The end is in sight. Or is it? We close the stand down for the season this coming Monday (Columbus Day) and as it has for the past 6-8 years, right on time comes a wide spread frost. We always have to respond to the same tired rhetorical question—“Slowing down for you now,I suppose. Not much to do but put everything away….” always with a knowing nod. Fact is, nothing could be further from the truth. As the days get shorter and temps start to cool down there is almost an urgency in the air to get as much accomplished before the snow flies, because in the spring we will all be consumed with the greenhouses and spring plant production. So we spend our days fixing and putting away machinery, mulching strawberries, perennial pots, garlic, rhubarb, patching up the greenhouses, cutting brush and the list goes on. In the dead of winter we are finally confined to the office for tax work,seed orders and trying to lay out at least a rudimentary game plan for the farm for the upcoming season. Everybody gets some down time,but there is always something that needs attention. We just dont all pack up for a couple of months and head to Florida. But then, who would really want to…?
This winter we will complicate things by doing a farmstand renovation. We have batted the idea around for a couple of years of having a commercial kitchen at the farmstand. Many New England farmstands have them and we have recognized the benefits of them, but they looked like a lot of extra money and harder for us-more personnel management. But recent events have precipitated impending federal food safety legislation (Google California Leafy Greens Amendment and SB 510) that have us looking for an alternative income stream should the FDA make us loose our capacity to service wholesale accounts. For me personally, it forced my decision to go ahead. Other members of the family found their own reasons to pursue the stand renovation with a state certified kitchen, so we are all on board. But it has been quite a process thusfar trying to talk to the State agencies,utilities and municpalities. As we are trying to do as much of the construction as possible with the farm crew, I have been acting as a “general contractor” and I must say that I have a greater appreciation of what it is that a general contractor contributes to the process of building something. That said, we are poised to clean out the farmstand the day after we close for the season and start tearing the old structure down. So in essence we will be trying to cram reconstruction in around everything else that needs to be done. It promises to be a very busy (and expensive ) close to 2010. Stay tuned…