Finding our ideal farm truck

Lambing season

Except for that little bit of snow we had yesterday, it's really starting to look like spring and the grass is starting to green. That means that it's lambing season! Our sheep named Leviathan started the season off by giving birth for her first time ever to a single lamb. Our sheep generally twin, but singling the first time is normal. The unusual part was that we needed to assist in the birth. Our sheep (and goats and pigs!) have always birthed on pasture without assistance from us, but we do keep a pretty close eye on them in case something goes sideways.

In Leviathan's case, the lamb wasn't in the right position and got stuck in the birth canal. We anticipated this would happen at some point, to some animal, so we've watched several videos and been to training classes so that we would be prepared. We also keep a ready-to-go medical kit with long gloves, lube, and other useful items just for this type of situation. We had it on good authority that the person with the smallest hands is going to be best at this type of thing, and our results were in line with that wisdom. We're happy to report that both Leviathan and the lamb are okay! 

New online store

If you've been a long-time BOTL Farm fan, you may remember we briefly had a Square online store. It was sort of terrible, so we switched it to an inventory system that you couldn't actually purchase from. That seemed to annoy everyone, including us, so then we tried to have an elaborate Google Form that was somehow also an ordering platform? It wasn't great. 

We know we should be like everyone else and have an online store, but all of the options were pretty terrible for us for several reasons:

variable-weight meat packages: customers could order a package of chops online but the package weights vary from 0.4 to 2.2 lbs! How do we deal with that? 

there are some farm-friendly online store platforms, but they have fees of 10 - 20% that weren't clear to customers, or the platform would want to roll their fee into the farmer's per-pound price instead of being transparent about the platform fees

inventory is hard. None of the platforms would interface with our current inventory systems, so this would add another layer of complexity

After years of online- and soul-searching, we found a mostly-great platform! It's called Eat From Farms (EFF) and we're now paying members. It's not perfect (who is?) but here's how it works better than other options:

customers can place orders without paying at checkout. We receive the order, pick and pack it, and then update the order with the final price. The customer receives notification and their credit card is charged, or they can pay at pickup. That way, you are charged for the exact 2.2 lb package of meaty, fatty, wonderful chops that you get. Mmmm chops!

EFF has the lowest fees we've seen and they are clearly marked at checkout as "platform fee," separate from the price we charge

we can't all be winners. EFF does not interface with our current inventory system, but hey, two out of three isn't bad!

Check out our new online store. Right now the pickup location is limited to our farm store, but once farmers markets start, you will be able to place an order online and pick it up at any of our markets!

Our ideal farm truck

We've never been truck people. Nick used to be big into Jeep Wranglers and Danielle spent as much of her adult life not owning/driving vehicles as possible. Up to this year, our 'farm truck' has been a Subaru Outback and our 'market van' has been an all-electric Nissan Leaf. We get made fun of at the slaughterhouse and at farmers markets, but we like to keep it weird. 

Now that we're expanding and experiencing higher demand (y'all are the best!), we needed to reconsider the sticky question of what our ideal farm truck is. After much navel-gazing and discussion with our families, we've decided that our ideal farm truck is, indeed, an AWD mini-van with all (except the front) seats removed and a hitch on the back. So the next time you see us, we may be driving our new-to-us Toyota Sienna. Cool!

Organic animal feed

Remember how last newsletter we said that we don't stock starter feed? New plan: we have New Country Organics Poultry Starter feed in stock (40 lb bags). We rarely make mistakes but we accidentally ordered more starter than we needed and now we're happy to pass it along to you!

As mentioned above, we have a new online store and are going to use it to organize our feed orders/sales. We encourage feed customers to use it to place orders and pay when you pick up. As you check out, it will ask what day you want to pick up. Choose the day that works best for you, but if it's a custom order we'll contact you after we receive it from NCO to arrange pickup.

Find us this month

On Farm Store Hours: Tuesdays noon-2pm, Sundays 2-4pm

Know Your Farmer Fair: Saturday April 1st, 11am to 2pm at the new Community Center in downtown Willimantic, CT