Published from an original story from High Meadows Fund. Find them on Twitter at (@HighMeadowsFund).
We are in a precarious moment where gains made by Farm to Plate and Eat Local initiatives to grow and diversify Vermont’s agricultural opportunities are threatened by consolidation in the retail food industry. This consolidation is creating intense pressure to drive costs out of food distribution. These changes are making it harder for farmers to reach consumers who want to provide both healthy food for their families and a fair wage to the farmer.Moving from Local Purchasing Relationships to Centralized Control
We’re seeing a severing of the ties between local producers, distributors, and the corporate buyers at mega-grocery chains. Farmers are being forced to bear the costs of transportation and labor along the supply chain as stores and distributors seek greater savings. When stores buy too much, or there’s spoilage downstream, farmers are saddled with “chargebacks” for unsold goods.What are the Right Markets for Vermont Farmers?
Many specialty, independent food stores and co-ops aim to offer farmers a better price point than their corporate competitors. However, despite offering needs-based discounts (for example, through the Food For All program at Burlington’s City Market), the higher prices feed perceptions that they primarily serve affluent consumers.
Food Hubs Connect Farmers, Food Processors, Distributors, and Markets. Graphic by Sustainable Table.

Food Connects, a nonprofit food distribution hub based in Brattleboro, delivers locally produced food and farm products to independent stores, schools, health care facilities, and colleges in New England. Photo by Food Connects.
Food Connects, in Brattleboro, collects food from more than 50 farms in Vermont and New Hampshire and distributes that food to more than 100 wholesale customers in the region. With its own fleet of trucks, and their location in southern Vermont, Food Connects has excellent access to markets in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Sales have increased over 25% in 2018, including 46% increase during the 3rd quarter, which is the main growing season. Much of this growth has come through collaboration with other food hubs and distributors to get easy access to more producers throughout the region. They have plans to begin purchasing from farms in the Upper Valley.
Opportunity in Institutional Markets – Health Care, Colleges, and More
Another area that’s showing particular promise is food hubs’ ability to connect modest-sized Vermont farms with institutional markets, particularly colleges and hospitals, where administrators recognize the value of healthy food and local sustainable growing practices. Students are also able to hold colleges to local buying commitments through programs like the Real Food Challenge. Hospitals and health care centers are guided by standards set by Health Care Without Harm, which articulate both food and sustainability practices across their industry.UVM Dining highlights the connection between food served at UVM cafeterias and the farms and food businesses where food is produced. Photo by Nate Stevens.
The Intervale Food Hub sells Sodexo produce from the Vermont Food Venture Center (VFVC), each week moving more than 1,200 lbs of processed local potatoes alone to UVM during the school year. The VFVC’s Farm to Institution program provides lightly processed farm products (shredded cabbage, diced root vegetables, whole peeled carrots) in appropriate portions to make food services and cafeteria serving more efficient and labor saving. The VFVC works with both growers and buyers to test produce varieties, portions, recipes, and products (shredded, diced, and chopped) that work best given constraints of climate, cost, and consumer taste.

The Farm to Institution program of the Center for An Agricultural Economy's Food Venture Center provides lightly processed farm products in appropriate portions to make food services and cafeteria serving more efficient. Photo by Todd Balfour.
These products, sourced from over 15 farms, currently move across the state of Vermont and into New Hampshire to hospitals, colleges, schools and even caterers or retail food service outlets. However, these locally grown and locally processed foods are replacing some of the lowest cost commodity products for the institutions which purchase them, and require commitment on behalf of the buyers to meet the price point that supports farmers and the processing entity.Conclusion
High Meadows has committed $300,000 over the next two years toward growing local food sales by helping food hubs scale up and find sustainable business models, focusing on markets that recognize, and are willing to pay for, the value of locally produced food. While this is a large commitment for High Meadows, it will only partly meet the need, so we hope other funders will join us in this work. If this initiative proves successful, we’re committed to extending it beyond 2020.
This article was written by Gaye Symington, with initial research and writing by Morgan True, of Kria Associates.
[1] Jean Hamilton, “Stagnant, Saturated, or Ready to Surge? Strategic Marketing Investments for Vermont’s Direct to Consumer Markets,” NOFA, 2017, https://nofavt.org/sites/default/files/files/resources/vt_direct_markets-stagnant_saturated_or_ready_to_surge.pdf.