Community Supported Agriculture is a seasonal contract between the farmer and the members. You purchase a share of the seasons harvest in advance. Your investment helps the farmers pay for the seeds, soil amendments, and tools at the beginning of the farming season, when a majority of the spending happens all at once. We commit to providing you with healthy, locally grown food throughout the growing season. This interdependence helps to ensure the longevity of small farms, while also reconnecting people to the land that helps to sustains them.
The Risk
There are risks to participating in a CSA. You experience our hardships as well as our bounty. There are many factors to producing a single crop from start to finish with out failing. Seed, weather, workers, timing - all of these things could be bad. One of the benefits of how we farm is the wide variety of vegetables that we grow. Consider it crop insurance. Because of this diversity, the ratio of crop failure is low, and only a few crops ultimately suffer through the year (i.e. ground hogs ate it, pest infestation, poor germination, to name a few). There are natural occurrences such as hail, floods, and drought that can have a greater impact on the availability of all the crops, as a whole. Yes, a flooded field would strongly affect your share. This is ultimately the risk that you agree to take with us, as a CSA member of a small vegetable farm.
The Details
Ten Mile offers a Market Style CSA. Traditionally, a CSA share consists of pre-payment by members for a box of vegetables of the farmer’s choosing, provided each week throughout the season. Our Market Style CSA provides you with the ability to shop for your share each week. Like all CSA’s, you pay in full for your share at the beginning of the season. At the market, we add an additional percentage to your credit, based on the amount you invested (see chart below). But, instead of us choosing the vegetables for you, you are able to pick and choose to your liking. There is no obligation to how much or how little you spend each week. You also have the flexibility to shop at one or both of our Farmers Markets each week, or even skip a week. This gives you much more freedom, and time, to spend your share. We keep track of the amount you spend each week at market, all you have to do is shop! This style of share is a great alternative if you find yourself giving away certain items from your share each week because you or your family don’t eat them. Essentially, that is giving away your invested money each week! There are a few points to consider. Your CSA share is for the 2012 growing season, it will not transfer over into next year. Please be aware that there may be limitations placed on certain items at certain times of the year. For example, if we only have twenty pounds of strawberries, you will not be able to take ten pounds. We will limit you to a certain amount. Also, our greatest selection of items is at the beginning of market each day, not the end. We will not typically promise to hold any specific items for you on a weekly basis- it is first come, first serve. If you are not an early riser, maybe shopping our Wednesday afternoon market would be better for your selection. Below is a list of the shares available.
Markets
Our market season is typically around 28 weeks. We will email you to let you know when we start market. We usually start in mid May and always go until the weekend before Thanksgiving. You are welcome to shop for your CSA share any time during our Montford Farmers Market, located in the parking lot of the Chamber of Commerce from 2 - 6 pm, or on Saturday at the Asheville City Market, located at the Public Works building on Charlotte St from 8 am - 1 pm.
To Join
We take shares on a first come first serve basis. The best way to secure your share is to pay in full once we confirm there is space available. We strongly encourage those folks who can pay in full to do so. If some extra time is needed, we are open to some payment options. But, all payments need to be paid in full by April 15th. We do not offer refunds, but your credit is available until the end of November, 2012.
Please respond to keepinitrural@gmail.com or call 828.236.1822 if you are interested in joining. We will confirm space availability and provide information on how to make payment.
