Growing Profitable Local Farms
Small Farm Central has grown into Harvie: a platform for local farms to run a customizable, customer friendly CSA / farm share program.
The Small Farm Central platform remains active.
What is Harvie?
Harvie helps farms selling through a CSA / farm share model increase retention (+15-30% year-over-year retention) and meet sales growth targets while increasing overall profitability. To accomplish these goals, Harvie focuses on providing a better member experience that includes customized shares, flexible share sizes and flexible weeks. At the same time, Harvie streamlines administration so the customer-friendly features do not drive farmers crazy with logistics.
Harvie is also a marketing and customer service platform, as we provide a customized marketing plan to meet your membership goals and we also handle customer service inquiries in tandem with you.
Features and Benefits for Your Farm
Increase Retention Rates 15-30%
Competition in a Changing Marketplace
Local food and claims of local food are everywhere now from your local grocery store to meal kit delivery services to big new competitors. Consumer attitudes towards convenience and technology are changing rapidly and our goal is to help your farm compete in a quickly changing local food marketplace.
Broaden the Market for Your Farm Share Program
Harvie makes it easy to be a part of a farm share and support a local farm. Customized boxes, recipe suggestions, and an accessible platform for desktop and mobile make it easy for new members to connect with you. We also provide you the opportunity for add-ons and extras, which is a great way for you to increase top-line sales and widen your reach to market your products.
About Small Farm Central
Small Farm Central was founded in 2006 by Simon Huntley to serve the technology needs of farmers. Since 2006, over 1,000 farms, farmers markets, fisheries, and other local foods businesses have utilized Small Farm Central’s tools.
Simon grew up on a farm, studied technology, and came back to farming to help develop a CSA program for a fruit farmer in western Colorado.
Through this experience working at the ground level, Simon saw that farms needed help to develop a web presence and there was an opportunity to join his passion for technology solutions and agriculture.
In the years since the initial Site Builder release, online sales, CSA member management, and farmers market marketing tools have been added to continue filling the gap between the available technology tools and farms by developing a farm-centric approach and providing education and guidance on how to use the tools.
How to get in touch:
Phone: 412-567-3864
Email: [email protected]
Address: 700 River Ave, Suite 315, Pittsburgh, PA 15212
The Harvie Blog
What is Harvie? It’s an online platform that connects local consumers to local farmers through a customer-friendly CSA / farm share model, including customized shares, payment plans, a Cooking Suggestion Engine and more! We want you to love your farm so your farmer can build a thriving business that takes care of the farm family, their employees, and their land. It’s been a long journey for me to get to this point: the story of why I created Harvie started almost 13 years ago…
Buying a farm share from a Harvie farmer is a great first step to culinary adventures and eating healthier, but now you need to take that beautiful, farm-fresh produce out of the box or bag and put it to good use in your kitchen!
Our philosophy at Harvie is that cooking is not about intimidating recipes and elaborate meals. Our obsessions with food TV like “Iron Chef” and “Chopped” make us feel like only the professionals can make food taste good. False…
Local farms are an essential part of healthy local economies.
They protect farmland from development, they take care of the environment by responsibly growing on their land, they build a rural lifestyle for farm families and their employees, they preserve local food production, and often build a community around their farm.
However, it’s not a glamorous lifestyle. It’s hard being a local farmer…