Meat+Poultry - December 2020 - 76

S M A L L B U S I N E S S M AT T E R S

" We like
to celebrate
our farmers as
they grow. "
- JESSICA ROOSA

This Old Farm features
a 2,000-square-foot
retail area featuring
fresh and frozen meats
as well as locally
produced artisan items.

Ever the food purist, Roosa boasted that
all the value-added meats are produced with
no added nitrites and have garnered a great
reputation...a little thing most would call
public confidence.

SUCCESSFUL FAILURE
" I would venture to say that our original
business plan worked well, " she said. " There's
an old adage taught in business schools that
you aren't really successful unless you've failed
somewhere along the way, and that made you
better. Through the years, I have certainly
found many things that did not work, failures
taught me valuable lessons.
" Yet the point is well taken that you have
to constantly reflect on what you are doing
and why you are doing it that way. That
results in changes almost continuously. I am
blessed to have a staff that reacts positively
to change. "
The 44-year-old entrepreneur said the
COVID-19 pandemic really opened her eyes
about what people expect in the food they
eat...they want to know the source and
the conditions under which the product
was produced.
As far as the maturation of the Farmers
Alliance goes, Roosa adds that there is a very
informal management structure that works
in an advisory capacity. She said the initial
funding from the Community Supported
Agriculture (CSA) amounted to about $7,000,
which was used for marketing and was all

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MEAT+ POULTRY | 12.20 | www.meatpoultry.com

paid back. Nothing was provided to build the
processing plant.
" We like to celebrate our farmers as
they grow. Many of our long-time Farmers
Alliance members have gotten back on their
feet and struck out on their own to market
their livestock and agricultural products, " she
said. " That means we have achieved what we
originally set out to do in helping save our
family farms and getting our food supply back
under more local control. "
She pointed out that the near future
holds the likelihood that greater processing
capacity will be needed, possibly resulting in
plant expansion.
" We are currently looking for partners
that want to invest in processing capacity by
either signing letters of intent for co-packing
relationships or through equity investment. "
Meeting the need for small producer
processing access has been a boon for both
family farmers and This Old Farm.
" Larger packers don't have the time or
inclination to service local agriculture, " Roosa
said. " We saw the demand and tried successfully
to serve that need. In fact, we are totally booked
up for our livestock processing through all of
2021, though we intend to add capacity and thus
appointments as early as next spring. "
An improbable background for this
mission? Indeed. But for Jessica Roosa, her
role in providing a much-needed service is
certain to inspire others to just look around
them and see what needs to be done.
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Meat+Poultry - December 2020

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