Latest / Beyond Labels Premium / Episode 14: FOOD INFLATION: Can Family Farms Save Us?

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Episode 14: FOOD INFLATION: Can Family Farms Save Us? · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: The thing I want us our folks to understand is farmers are not going out of business.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: The sunlight has not quit growing plants, and and cows are still eating grass and trees are still growing just like they did, you know, two years ago.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is not a production issue.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: It is after production.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yes, it really does affect us.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: So then you say, well, you know, so how do you how do you decide uh you know how much to go up, how much to to do?
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: And for a small farmer, we don't have a, you know, we don't have a crew of bean counters to you know to to push the pencil for all these things.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: So we just kind of watch you know what we're paying more for for fencing, for fuel, for things.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and we just, you know, we just have to we have to follow that we have to follow that bouncing ball, I'm afraid.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we're not immune to it.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Beyond Labels.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'm Dr.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Cena McKella here with my co-host, the one and only Joel Salatin.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And today's question actually is from my husband to Joel.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: So today we're talking about um something that affects everybody food inflation.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: Food inflation is here and it is predicted to get worse.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: So we have many food manufacturers saying that they're gonna be increasing their prices even more because they're feeling cost pressures.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um we have we have large companies who stated that they need to increase the price onto the consumer at this point, that they've actually been kind of absorbing the cost, and now they're gonna give it to consumers.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: In our household, we actually track some foods at our local grocery store.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: So we track our own inflation here.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: And just as an example of inflation we're already seeing, um we buy a certain type of wild rice.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: At Whole Foods, that wild rice has gone from$9 to$11 a bag just in the last like month.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we also, my husband has this coconut chocolate drink that he consumes.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Buying directly from the company, it went from$9 a bottle to$11 a bottle.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and um just as a comparison with Polyface, uh, we track um Applegate organic hot dogs.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: At Wedmond's, they went from$6 a pack to$6.50 a pack.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: And at Target, they raised the price by a dollar per pack.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, crazy.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: So our question, or my husband's question for you, Joel, is we're seeing the large food manufacturing companies saying that you know they've been experiencing increased costs and there's more costs coming their way.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: And because of that, we're gonna we're gonna experience higher costs in the grocery stores.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Is this affecting small farms like your like yours at Polyface?
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, Cena, yes, Cena, it is.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and and right at the outset, I need to make a point that this is not about production.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're not suddenly unable to produce food.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and one of the biggest uh inflations we've seen, as you know, in the last year is in fiber, specifically lumber.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, it was interesting the the very like like that that lumber prices went up, I don't know what, like three times.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I mean I mean like a threefold increase in in uh like three or four weeks there.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: I happened to be down uh south doing a seminar at that time down in Louisiana uh on a on a great big uh uh pine plantation that the family that the family had actually planted, you know, grandpa planted it, and this was going to be a family legacy, you know, that was gonna be harvested in uh you know 60 years and and have this big windfall.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: And um and prices and the family was in jeopardy of losing their losing their whole farm, their property, because the price had plummeted uh to almost nothing, you know, from from the from the trees that grandpa had planted, while prices at the retail store were up threefold.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, there's there's plenty of lumber, plenty of timber, plenty of trees.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh this wasn't so so you start digging and and you say, well, what is this?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And and what it is, is is primarily uh uh an emplo employment pressure.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know, people with when people are paid more not to come to work than to come to work through the the COVID largesse, um then well, you know, I'd stay home too, all right.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: And and so so these mills, so the the the bottleneck is the mills.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: It people haven't stopped raising trees, and people stop haven't stopped raising dairy cows or raising you know wild rice.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um the the bottleneck is in is in the the employment and and the uh the supply chain thing.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we're we're all familiar with the ships docked out of um uh you know San Jose out in California, the the hundreds of of ships out there docked.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and and so so the supply chain thing is real.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm I'm trying right now, uh Cena to reprint uh Polyface Designs and uh Polyface Micro, the two latest books that we've done here.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: And uh there's been a true rush on them.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I've I've published you know uh uh more than a dozen books in my lifetime, and and I I've always been able to get them reprinted.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: I can call the printer and say, uh, you know, can you have these to me in like 30 days?
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of a 30-day out kind of thing, normal.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Now we're looking at at four months, you know, two and a half months.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so so actually, on our just just to give you an example of what's of what's happening at our farm, a small farm, um, we are now realizing that we can't afford to do just in time, for example, egg cartons.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we've always gotten them, you know, two or three pallets at a time.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: They come out of Pennsylvania.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: And the last time we got them, uh what is normally a one-week turnaround suddenly became a one-month turnaround.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Suddenly we've got all these eggs, we don't have anything to put them in.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you you you can't put eggs on a tabletop.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you you got to put them in an egg carton.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're now looking actually at renting warehouse space in Stanton, you know, about eight miles away.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: We found some some vacant warehouse space uh that that we could rent so that we could buy a uh a tractor trailer load of egg cartons or or egg packing materials, um, just so we aren't, just so we don't, so we can have a much longer lag time.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: So when when we see, oh we're we're we're you know we're like three months out, oh we we can get some more.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I just I just purchased I just purchased um a two-year supply of uh sawmill blades.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: We we have a sawmill, a band sawmill here on the farm.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh those of you who've been here know that there's a big sign on it says Joel's Man Cave.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so we have this sawmill, you know.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we've always bought you know 10 or 10 or 20 sawmill blades at a time.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's enough to last us a month.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: And when we, you know, when we run through those in two or in in a couple months, we just get some more.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we just bought sawmill blades enough to go for two years uh because of these these supply chain uh glitches.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh when I when I uh ordered this new reprint of the books, the printer said, yeah, we'll get up to as fast as fast as we can, but we can't get paper.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, imagine something as ubiquitous as paper, and and and a paper printing company can't get paper.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: The other one says, well, you know, they're their press foreman uh got COVID.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then you know they have all these protocols, and and and if if people in one department, somebody gets COVID, then the whole department has to, you know, uh uh be out of work for two weeks while they quarantine.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: So now's at the printer can can do this work.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: So so these these um I'm kind of just you know rattling off several of the very practical uh uh things that are going on as we as we wrestle with this.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so what happens then is when a company has to inventory larger stocks due to these uh glitches within the supply chain caused by uh a lack of ability to get labor, um, or or because of of COVID uh COVID requirements that that's that empty empty whole departments all of a sudden because somebody got COVID, you know, so now the whole department empties for a week or two.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, those kinds of structural um inefficiencies within the system are putting pressure on costs because you can't you can't be inefficient and not recover those costs.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so while while the the you know the the technology of our um you know of our systems have stimulated efficiencies for a long time, now we're we're dealing with these um uh incredible inefficiencies that are that have to be uh uh look the value of money.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: Look, if we if instead of being able to call for egg cartons um you know uh uh a month at a time, we have to inventory a year's worth of egg cartons at a time.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: Suddenly that check, that check, instead of being a$2,000 check, is a$12,000 check.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's money tied up in inventory that couldn't be spent on on something else that we need today.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so so all of that budgeting and all of that lag time, all of that uh that that capital investment sitting out there to protect us from a glitch in the supply chain, all of that has to be recouped.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: That that that's money that's just sitting there in the system, it's not generating anything, it's not turnover, it's just there to protect us because of these uh supply chain uh glitches.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: So believe me, the the the production capacity is not driving these food costs.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's not it's not suddenly uh that it's harder to raise a chicken or harder to make a pot dog or harder to, you know, that's not the issue.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: The issue is much more um endemic, it's much more business oriented, uh capital and and and uh commercial oriented uh than all of those kinds of things.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: And and you know, I can't help but mention the fact that when you dump when you dump trillions of dollars into an economy without any service or production to back it, those dollars are gonna chase fewer goods.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're now seeing the results of trillions of of just you know uh I call it funny money, uh just funny money dumped onto the economy.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, uh the economy hasn't expanded the the productive economy has not expanded at the rate of government spending.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_01: And when government spending expands what much faster than than production and service, then than than true production and service in the economy, then all of that government money is going to chase fewer goods and services, which makes everything go up.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_01: So that's happening as well.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um that that's a that's a huge thing.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: So you've got you've got a combination of numerous things here happening.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: I want us our our our folks to understand is farmers are not going out of business.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: The the soil hasn't, the the sunlight has not quit growing plants, and and cows are still eating grass and trees are still growing just like they did, you know, two years ago.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: This is not a production issue.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: It is a it is a process issue.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: It is it is it is uh after it is after production.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yes, it really does affect us.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: So then you say, well, you know, so how yeah, how do you how do you decide uh you know how much to go up, how much to to do?
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: And for a small farmer, we don't have a you know, we don't have a crew of bean counters to you know to to push the pencil for all these things.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: So we just kind of watch you know what we're paying more for for fencing, for fuel, for things.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and we just, you know, we just have to we have to follow that we have to follow that bouncing ball, I'm afraid.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we're not immune to it.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's fascinating because so I had read exactly what you're saying, that um supply chain is the biggest disruption uh because of this just-in-time um inventory management, uh, you know, along with exactly what you said, um, that so many people have left the workforce, right?
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: So um, and the COVID policies you got to get everybody out of the office when there's you know an infection and whatnot.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: But a lot of people left the workforce and this just-in-time inventory management.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: So I didn't realize that um on a small farm, you were you also used um just in time inventory management, you know, like you said with the egg cartons.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that's why we were thinking, okay, maybe you were not affected by the supply chain issue um because you didn't do just in time.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: But so so like a cartons would be just in time inventory management.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what else would like buying feed for like the chickens?
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: Would that be a just in time?
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, yes, absolutely.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so so uh fortunately our mill um our mill stockpiles uh feed, you know, they have they have storage bins, and so they they stockpile uh feed for us uh for us as well as a bunch, you know, a whole bunch of other uh uh GMO-free you know, farmers who use local GMO-free grains.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I will say this, um in our defense, and and I I don't want people to think that that you know local food systems, regional food systems, and small farms are just as subject to everything.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: We are subject to a few things, as I mentioned, but I can assure you that the the the much shorter supply chain, for example, the farmers, the farmers that produce for us in the in the in the region, those those farmers um have neighbors, and so the the the ability to um to respond, the ability to respond to things is much quicker when the whole outfit is smaller.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and so it's like the difference between turning uh turning an aircraft carrier and a speed boat.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: If you want to turn an aircraft carrier, you know, it's gonna take you several miles to turn that thing uh around or change course.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: A speed boat can do it in about 10 feet.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: And and so so while we are subject, uh, we're not immune to some of these glitches that we're seeing within the within the economy, um, within commerce, by the same token, our smallness gives us a chance for for quicker adjustments, I would say.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um we saw that last year, right?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: With with COVID and how there was a run on the grocery stores and there were food shortages.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: And correct me if I'm wrong, but it was the small farmers that stepped in and helped feed people because they have that better right flexibility, I guess you could say.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: So they stepped in and helped feed people when the grocery stores couldn't, correct?
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, absolutely.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: And and in fact, the the the the composite inventory, uh, the composite inventory among small farms, look the the the truth is that we small farmers, yes, we certainly do some just in time inventorying, especially of things that we buy commercially, uh, you know, things like egg cartons, okay?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, we don't make egg cartons, and and so we, you know, we buy those uh uh through you know from from regular industry sources.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um so you know, those we do just in time, but as a general rule, as a general rule, our food inventory, our stockpile of food inventory is much larger.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, that's an interesting question, Cena, and I don't have the answer.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: But my in but but my intuition, my intuitive, well, I'm I'm already I'm I'm way ahead of of where the discussion is in my mind.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: So let me bring up to speed.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: My my my so so so so a a valid question is relative to to today's sales, let's say Kroger, okay.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: Kroger, they're they're gonna sell X number of stuff today, all right.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: What is the ratio of their warehoused inventory as a ratio of daily sales, all right?
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I don't know what that is.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not I uh that's not in my you know uh bag of tricks, but but an equal question for a small farm like us, my intuition is that our inventory per uh as a ratio of daily sales, I I my sense is we are 10 times.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just gonna say we are we are probably 10 times the inventory that we stock relative to daily.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: Because because we're seasonal, we produce seasonal.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: So we always have to be thinking of a long horizon out there.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: We're thinking six and eight months of of inventory out there um in advance uh because we can't because we can't just call up a warehouse in you know you know in in Uzbekistan and get a bunch of stuff, okay?
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so my sense is that the large food you know supermarkets, food suppliers have a much smaller inventory behind what you see than we as small farmers keep.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we have a we have a little farm store with with massive you know freezing capacity where we have you know thousands and thousands of pounds of inventory uh behind us.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh uh I've never actually been asked that question.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: I haven't even analyzed that, but it is it is a fascinating thing.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, I don't know, I don't know who would be able to answer that question for us, but my my hunch is just my educated guess is that as in general, small farms, especially livestock-oriented small farms, carry far more behind the back door than you see when you come in the front door relative to a Kroger or you know, a Wegman's or a uh you know a Whole Foods.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so so these glitches, these glitches um uh have a much more dramatic impact when everything's running on just in time.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, uh on on our small farm, uh, yeah, there are a few things that we do just in time, you know, uh uh supplies, supplies mainly, but the basic farm, we don't run just in time.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: We run year to year and seasonally.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: So we have these you know large stockpiles of inventory, whether they're whether they're animals in the field uh that'll be processed, you know, uh next year, or or whether you know they're actually you know uh T-bone steaks uh in the freezer waiting for purchase.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: Fascinating question, and I've I've never I've never had that discussion.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: See, that's why I love you because you you and Donnie, all right.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for bringing out thanks for bringing out a nuance to this that I've never thought of.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's uh it's it's it's truly uh I I love going where I haven't gone before.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: Me too.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: Explore new avenues.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so because let me tell you where we're going with this.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know, so we're as you know, I continually encourage people to um support their local farmers.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Farmers, you know, the ones that are aligned with their principles.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so we're, my husband and I were having this conversation about food inflation coming and how can we combat it to the best of our ability.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: And we got into the discussion about how is it affecting small farms?
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: And one thing that we thought was this, I'm going to run it by you and see is this is this even logical?
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so we know that this just-in-time inventory management is huge for big food companies, right?
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: And the grocery stores and whatnot.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: So they are more, like you said, they are more susceptible to not only shortages, but inflation.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: As you've just nicely laid out, the farm doesn't run predominantly on just in time inventory management.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: So is it possible that we would see, you know, people have a perception, and in some cases it is true, that food that you buy from a local farmer can be more expensive than like the organ uh than the food that you would buy in the grocery store?
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying every item, but it but it is it does happen sometimes where food from a local farmer is more expensive than food from the grocery store.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Is it possible that we're gonna see a narrowing of that price difference?
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: Because the stores, you know, these huge manufacturers like Big Ag, the big food companies and the stores are more susceptible to the rising costs.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, so they're gonna feel more of the increase in the prices than a small farmer.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: So, in other words, could it be that the grocery store prices are gonna raise a higher percentage than the prices at your local farm, narrowing that gap, which would entice more people to out of the store and go to the local farmer?
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, Cena, I think that's I think that's exactly right.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and it would be consistent with what we've seen, for example, in e-commerce as the as the cost of shipping because of because of logistics and you know the internet of everything uh has created a a tremendous um drop in uh in shipping costs, distribution costs, you know, door to door, door to door.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, everything from you know from Uber Eats to Amazon to you know FedEx and UPS.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: The logistics of of of distribution, of, of retail, retail distribution have plummeted in the last you know 10 years relative to the cost of bricks and mortar retail interfaces.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so that that is what is opening up the option for us here at the farm.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um we now ship nationwide competitively to you know to uh a lot of um you know retail uh uh branded prices because the cost of maintaining liability insurance to make sure you know that somebody doesn't stub their toe on your curb because you didn't clean the ice off of it in time.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: All of those costs are or you know, that somebody didn't uh somebody didn't fall in the back aisle, aisle 13, trying to go to the bathroom because a light fixture wasn't fixed in time and and the alley was dark and you got sued for for having a dark alley in your store.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: Those those costs are huge.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: They're just huge.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so as the not not to mention the cost of keeping a happy, a happy, smiley face cashier, you know, at the front of the store to check you out.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so, so um, so all we had so so with a with a shipping thing, all you need are are people that know how to interact, you know, electronically on social media, and and the perception is everybody at this company is happy.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you just have a really you know uh a gushy uh social media person, right?
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: To to make sure that that and and so the cost of that of that public face of having that that uh physical that physical interface has increased while the cost of a non-physical interface uh and distribution capacity has decreased.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: So just like that, I think that you're exactly right that we're going to see these large, large, um, uh, I call them fragile, fragile food chains are going to continue to have these issues, these problems.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's the cost of the bureaucracy of getting large.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh large large is not is not always efficient.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: Large often gets in its own way, you know, and and and and uh whatever and crumbles into bureaucracy.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas on our small farm, on our small farm, we don't have uh you know a bunch of uh of people that we're concerned about that if we don't uh follow a COVID policy, somebody's gonna sue us.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, we we have much more freedom to develop the team, develop a homogeneous, value-based team that sees the world through our eyes.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: And um and and and and so that creates a lot of efficiency.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: I don't sit here and wonder, oh no, what employee is going to sue me today?
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't that never even crosses my mind.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: But but let me tell you, Cena, in big business, that consumes the minds of managers, it consumes the minds of big business owners.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: And on a small scale, we don't have that.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think I think you're exactly right.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: I think that the narrowing, the narrowing of this gap between artisanal, artisanal local craft food, uh, what I call authentic food versus the um you know the large-scale uh counterpart uh in the supermarket, I think you're exactly right that that gap will uh decrease.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh not only will the gap decrease, but the but the the security will increase, the the ability to make sure to know if if uh if I know my farmer.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_01: Look, I just had, I know we're almost out of time, but I I just had a a guy stop by the farm actually last Saturday, and he said, I'm a member of a hundred families in Charlottesville, a hundred families, and we're trying to figure out how to develop food security.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we're we're concerned about shelves being empty, we're concerned about feeding our families and kids.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: How can we work with you to develop food security?
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh so we're actually, you know, uh we're actually toying with how how do consumers how uh and of course I'm a consumer too, I don't grow everything that I grow.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_01: How can I get on the top of a farmer's list?
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um you're talking about like a buy-in.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, yeah.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um I mean, you know, we we have CSAs, but you know, is there um you know, as a farm, we've got to pay bills in real time too.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: We can't sit around here and wait for and wait to discover, well, who's who's gonna continue to patronize us when the wheels fall off?
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we can't sit around here and wonder about that.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: So what we do is if somebody comes and they've got money in their pocket and they want to buy, we sell to them, whether they're here for the first time or the hundredth time.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so so it's it's a fascinating question.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh now we do we do uh uh use uh longtime loyalty and seniority if we're short of something.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, uh uh restaurants that have been with us a long time get eggs before restaurants that just came on this year, for example, if if we're short of eggs.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that's a real common one because it's you know it's seasonally cycles and all that sort of thing.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: We always get short of eggs this time of year.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: We always have too many eggs in in the spring.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: So so um, you know, how you really get loyalty is uh you go to the farmer and say, well, what are you long on?
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: And you buy stuff that the farmer's long on.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: That's how you, you know, those are farmers that we hug and and love.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and so so you know, we're we're toying with that, but we're hearing this kind of question.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, nobody's ever asked me that before.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: You know, how do how do I get how do I get on your you know your um uh you know your your number one list?
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and so you know, we're seeing people think about these kind of things as they see uh empty store shelves and things, and uh and and these are simply supply chain glitches that the longer the supply chain is, the more the more links all have to function uh together to make it work.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so our supply chain, where we actually grow it, process it, and then sell it, ours is very, very short.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's all on site.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: The supply chain is short, but our compensation is the inventory is long because the supply chain is short.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: So uh that's an interesting way to think about it.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: The longer the supply chain, the shorter the inventory, the shorter the supply chain, the longer the inventory.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of a I've never said that before, but again, you you you tend to you know bring out in me uh better stuff.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: So good.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm making you think.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_00: No, that's great.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: All right, we're about out of time, but I want to thank you because this has been so fascinating.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I think just like small farmers saved us in um in the early stages of the COVID situation, I think that we're gonna see small farmers saving us again.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I hope that people are gonna start um patronizing their small farmers, you know, really getting to know them and um forming relationships with them so that we don't just go to them when the grocery stores are you know are in shortage, so that we actually make the switch to the small farmer permanent.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: So um let's come back around to this topic as we get into the inflation and and let's see did did that prediction actually come true.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: I think that would be fascinating.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: Sound like it will be it will be indeed.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_01: It will be indeed.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: All right, thank you, everybody.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: We'll see you next time.