestions. EMAIL ME

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

We thank you for your interest and support of our efforts to bring you the healthiest, the freshest and the most delicious locally-produced foods possible!

Market News

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

GREEN PASTURE
This week Green Pasture is offering a Holiday Sale of 10% off. Place your order for cod liver oil, butter oil or coconut oil this week, I will need to place our group order before the sale ends on Saturday.

DELIVERY
You asked for it and we’d like to try it out starting this week. Order delivery to the Vickery/Polo area of Cumming for only $10 and your order can be delivered to your door.

1. Add and place your items in your cart.
2. Add and place the “Delivery” item in your cart.
3. Place order and Pay for your order online. (Delivery orders have to be pre-paid!)
4. Email me, thecummingharvest@live.com, to confirm delivery and ask any questions.
5. Saturday afternoon, place a cooler or cooler bag outside your front door.
6. Orders will be delivered Saturday between 1pm-3pm.
There is possible rain on Saturday, if you choose delivery please plan accordingly.

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Ways to PAY…In person and Online
Cash and Check are preferred.
Credit cards are accepted and have a 3% convenience fee applied.
Add funds into your account and draw down when you order.
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LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040.
Google Map

PICK UP HOURS
Saturday from 10-12pm.
106 Colony Park Drive, Suite 100 Cumming, GA 30040
Please contact me if you have any questions, problems or suggestions. EMAIL ME

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

We thank you for your interest and support of our efforts to bring you the healthiest, the freshest and the most delicious locally-produced foods possible!

Holiday Open House

Wishing everyone Happy Holidays and Peace on Earth!

As a token of our appreciation for your support of locally grown farmers and The Cumming Harvest we would like to invite you come by this Saturday, 10-12pm, to our Holiday Open House. Everyone is invited to peruse the many delicious samples from our local vendors. If you’re new, come by to look around and finally see how this online market and pick up actually works.

Participating vendors:
Sam Giganti – Complimentary Massage Massage Sign Up
Carrell Farms – Water Buffalo
B&B Enterprises – Local Raw Honey
Heirloom Gardens – Produce & Holiday wreaths
JavaGenesis Coffee Roasters – coffee
Leilani’s Gardens – Produce & Holiday wreaths
Dream Horse Pottery – Pottery
Esmeralda’s Pot of Potions – Household Cleaning Products
Ancient Awakenings – Fermented and Cultured foods
2B Whole – Gluten Free bakery

We’ll also have many delicious samples on the extras shelf for you to try.

SALES AND SPECIALS
My Daily Bread has their mini loaves for $4.50, pumpkin, chocolate zucchini and cinnamon rolls for $7.00, and yeast rolls for $6.50.

Indian Creek Angus has listed bulk portion of beef online. A great way to stock up and save.

For more…look under the WEEKLY SPECIALS category on the website.

Welcome to the market We are happy to announce we have added Esmeralda’s Pot of Potions to the market vendors, selling a “clean” line of home cleaning products. You can find her products listed under “Home and Garden Supplies” / “Home Cleaning Products”. She will also be at the market this Saturday so you can meet her.

LOCATION
Building 106, Colony Park Dr. in the Basement of Suite 100, Cumming, GA 30040.
Google Map

PICK UP HOURS
Saturday from 10-12pm.
106 Colony Park Drive, Suite 100 Cumming, GA 30040
Please contact me if you have any questions, problems or suggestions. EMAIL ME

To view the harvest today and tomorrow till 8pm, visit “The Market” page on our website, The Cumming Harvest

We thank you for your interest and support of our efforts to bring you the healthiest, the freshest and the most delicious locally-produced foods possible!