As the situation around COVID-19 worsened in the USA, Freight Farms has still been able to continue its momentum in a meaningful way. With the company’s team working remotely during this crisis, demand for Freight Farms’ Greenery has continued to grow, resulting in the team exceeding its sales goals for the first and second quarter of the year. Brad McNamara, President of Freight Farms mentions: “There are a lot of people coming to us seeing the urgency of the food supply.”

The company’s customers are also responding to the crisis in various ways. Many of Freight Farms’ small business customers have been able to quickly pivot from supplying restaurants and foodservice to consumers in their communities directly via CSA, delivery, and drive-through models. CEO Rick Vanzura says that there has been a lot of discussion on how countries' food supply chains were or weren’t prepared for COVID-19. “The situation has spotlighted urgent supply chain challenges faced around the world, and we want to help provide solutions wherever we can.”

Business past weeks

Caroline Katsiroubas, Director of Marketing & Community Relations states, “There has been an increase in consumers researching how to grow their own food that’s highlighting a heightened interest in local sourcing and the need to shorten supply chains. People are also searching for food production technology – we’ve seen a significant increase in visits to our website, as well as in inbound inquiries.” The company receives many messages of people that are interested to create a reliable source of food for their communities. “Our small business customers sell their produce directly to consumers in their local communities, as well as to local restaurants and foodservice groups.

Those who relied heavily on restaurant and foodservice sales prior to the pandemic have been nimbly pivoting their business models to reach consumers in their local communities directly through contactless CSAs, drive-through farm stands, and delivery models. And the communities have very receptive – they want access to fresh produce without having to go to the grocery store right now, they want to support local business, and they like knowing their food has been in contact with fewer people – just them and their farmers.”

At the moment Freight Farms is scheduling live videos for social media and online webinar presentations to highlight Freight Farms’ customers. There will continue to be webinars for customers to share their experience and learn new farming and business tactics. “We are increasing digital experiences for our existing farmers and those interested in learning more about our farming technology.”

Freight Farms supporting farmers

 McNamara: “We are working on initiatives to support our community of farmers around the globe and domestically. We’re offering free access to our IoT platform Farmhand Connect to support their remote access to their farm operations. We’re also helping to connect farmers in our network who have extra produce to nonprofit organizations seeking donations.” Freight Farms is also supporting its customers by ensuring access to its service and technical teams. “We’ve increased our customer service and engineering support,” Vanzura mentions. We also have an online platform where our farmers share tips and tricks, and we are helping facilitate that conversation, even more, to promote best practices to respond to this crisis.” “For some of them, it’s pivoting to a more B2C model and we want to help them achieve that,” Katsiroubas notes.

Locals are helping out

Katsiroubas: “Some of our institutional customers, like schools which are of course now closed, are donating the produce they’ve been growing for the dining hall to food banks or nonprofit organizations that are lacking fresh produce. Our customers at Saint Joseph's College have been continued growing despite the COVID-19 to deliver their supply to the local elderly population in the community.” “Our customers have the power to grow food in minimal time and pivot supply to where it needs to be in the community. I am so proud of our community of farmers as they’re using our technology to do what they can to help others in this time of crisis,” McNamara notes. 

Pushing forward developments

McNamara states that the company’s resources are ramped up, for the current situation and for continued product development. “Fortunately, our supply chain is in good shape, so we are in a good position not only to support the current network, but also the new farmers coming on board in the upcoming months.” Freight Farms recently hired automation and robotics specialist Jake Felser, as the new head of engineering. “Having Jake onboard has been great. We have a dream team pushing development forward, especially from an automation perspective. We are moving forward constantly and have never been better positioned.”

Crispr tomatoes

“We’re always pushing forward on collaborative research, and recently worked with Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory as they explored how seed genetics and vertical farming can work together for efficiencies in food production, especially in confined environments. Our farm was used to create optimal growing conditions to unlock unique characteristics of their gene-edited tomato seeds,” McNamara states. The launch of the Greenery last year has proven to be more powerful with 70% more linear growing room in the same 320 sq. footprint as its flagship farm. “The interior flexibility of the Greenery supports efficient growth of more than 500 varieties of crops, and farmers are able to increase yield overall. With our integrated IoT platform farmhand, these farms will only continue to be more efficient.”

Investment

In February the company raised $15 million in their series B funding led by Ospraie Ag Science. McNamara says, “Ospraie Ag Science is a great investor and focused on agricultural and environmental sciences. It’s important for us to have our mission in line with whomever we work with on the investment side. We are using the funding to push ongoing technology development for our growing customer community.” “The partnership with Sodexo was a milestone moment for the company. By being a key player in their foodservice program, integration of our Greenery farms onto more campuses across the country will accelerate.” “It’s an important time to invest in agtech and to empower food production on a local level everywhere.”

For more information:
Freight Farms
www.freightfarms.com 

Publication date: Wed 29 Apr 2020
Author: Rebekka Boekhout
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