Ep 49. Voices from the Field: FarmLink with Founder Rob Barreca

Episode Transcript
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Thao Le (00:00):
The information or opinions expressed during the

(00:05):
seeds of wellbeing series aresolely those of the individuals
involved and do not necessarilyrepresent those of the
University of Hawaii College ofTropical Agriculture and Human
Resources, our funders, and anyaffiliated organizations
involved in this project.

(00:26):
Welcome to a Seeds of Wellbeing"Voices from the Field" podcast,
featuring voices of Hawaiiagriculture producers for Hawaii
agriculture producers. Thesepodcasts were made possible by a
grant from the University ofHawaii College of Tropical
Agriculture and Human Resources,also known as CTAHR. And the
Seeds of Wellbeing or SOWproject. And it's supported by

(00:49):
grant from the US Department ofAgriculture, National Institute
of Food and Agriculture, and theHawaii Department of
Agriculture.

Rob Barreca (01:00):
I think I unexpectedly really just fell in
love with the act of producingfood. It's kind of cliche, but
maybe it's cliche for a reasonof just like planting this
little seed and then seeing itmanifest and become, you know, a
carrot, or an eggplant or atree. Like, it's, it's super, we

(01:21):
take it for granted, or I tookit for granted at least. But
it's, it's so magical andamazing. And it's like this very
important thing for oursurvival. So it's super
practical.

Jim (01:35):
If you have lived on Oahu during the COVID pandemic, or
more recently, then you probablyalready know about FarmLink. In
this episode, we speak with itsfounder Rob Barreca about the
pre-COVID days of this onlinelocal only food marketplace, and
also how it's grown by leaps andbounds since. We find out how he
went from "geek for good" to CEOof an innovative new
Hawaii-based company, and is nowfirmly in the role of Chief

(01:58):
Technology Officer to ensureFarmLink's success into their
promising future.
Aloha. Welcome to another Seedsof Wellbeing "Voices from the
Field" podcast. Today we havewith us, thanks for joining us,
Rob, Rob Barreca from FarmLink.
Hey, Rob, how's it going?

Hey, Jim, happy to be here. Thanks for having me.

Jim (02:18):
No, I've been trying to track you down for a few months
now. I've been following whatyou've been doing for a number
of years. But I think if youwant to give us a little
background to start with; Whatgot you to Hawaii? And what got
you to a point where you wantedto start FarmLink

Yeah, so I came out to Hawaii in 2007, February 13
2007. And I was born and raisedin California, northern
California. And probably when Iwas about 15-16, my mom got me
this huge, I don't know, couple1000 page - total nerd nerd

(03:04):
alert here - HTML4 book and shewas like super subversive. You
just kind of like set it on thetable. And so I don't know, this
is '90, 1996 or something. Andthis is going to connect to how

(03:26):
I got here. And she was alwayskind of like, you know,
nurturing my, my math side andgiving us little like math
workbooks and stuff. And I don'tknow, my brain is just wired for
that. But yeah, you know, theweb was just kind of like
becoming more of a thing then,and she was like, "oh, yeah,
there's like, the Worldwide Webis out there. And you can

(03:50):
actually like, learn how to makeyour own web page" and actually
got me that book. And it wasjust like, it just triggered
something in me, it was sointeresting and exciting. And
just like this, this wild west.
Both the web itself and justlike that, that finding, finding
a way to find a creative outletfor kind of a more math

(04:13):
engineering guy was really cool.
And so yeah, you know, 16 yearsold, I started messing around
creating little web pages andstuff. And I think I was working
at the movie theater, the localmovie theater in in Sebastopol,
California. I remember I wasmaking $5.15 an hour training

(04:38):
wage. So I worked there for Idon't know, six months and I was
learning how to make little webpages and then I got in, I think
my mom got me an internship atAutodesk which is in like the
North Bay in California. Andkind of just started me on this
career of being able to makesome money as I was going

(05:02):
through high school, and thenthrough college of making
webpages for people, and it was,yeah, super interesting,
exciting. So, you know, thatevolved and just kind of kept on
that career path and starteddoing more, you know, semi
serious programming webapplication development for
clients kind of just doing it asa consultant and also sub

(05:25):
contracting for some companies.
And then went to school in SanDiego, and lived there for a
couple years after and I wasjust ready to go somewhere new
and me and one of my bestfriends, James, we call him
"slow James" in San Diego, we'relike, let's, "Let's go move to

(05:46):
Japan." And he was going toteach English and I was going to
do some, you know, digital nomadstuff, you know, do do web
projects, and we'd just liketravel Southeast Asia, and go
explore and surf and cruisearound, but James's nickname is

(06:08):
slow James for a reason. He justtakes forever to get ready to go
anywhere, whether it's, youknow, out to lunch, or moving to
Japan especially. And I wasready to go, and he was just
takin' forever. So I was like,well, maybe I can find, you
know, a month long contractsomewhere. And I was looking
around on Craigslist, in Sanlike San Diego, Craigslist or

(06:33):
something. And I see someposting for, for, you know, web
web contract, you know, onemonth long for a company called
ChipIn, all one word. And Ianswered it and found out they
were based in Hawaii, butthey're okay with somebody, you
know, working remote. So we dida short contract together, where

(06:58):
I helped them build a web appfor UC Berkeley, it was like a
UC Berkeley project for peoplethat had like a big idea. So so
my contact was Olin Lagon, whichis, which is amazing. Thank you
Olin for getting out here. ButOlin, Olin’s still involved in

(07:20):
the tech community in a lot ofreally great ways. But Olin, you
know, Olin and I've kind of justworked remotely on this UC
Berkeley project. And then Ithink Olin and one of his, so a
co founder Carnet Williams, ofChipIn at the time said, hey,
you know, that was a greatlittle project you did for UC

(07:44):
Berkeley, you know, we actuallyhave this startup is doing a lot
more other stuff. We're lookingfor people to come out, would
you be interested in coming outto Hawaii and working for, you
know, another another month orso? So I said, yeah, that'd be
great. That's halfway to Japan.
Still waiting on slow James topack his bags and set up as his

(08:08):
English English teaching job inJapan. So I'll come on to Hawaii
for a month. And then, you know,I’ll continue on my way to Japan
and keep sort of living livingthat life. And I don't know,
long story short, I think we'llgo back and forth a bit. But I'm

(08:29):
still here. Slow James went toJapan. And I never moved to
Japan. I've been here since andwe went and visited him. But
then James was there for threeyears. And then he's back back
in San Diego. So I never quitenever quite made that that leg
of the the full trip, but reallyglad I ended up where I am.

Jim (08:53):
You got most of the way there. First, I have to ask, are
there any websites that you didin the early days that are still
out there somewhere that we cantake? In the show notes?

You know, I looked I looked for one I don't think
it's there anymore. I think itwas I did. One that I was really
proud of. It was for The HolyCow. It's like it was like a bar
in San Francisco. And I wasusing like, at the time I think
it was like Macromedia Flash.
And I did this like, you know,now it's like pretty lame, but,

(09:34):
you know, animated this like cowand then like a halo over it and
added some sound to it. I'mpretty darn sure that website is
not there. Not what I did.

Jim (09:51):
You can be sure I'm going to try to find an old copy of
it. And yeah,

That'd be fun if you did

Jim (09:57):
I’ll put a link out there for the folks.

I’d love to see it.

Jim (09:59):
I think watching or listening. So that got to you
got you to California, you're acoder, probably learning new
things like Java and, and thingsthat keep you on your toes for
for as things change in theindustry. So you're, you're in
Hawaii, tell us how you got theFarmLink? And how did that all

(10:20):
come about? What's the link inFarmLink?

So yeah, so I came out in 2007. And I was working
at clChipIn a bunch ofincredible people there. You
know, Olin, Carnet, Kevin,Matthew McNealy, a lot of
really, really smart folks. AndI was working there from 2007

(10:45):
until I think, I think was 2013.
So we ended up getting acquiredby, so we rebranded ChipIn to
Sprout. And then Sprout wasacquired by a global ad company
called InMobi, based out inIndia, and we, you know, we
pivoted a bunch of times thatChipIn and then Sprout and, and

(11:08):
into sort of advertising,technology, really, like
interesting cutting edgetechnology, but wasn't something
that was like, near and dear tomy heart, you know, like the
people and the engineeringchallenges was great but I was,
especially in the fast the lastfew years working there, I was

(11:29):
really kind of yearning for abit more fulfillment, or, you
know, meaning in life, like Iwanted to be, I wanted to be a
geek for good Jim. And, youknow, use use some of these
skills and, and do the work thatI like to do, but have it, you
know, impact the world in someway that that meant something to

(11:53):
me. So lucky enough that, youknow, we were acquired, and, you
know, I made enough money, itwasn't, you know, a huge payout,
but made enough money to give mea couple years, to kind of
explore what the next phase ofmy life was going to be. And I
was really, I think this is kindof, you know, as local food and

(12:18):
farming, sort of, we're having abit of a moment, you know, just
becoming a little more like,sexy. And it was kind of, you
know, cool to be a, cooler thanit has been historically, in the
last, you know, hundreds oryears, millennia ever to grow

(12:38):
food. And so I was, I wasinterested in that realm, but I
didn't quite know what I wantedto do. And my first foray after
after leaving, you know, InMobiwas, I think I modeled it after
some, a company called like,Compost Cab in New York. They

(13:02):
basically pick up food wastefrom restaurants or homes, and
then do thermal orverma-composting, and produce
really good compost and thensell that I was kind of the
business model. And I thinktrying to charge people to pick
up their food ways, too. So I, Itried that, you know, to get

(13:26):
something started there. And itjust nothing was really clicking
on multiple levels. And a friendthat, “Hey, I heard about this
program called GoFarm. Hawaii. Idon't know if that's like what
you want to do. But I think youshould just go and check it out
and try it.” And I was kind ofhemming and hawing. And she was

(13:47):
just, like, just stop trying toanalyze, like, just go do it.
And you know, it's it's very lowstakes. And if you don't like
it, you can you can bail and dosomething else. And I really
credit GoFarm why I think it'sthe one of the best things
that's going on in the foodsystem in the state. I really, I

(14:08):
really credit them with, youknow, giving me a focus. And I
think I unexpectedly really justfell in love with the act of
producing food. It's kind ofcliche, but maybe it's cliche
for a reason of just likeplanting this little seed and
then seeing it manifests andbecome, you know, a carrot or an

(14:31):
egg plant or a tree like it's,it's super, we take it for
granted, or I took it forgranted at least. But it's it's
so magical and amazing. And it'slike this very important thing
for our survival. And it's superpractical too so that
intersection is really neat. Soyeah, when went through GoFarm

(14:54):
Waimanalo. It was cohort threeover there. And the yeah, so the
first the first, you know, entryinto the food system for me or
real one was starting a farm. Sowhen went through GoFarm
graduated out of that program,I, me and my partner, Laarnie ,

(15:16):
kind of who is still a flowerfarmer with with petal metal,
She's incredible. We started afarm and she came up with the
name, it was called counterculture. And we weren't just
gonna grow fresh veggies. It wasreally a farm and ferment

(15:36):
operation so we use thatbusiness that concept and and
applied to Kamehameha SchoolsPewaukee foundations, Monte I
matchup, which was a businessplan competition, you know, the
winner of which I think it'slike $25,000 in seed capital and
runner up, in kind of like15,000. And then you get a five

(16:00):
year free lease on five acres ofcommandment schools land. And so
we were awarded that we got wegot second place, prize and a
parcel. So some cash in a parcelup in Haleiwa to start a farm.
So we, you know, dove in is justa raw piece of land, jungle. And

(16:26):
Kamehameha Schools helped usclear that one. And yeah, just
went through kind of starting afarm from scratch, and then also
learning the fermenting kind oflike, commercial kitchen side of
everything there. So that wassuper informative, as we started
out doing that, but I don'tknow, typical, you know, to my

(16:51):
just distracted attention spanwas as we were kind of starting
that farm, you know, we wereselling some fresh produce, as
we kind of got the sauerkrautand kimchi product lines going.
And I was really just seeing,you know, and also from the

(17:14):
GoFarm experience working, youknow, with my fellow cohort
members that were there werestarting farms, I saw that we
were all, you know, like, it'shard. And I thought the hard
part was going to be all of themanual labor and working with
plants, and just all of theproduction side of agriculture.

(17:34):
And I realized that that isincredibly hard. But what felt
even harder, somehow, it'sharder and harder in a different
way. But it felt harder somehowwas like everything that
happened after you harvestedlike all of this incredible
produce. And then just like themarketing, sales and

(17:55):
distribution, you know, there'slots of everybody in spirit
loves buying local, they lovethat concept. But when the
rubber meets the road, you know,you find out who really wants to
go above and beyond and kind ofdeal with some of the challenges
of actually buying local. So,you know, just trying to find

(18:15):
folks that take this reallygreat product, and how to, you
know, with very limited time inthe day, how to get that product
to them. And so seeing that, allof us in the in GoFarm and
started meeting other small andbeginning farmers or other you
know, other experienced farmersand just seeing how much of a
challenge the marketing salesand distribution was. And so I

(18:36):
really, you know, like while thefarm is still going and, you
know, brought out my friend fromCalifornia to help help start on
the farm, Daniel Leas. I said,you know, I want to just like
start this, see if there'sanything there in some sort of

(18:56):
aggregator some sort of entitythat could help all of us, you
know, a bunch of small farmersthat there's that a lot of
buyers don't want to work withdirectly because of the many
challenges. Maybe we can allkind of hui up and have somebody
that's like taking care of a lotof the marketing and sales and

(19:18):
accounting and doing thedistribution for us, because
there was kind of there's kindof this awkward phase there
where like, the bigdistributors, big purchasers or
distributors locally, like theydon't want to deal with a bunch
of ragtag small producers. Thebig retailers, like you know,
the brick and mortar grocerystores, and even you know, a lot

(19:41):
of restaurants, they don't wantto deal with it either. And so
you're kind of in this placewhere it's like, you can, you
know, go to the go to somefarmers markets, which you know,
have limited opportunity to selland also just take a bunch of
time. Um, you know, when you're,that's when you're that small
and starting out, like, there'san opportunity cost for

(20:03):
spending, you know, a ton oftime going to farmers markets
versus putting that time intoproduction, which is really
like, something that the onlythe farmer can solve. But I felt
like there was some opportunityto start something, it wasn't
even called FarmLink at thetime. It was just, it was kind
of a little incubator born bornin GoFarm, I think we just

(20:26):
called it like GoFarm. GoFarmsales website. You know, the
marketing, sales anddistribution felt like, sort of
this overlaying entity likesomebody else, you know, some
other entity could helpeverybody solve that, and give
them more time to solve thevery, like, specific problems on

(20:46):
their farm. And, yeah, soFarmLink was was kind of born.
We got, we got some grantfunding, purchased a, well, at
first we were, we were drivingaround everybody's produce in
coolers with ice in the back ofmy partner, Laarni's like 1998

(21:07):
Toyota Tacoma truck, littlegreen machine. And then, yeah,
we got, we got, I think, a loanthrough Ulupono Initiative, and
some grant funding to help uspurchase a 16 foot refrigerator
box truck and, and yeah, inthose early days, it was, you

(21:29):
know, a couple of us just doingall kinds of the aggregation
we're doing pickup, we also hadlike, decentralized refrigerated
shipping containers, on partnerfarms, or on our own farm, or at
GoFarm. Where, you know, wewould kind of do the sales side
of going to restaurants andFoodland was actually a really

(21:51):
good early partner for us. Wewould say, hey, we have all this
product from all of thesegrowers, you know, are you
interested in buying it, andthen we would, you know, get
those sales orders. And then wewould communicate back to the
growers and say, Hey, okay, weneed XYZ, you know, this many
pounds by this date, to bedropped off at your, your local

(22:16):
drop site. And so, you know, allaround Oahu producers would be,
you know, just, they just get abunch of orders, you know, could
be you know, and restaurants andyou know, a few like a food,
Foodland, and a couple of Downto Earths like all just
aggregated, they just got oneorder, essentially from
FarmLink. And could harvest itall in one fell swoop, wash

(22:42):
pack, and then just drop it allat, you know, refrigerated drop
point like, and minutes awayfrom their farm, and then get
back to the farm and continue towork on production. And then we
would drive the 16 foot boxtruck around the island, pick up
everything, and then be doingdeliveries like all, all in the

(23:04):
same day. So yeah, it was kindof a crazy, crazy time. And it
was early days.

Jim (23:13):
And this is about eight, nine years ago when, when it
was, was it officially FarmLinkat that point?

Yeah. So I think pretty soon after we realized,
okay, this is this is sort ofbigger than then GoFarm and
branded it FarmLink. And yeah, Ithink that's 2015, so about nine

Jim (23:31):
Nice. And so that started to happen. So well, maybe you
years ago.
still haven't given up your dayjob, but were you able to give
up your day job at a certainpoint because there was enough
volume and, and potentialrevenue.

Yeah, and I guess I guess I left that part out, that
after InMobi was acquired in2011 I stayed on for a couple
years and then left left in2013. And so I basically I dove
all all into it, you know, I hadenough savings to kind of just

(24:11):
live very simply for a couple ofyears and try to figure out what
what the next move was. So I didkind of like leave, leave tech,
you know. I needed a bit of abreak. I was I was pretty fried
at that point and yeah, justwant to want us to dive dive
into something else. So youknow, started the farm started

(24:35):
FarmLink. And at that point, Ishould clarify that like
FarmLink, we were using sort ofoff the shelf software. So it
was a it was a platform calledLocal Orbit. And, you know, was
just trying to like, build thatas a as a as a, you know, this

(24:57):
purpose driven company at thatpoint. But yeah, so from 2013 to
2015 it was kind of likeflailing and trying to figure
out what, what to do next. Butthen 2015 on it was really like,
Okay, I got, I'm spending 50% ofmy time, you know, on the farm,
helping, you know, a partnerlike weed and plant, harvest

(25:21):
wash pack, and then 50% of time,kind of orchestrating and
coordinating on the FarmLinkside.

Jim (25:31):
Okay, so at a certain point to firmly take over and you
stopped farming, are you stillfarming now?

Yeah, I definitely am not in the field anymore. So
I think I'm pretty sure youknow, towards the end of 2019. I
was I was still splitting mytime. And I just realized, like,
Okay, this is just for easymaking. If, if I want, you know,

(26:00):
either to succeed, I'm going toneed to focus on one. And I
think more of my passion andexperience and skill set really
was on the farm leg side andseeing what seeing where that
was going. So, you know,basically 98% on on farm link,
and was fortunate enough, soCounter Culture, the farm, I

(26:22):
won’t spend a ton of time on it,but we kind of did the Kimchi
and sauerkraut thing. And then,you know, that was too much so
we stopped doing that and justfocused on fresh vegetables. And
then my good friend, andsomebody that, you know, Jim
Gabe Sachter-Smith, who wasactually, you know, got his

(26:42):
master's at UH CTAHR, but leftfor for a period of time to go
get some farming experience inthe Pacific Northwest. You know,
we were chatting and he said,“You know, I love I miss
bananas. I want to come back toHawaii, you know, is there any
is there any way that we can wecan work together.” And I was so

(27:04):
excited to hear that for manyreasons. But Gabe came back,
joined the farm, and really hastaken over the the farm
operation. And that's beenshifted from veggies to bananas,
and rebranded as Hawaii BananaSource. So, you know, Gabe is
totally, you know, runningeverything there. And I help do

(27:29):
some admin stuff and help withQuickBooks and you know, we
talked about some strategy andstuff like that, but really,
yeah, most of my time has beenon FarmLink since, yeah, since
2019, and it would havehappened, you know, the
pandemic, really would haveforced my hand anyway. So it's

(27:51):
kind of good. I had a few monthsto, like, mentally prepare as
much as one, one could for that,which is, which is

Jim (27:59):
I was gonna ask if COVID and the pandemic were were
material in the decisions, orwas it just coincidental?

Yeah, I mean, it's all a blur now, but I'm pretty
sure just yet it wascoincidental.

Jim (28:14):
How did you manage through COVID? I mean, to me, it seems
like perfect timing for fooddelivery. But what did you see
as a result of COVID? And howthat impacted FarmLink?

Yeah, it was super crazy. You know, free COVID
FarmLink was I think we weremaybe like three or four
employees. And I think revenueto that I should have looked
this up earlier, but I think2019 revenue Thank you. I think

(28:55):
it was maybe like 400,000 perfarm link. And, you know, mostly
most of the business at thatpoint was still b2b, you know,
selling to brick and mortarretail, grocery stores,
restaurants, processors, and acouple of schools like Malama

(29:18):
Honua charter school and maybeone others. So really b2b
focused, and 2019. Again,totally coincidentally, one of
our biggest supporters andfunders elemental accelerator

(29:40):
had invested some money in us,and that it was a project
focused investment. And it wasto start exploring direct to
consumer sales, just what thatwould look like because we had
so many just individualhousehold customers in the years
prior are saying like, Hey, Ijust loved it, I'm just a normal

(30:02):
household, I'd love to get this.
And we had let a few few, youknow, friends kind of like sneak
in, just to try it out. But youknow, we only had a 16 foot box
truck. And so you're driving a16 foot box truck into some some
of these neighborhoods. And thenlike dropping the liftgate that
to get in the back. It wasreally challenging and

(30:24):
difficult. And the websitewasn't really geared towards
direct consumer sales. But, youknow, in 2018, we started slowly
kind of figuring out okay, like,what would this look like to
expand this domiciled customers?
And, you know, we had a fewmonths of thinking about that,
but, you know, march 2020 hit,and you know, everything was

(30:48):
shutting down. And it just, youknow, we didn't have time to
wait and be calculated and plan.
Because we had between March andApril, I think it was like 7000
Customers sign up a week toFarmLink. And, you know, we've
never been and, you know, don'tever plan to be like a

(31:13):
subscription, CSA service and,and get some common myths or
misconception. You know, we'vealways wanted to be this, you
order what you want, when youwant, it's just ala carte. It's
like Amazon for only local food.
And so, yeah, we had 1000s ofcustomers sign up that website

(31:35):
platform we were using calledLocal orbit was crashing all the
time. It didn't, it didn't workwell to handle that level of
volume, especially just, youknow, let alone all of those
household customers and we triedto set up like a waitlist, and
we had, you know, 1000s ofpeople on the waitlist at a
time. And, you know, people weresuper freaked out seeing empty

(31:58):
shelves. And also, you know,there was the fear side, but
then people just just cominginto relief that, like, Oh, this
is really important to to have,you know, a thriving local food
system. So I want to support it.
Not just I'm scared of, youknow, having food tomorrow. So
yeah, it was just, it was justreally insane. Time. Yes, so

(32:21):
many people to talk about thathelp us help us through it. But
yeah, I think like the sort ofthe macro view of it is. I mean,
I sent us the keys for goodpodcast, I think I need to share

(32:43):
that. I hope it doesn't likecomplicate things. But so you
know, we had counterculture, wethere was drawing, produce, and
then fermenting, which isalready like two businesses in
itself. And then farm link, youknow, it's just local food
distribution. In 2019, theplatform local orbit, which we

(33:04):
were just a paying customer for.
And I had been, you know, like,there's all kinds of things I
wanted to see done to theplatform. And I'd emailed the
owners of that of that companyand said, Hey, like, I see like,

(33:27):
none of this stuff's gettingfixed and our bugs that just
have been around forever, like,I would be open to just
volunteering my time. And probono, I will just like help fix
bugs, and and help improve thesoftware platforms for all your
customers. But you know, I knowit'll, it'll benefit our

(33:49):
business benefit FarmLink. Solike, can I please, just
donating totally my time andhelp them spot from and I
understand why they said no.
Just like who is this guy, andlike, we don't know how to
figure that out. And so I justkept badgering them for probably
starting in 2018. And then 2019came around the end, the owner

(34:12):
of that company, emailed me andsaid, Actually, we're getting
their company had two platforms,local orbit and something else.
That other platform, the othersoftware product was getting
acquired, and acquired, didn'twant to deal with this local or
bid food thing. And the ownersaid, Hey, if you either we're

(34:36):
going to shut this thing down,or is there any way that you
would like take take this overand steward this, you know, and
they had over 50 other similarbusinesses to farm like other
other food hubs across thecountry and a couple in Canada?
So I obviously didn't want tosee it, just the rug get pulled
out from under s for FarmLink.

(34:59):
And then think being like, oh mygosh, like, there's 50 Other
folks like us. So, in additionto all those other things, I
ended up taking over, you know,as the EOC, to everything kind
of for local orbit as like asoftware as a service product

(35:21):
and in 2018. So that was justkind of a wild time, and then,
you know, trying to try to fixbugs in that platform, and
figure out, like, a way that,you know, it wasn't profitable,
like trying to figure out a wayto, like, fund this thing. And,
you know, peeling back layers ofthe onion of the code, and just

(35:41):
seeing like, oh, wow, thisthing, really, the intent was
great, but like, there's just,it's just spaghetti, there's,
there's so much technical debt.
And just eventually, seeing asthe pandemic hit that like,
trying, trying to put all theenergy into into FarmLink as

(36:02):
just a business, and then tryingto have this thing that all of a
sudden became so essential forall of the customers on it, that
there was just like, No way, noway to square square at all. I'm
sure if I was a savvy orfundraiser, you know, maybe
there was a way through that,but it was just, you know, lots

(36:26):
and lots of 100 hour weeks that,you know, I was, I was at my
wit's end. So in all of thiscrazy tangled web, you know, I
was figuring out a syntheticplan for local orbit, and trying
to get everybody a soft of aparachute as they could and
enough time as I could to, like,find another platform to migrate

(36:47):
to. And that included FarmLink.
So in 2020 1000s, of customers,trying to get food, you know,
through FarmLink using LocalOrbit, we're also trying to
figure out, okay, like, is thereanother platform out there that,
to just help us that justautomatically out of the box

(37:10):
works for household customersbetter. And so we found one that
seemed the least worst optionout there, which is Delivery
Bistro, which I do not recommendto anybody. And we can talk
about that later, about sort ofwhere we're going next. But
yeah, we were we kind ofmigrated to a platform that at

(37:33):
least was better than LocalOrbit for for household
customers, and really justleaned into the direct consumer
thing, and, and tried to, youknow, both ensure that producers
had a place, you know, hadrevenue coming in to their
farms, or, you know, or theirfood business. And then also

(37:56):
make sure that consumers, youknow, could access food, period.
But also, you know, be able tosupport local food, and, you
know, that's just been this,this, I feel super fortunate to
work on, you know, a problem, orin a solution like this, but you
know, in all of our existence,as, as, as a company, or

(38:20):
companies, really just beingable to have this dual mission
and try to continue to ratchetboth those up, you know, provide
better opportunity for foodproducers to sell more, get more
for what they sell, and justgive them more time to do things
that are really, you know,inherent to being a farmer and

(38:44):
anything that sort of can beoutsourced, or, you know, find
efficiencies that, you know, wecan help help with those, and
then make it really easy forcustomers to continue to
discover and find all thisamazing local food that's being
produced. And yeah, have thatflywheel continue to accelerate.

(39:09):
So I don't even remember whatyou asked Jim, I'm just went on
maybe a tangent there. But Idon't know. I felt like it's
forget I had I had to bring thewhole Hey, for a while there. We
ran a software as a servicecompany.

Jim (39:23):
Right. Well, I don’t remember seeing that on your
LinkedIn, but maybe I justmissed that not knowing what it
was. But it's kind of it'sfascinating to me, certainly.
And it makes me wonder, I mean,the Shopify platform is is
awesome. So many folks areadopting it. It's kind of eaten

(39:44):
a lot of other platforms lunch,and I know as an ag producer
myself, right in talking with agproducers that have used it or
tried to use it. There's somelimitations. It's not
necessarily as anything like yousaid. You're always looking for
the least worst, but when you'rewhen you're trying to find web
platforms, but I think it leadsme to think that maybe with some

(40:08):
of the modifications andscripting you're doing for
FarmLink, I wonder if that mightbe a piece that you could offer
that could be of help to others,right just I’m thinking’, if
they can steal some of yourscripts to have it more
conducive to what an ag producerneeds. I know, your needs are
real specific related to, youknow, your your online sales and

(40:30):
your delivery and all that. ButI wonder, do you think there's
any anything to that that mightbe an option that you folks
could offer? If when you'rethrough your migration that
might be edit some scripts, sothis could use?

Totally, and it's something I get really excited
about. And then I like, try to,you know, check myself and learn
my lesson and go, okay, like,try to focus on what, what's
really essential right now,which is, you know, having
FarmLink sort of be the firstyou know, at least for what

(41:04):
we're building. And so, yeah,we're, you know, we're migrating
from our current eCommerce siteover to Shopify, and been
working on that for months now.
And build doing a lot of customapp development, as well as
custom theme development. Andit's something we talk about a

(41:25):
lot like, once, like what we'rebuilding, you said, you said,
it's kind of specific to us, Iactually, and I've heard other
people say that. So it's like,it's, it's a, it's specific in
the realm of maybe of eCommerce.
You know, if you're selling Tshirts, you don't need any sort

(41:45):
of any conception of this highlyvolatile supply of this
perishable product, that youneed to sort of have accurate
inventory and sell it as quicklyas possible. And somebody
ordering, groceries, reallyneeds groceries, on that day,

(42:06):
it's like, I'm orderinggroceries, for tomorrow, for
Saturday. When you're ordering at shirt, it's like, Oh, it'll be
here in like two to two to eightweeks. Like, that's cool, that's
fine, I don't really care, I'mgoing to forget about it, and
then it's going to arrive andI'm going to be stoked. And so
it is, it is, you know, specificin sort of that in an industry,

(42:33):
that it is, you know, aperishable product and, you
know, local food exacerbates alot of that. Those Those
intricacies too, just localfood, you know, and really
meaning like working withbeginning, you know, smaller,
smaller producers, if you have amega farm that's just like, or,

(42:57):
you know, something likeDriscolls or something that's
like, you know, they have theirown berries in the northern and
southern hemisphere. And it'sjust like, they're pretty much
always going to have raspberriesfor you. And, you know, maybe
you can just like assume, youknow, near infinite supply. But
if you're working with, youknow, hundreds of small

(43:17):
producers like we do, and theyhave products that are available
on certain days of the week, butnot others, and it goes up and
down. And sometimes they thinkthey have, you know, 500 pounds,
and they have 30 pounds. Butthen some producers, you know,
are really consistent. So, youknow, if they say they have 500
pounds, we can probably resellyou know, let's say 450 pounds

(43:43):
of that, because like, they'regenerally you know, they're 90%
accurate. And so yeah, anyways,I'm sort of going into some of
the functionality a little bit,but I think from abroad from
broad strokes, you know, we're,we're building this custom stuff
on top of Shopify, because wedidn't want to, like reinvent a
bespoke eCommerce platform. AndI've been looking at Shopify for

(44:09):
the past five years, every year,you know, like, do a little dive
and like, kind of see what thedeveloper ecosystem looks like.
And really, you know, every yearuntil last year, it had it, it
felt like, I don't know, itdoesn't seem like it's there to
be able to support what we wantto do. And, you know, I'm, last

(44:33):
year like, I just continued tobe pretty impressed with what
how extensible it is, if youknow how to code and even if you
don't, but if especially if youknow how to code you can you can
do a lot on top of it. And lastyear, you know, it really just
felt like okay if we as FarmLinkwant to get where we need to
get, which is you know,quadrupling in size from where

(44:56):
we are now. We need a better,you know, or this is the way
customers order, discover uslearn about us explore and
discover new products, and youknow, make their make their
weekly or, you know, some peopleorder a couple times a week, but
make, you know, make theirgrocery orders. So trying to,

(45:18):
you know, improve thatexperience for them. And, you
know, we felt like you know, wehave a unique opportunity that
myself and even anothercolleague in the company, you
know, are, are highly technical.
And sort of felt like, we have,you know, I got these very

(45:39):
delicate non farming fingersnow. And I wanted to find a way
to like, have some autonomy andput them to use for the benefit
of FarmLink and for the localfood system here. So yeah, we're
really focused on, you know,let's just get our migration
done, let the dust settle, like,really be sort of the case study

(46:02):
for this, but we are superexcited about about the
potential of, you know,everything we're doing. For
FarmLink. And I'm getting allthe way back to the specific
comment I was making earlier, isnot really specific, you know,
food is the biggest retailindustry, globally, by far, like

(46:23):
we all everybody needs to eat,and everybody spends money on
food. And, you know, like, yes,ordering food online, and
getting it delivered, or, youknow, going to pick it up is
like somewhat of a of a newerconcept, or, you know, some of

(46:46):
those, those pieces are. Butwhat we're building actually is
super common, you know, globallyacross food. So like, you know,
and, and part of the benefit,you know, even though it was a
crazy time running Local Orbitas a software as a service
business, was, I just feel sofortunate that I got to interact

(47:08):
with those 50 other food hubsacross the US and Canada. And,
you know, see, sure there arelike little differences and how
we operate, here and there, butthose are totally on the
margins. Like the core of whateverybody is doing is, is so
similar. And, you know, keepingall of all of those stories in

(47:33):
mind as as we build what we'rebuilding for us. So, you know,
it doesn't make sense just to,like, we've invested a lot of,
you know, my my time otheremployees time, we're
contracting some folks to help.
So putting a lot of investmentand we've benefited a time from

(47:54):
from philanthropic philanthropicorganizations, as well as, you
know, social impact investorsand, and grant funding from USDA
and others, to just helpFarmLink in general, but
everything we're doing, we feelis totally applicable to a lot

(48:17):
of food hubs and other you know,smaller entities. Yeah, that are
just buying, aggregating anddelivering food, and we want the
platform. You know, like, I feellike Hawaii is a great place
that Hawaii, anybody operatingHawaii's local food system, it's

(48:39):
a great place to, you know, bethe guinea pig for for software
like this, because, you know,FarmLink now, you know, we're
not just sourcing from producerson Oahu, we're sourcing from
producers all across the state.
And, you know, it is reallypeople don't think this, you
know, outside of Hawaii's agscene, but growing food here is
really, really hard. There'ssome things that just grow

(49:02):
great, and it's all good. Butjust from, you know, an
agronomic sense, you know, it's,especially if you're trying to
grow all these temperateveggies. Land is land costs are
high, Labor's high. There's,there's not a lot of equipment
laying around that you can goborrow from somebody or learn
from somebody else. So there's aton of challenges to produce

(49:25):
food here. We're doing air andocean logistics to move food
between islands. You know, tonsof tons of traffic like that,
you know, we have, I think wehave, you know, probably nine
out of the 10 challenges that,you know, are generalized over
over food systems globally. So,to me, and maybe it's a little

(49:50):
delusional, but I don't thinkso, like, if we can do it here
and build something that worksfor FarmLink for as complex as
our operation is and you know,we're selling direct to consumer
and to wholesale and to foodaccess programs and dealing with
SNAP EBT and all of thesethings. If we can make it work
for us, I think it's totallygeneralizable to be a solution

(50:14):
for for others around around thestate around the country and the
globe really

Jim (50:25):
Nice. And I think, I mean, you're certainly focused on EBT.
And making that easier. I knowyou do free deliveries, for EBT
orders of any size. I think youmentioned when we were talking
earlier about one of the bigdeals about the replatform is to
make EBT easier, as well. And,and I know a lot of aggregators

(50:46):
are really focused on that andhave adopted that. And, and, but
I can think, you know, we've,we've spoken with Hawaii
Farm-to-Car folks spoken withHIP ag and what they're doing
with food hubs, and you know,and I think they could really,
there could be huge benefit tothem, but I won't bug you for a
year or two about that, becauseI know you get this yourself.

(51:07):
But I think there's a hugebenefit. Anyone, just small
scale mom and pop, when to selldirect to consumer, I think
there's probably a bunch ofmodifications you're making that
could make their lives so mucheasier. And, you know, most of
them, most of them, those folksthat I know, aren't really
script kiddies, or you know,don't write their own code. So I

(51:27):
think I think it would be a hugebenefit. So I'll just, that's my
two cents related to that,because I think some of your
big, hairy, audacious goal thatyou could have on your website
as being the driving forcetransforming local foods, so

Yeah, I mean, I am super excited about the SNAP EBT
side, I mean, you know, we knewand we were getting into it, so
right now, you know, just justto describe how it works
currently, if you're if you're,if you are a SNAP EBT recipient,

(52:06):
you can go onto our websitecurrently and place an order.
First, we have to sort of likeyou know, you have to email us
and we have to flip a switch onyour account. But then if you
have that switch flipped, youcan go place an order, and it
doesn't charge your credit card.
But we have to you have to be athome when our driver shows up at

(52:28):
your house. And so you knowFarmLink has like we of course
we use technology everywhere wecan, if you order on FarmLink
you get like automated textmessages as your orders out for
delivery and then you can liketrack your driver on your your
smartphone. So you kind of canpredict a little bit of when

(52:48):
your driver is going to show upthat day but it's still a pretty
big window and you do physicallyhave to be home and swipe your
EBT card you know our driverwill swipe your EBT card, put in
your pin. But we're superexcited about you know, removing
that constraint and so if youhave SNAP EBT you know you can

(53:09):
the night before before 10pm Youcould go online order pay on
SNAP EBT on the website in thefuture and then you don't need
to be home to get your orderbecause especially if you're in
SNAP EBT you know you probablyhave lots you know you might be
working multiple jobs and havehave challenges you know, with

(53:30):
the transportation or whateverwhatever it might be so you know
even even more so than folksthat might not be on be a
recipient of that. And so yeah,trying to make it really
convenient for them and givethem access for that. Oh yeah.
And then I mean the other aspectof that is is the whole Double

(53:51):
Up Food Bucks so you know, thefood basket on Hawaii Island
administers the bucks for thestate which you know, everybody
so on FarmLink today, if you paywith SNAP EBT you get 50
automatic 50% off all produce,you know fruits, vegetables,

(54:14):
poi, basically anything that'ssince we are just 100% local
product at FarmLink, anythingthat's on our website that is
purely you know, just fruit,vegetable or water. So pulling
in some other things count. Sointegrating all of that into you
know, SNAP EBT online. Andbecause again, like those, those

(54:38):
are not those are not specificto why you know, Double Up Food
Bucks is is a program. I don'tknow that every state has
implemented but I know manystates, many states do.

Jim (54:55):
I think that will make it much easier for folks, which is
great. So thanks for all yourwork on on that. CTO, you're now
CTO and not CEO, is that right,at FarmLink? Did you

That’s right.

Jim (55:10):
Was that around? 2021? So what inspired that? Then? How
does How did that feel? Do youfeel like you've handed it over
to others? Or gotten through thefounders syndrome phase? Are you
still kind of the seen as thatperson?

Yeah, I mean, that's, this is probably my
biggest achievement. And mycareer was, I guess, you know,
creating something thatattracted somebody, like Claire
Sylvan, who are, who is our CEO,now to join the company.

(55:50):
Because, you know, still, youknow, she's been with the
company for two and a halfyears, I think. Yeah, so, yeah,
so back end in October, I think,doesn't 21. You know, she and I
had been colleagues and kind of,we would chat probably for like,
18 months prior to that, wewould just have like a monthly

(56:14):
call, just like, you know, weenjoyed talking to each other.
And at the time, you know, she,she was part of the team that
founded your that, that startedWhole Foods here in the state.
So she, she used to get thewhole foods mail delivered to
her house. So like, he wasthere, from before, there was

(56:37):
even a Whole Foods in Kahala.
And he was working there for 10years, and really, really the
driving force behind growingthat local food program, they're
so at their peak, they werepurchasing, you know, she had
the purchasing power and developthe relationships and supply

(56:57):
building to buy $12 million oflocal product a year, you know,
for comparison FarmLink rightnow. We're purchasing I probably
this year, we'll end uppurchasing, you know, close to 3
million, maybe two and a halfmillion of, you know, money to
farms. So, yeah, you know,Claire, and I were chatting,

(57:25):
just on that monthly call for ayear and a half or so. And she
was at M’ao organic farm, whichis, I think, one of the most
incredible organizations in thewhole state. I'm actually
wearing the t shirt today,coincidentally. And Gary and
Kukui, and Callie and Derek andeverybody else, just Yeah, so

(57:49):
amazing. And they're one of ourbiggest suppliers now, but
Claire, Claire was, was workingat M’ao for a few years, and
then I think she was just, youknow, saw, she was she was
looking for the next thing, away to a way to be more
impactful, you know, maybe on onthe, this, like intermediary

(58:09):
place where we said, and so justin our conversation, it just
kind of evolved, I think sheheard me sharing, you know, that
I felt like, you know, I, Ihave, I have my certain things
that I'm just drawn to the typesof work that I'm drawn to. And

(58:32):
while I love all the, all thehumans, it's, you know, I'm just
not the right guy for that role.
And, you know, I like startingthings. But I don't necessarily
like being the center ofattention, or, you know, having

(58:53):
some of those pressures orhaving to navigate some of, you
know, a growing organization,there's just a lot of human
challenges. And just ensuringyou know, that, like, you're
really taking care of the peopleinside the company. And also a
lot of strategic thinking that,you know, I just, I saw that,

(59:13):
like, I wasn't super happy inthat role. And I think, you
know, I had enough time awayfrom my, like, tech career
burnout, that I was really kindof missing that and also just
being like, I want to beimpactful and effective. And
like my highest and best usereally like I just I knew and

(59:33):
know that it is working on thetechnology side. So kind of
knowing that FarmLink neededsomebody better in the CEO role,
and that you know, I would behappier and and better in a CTO
type role. So I was supersurprised that Claire was even,
you know, at all interested init just because I sort of, I

(59:55):
felt like she was just anotherechelon higher But yeah, I think
she saw, she saw the potentialand of what we're building. And
then I think also, you know, shehad built this incredible local
purchasing program at, at WholeFoods, which was super
meaningful, you know, $12million bucks a year. And they,

(01:00:17):
they co developed a lot ofproducts with folks and
encouraged some producers to getorganic certification because,
like, you know, there's, there'sa market for that. And, you
know, really was superinclusive, which is, I think, a
spirit that she's brought in,you know, I, when, when, when

(01:00:39):
FarmLink started, you know, thatwe had, we had a requirement
that you had to be certifiedorganic, or, you know, we had to
ensure that you were, you know,following organic practices, but
just hadn't gone throughcertification. And I think I've
evolved there a lot, like, youknow, our banana farm that gives

(01:01:02):
running is USDA certifiedorganic, I'm still a total
proponent of organic, butrealizing the sort of, I want it
to be for something and to buildsomething as comparative being
against something or wanting todestroy something, or exclude a
way, a way of being, and wantingto, you know, broaden the tent.

(01:01:27):
Like, you know, we don't leteverybody in, and I think
there's some producers thatlike, we will never work with,
because we don't agree with whatwhat they do, either the human
or the, the ecology side. Butyeah, really excited about, you

(01:01:47):
know, working with somebody thathas helped, you know, evolve the
whole organization and themission, and be in a much more
like constructive, generativestrategy, you know, taking a
more constructive, generativestrategy to try to, like, get
more people into this and say,hey, if we work together, and we

(01:02:10):
communicate, and we collaborate,like we can build something
better than actually everybody'sgoing to want, versus trying to
say, like, you are bad, like,you should not exist or not do
your thing anymore, and we'reonly going to work on this. It's
also just a practical thing, youknow, there's there's only so

(01:02:30):
many people that are willing toactually produce food. It's
really frickin hard in so manyways. And so, you know, anybody
that's like, willing to putthemselves out there and grind
and be, you know, be the plantscientist, the chemists, the
biologist, the plumber, theelectrician, you know, the soil

(01:02:54):
scientist, Yachty, the, youknow, the driver, the whatever,
like, the million things that itis to produce food. Like, we, we
want to talk with you, we wantto work with you. And something
I think that she, she broughtinto the role and the DNA of the
company is, you know,transitioning from, or just

(01:03:18):
recognizing that, like, farm,FarmLink’s role is to be an
activist buyer, and to catalyzeand encourage, and, you know,
actively take part in supplybuilding, and not just expecting
other people to figure it outand just come to our door and

(01:03:39):
say, “Hey, I got this stuff, doyou want it?” and like, “Sure,
well, we'll take it.” andthat's, that's kind of the role
of, you know, that's, that's howmost, you know, buyers work.
They, they're, it's, it's notthey don't see it's in their
best interest to put their moneywhere their mouth is, and like,

(01:04:00):
you know, it takes money andtime to like work with producers
to help them scale up, help themfind capital, find resources,
all of these things thatFarmLink because we have our
mission and we're holding to ithave we are 100% locally grown
or locally produced product. Youknow, we we've set those those

(01:04:25):
kind of blinders are those thosebumpers on so we can't just be
like ah, it'd be so much easierjust to like we can buy organic
carrots from California for like30 cents a pound. We don't need
to actually like work with aamazing up and coming farmer in
on Hawaii Island to help themyou know, find resources and

(01:04:49):
grow their certified organiccarrot farm you know, in in, you
know how that scale up, which issomething we're doing. And yeah,
so I think I think, you know,it's been such an amazing
partnership, to be able to workwith Claire and have somebody in
that CEO role that's like, it'slike, she's, she's incredible.

(01:05:14):
And so I'm so thankful and justmotivated, being in the role,
but it wasn't, it wasn't an easytransition, you know, it's like,
you know, I was I was sort ofthe, the main founder. And it
really, you know, we didn't knowwhat that was gonna look like.

(01:05:35):
And, you know, we just, we justwere communicated and, and work
through it. And it really,honestly, it probably took, took
a couple years to, like, reallymake that transition like solid.
And a lot of intentionalityaround just how do we how do we
communicate? How do we interact?
Who, who kind of owns whatdecisions and making it really

(01:05:59):
clear, like, Okay, this is youown this decision, I can give
you my input. But it's your it'syour ultimate decision, and
finding just the way oforganizing ourselves as a, you
know, as a company. Really, it'shelped that, but it was also
just like necessary that kind oflike, it forced us to, like,

(01:06:21):
confront some of those things,too, which is, which is, yeah,
really, really fun andinteresting challenge.

Jim (01:06:30):
And you got, it sounds like you got through the other end of
it. So totally, totallynice. And how many employees?
Are you up to now? I think pre-COVID, you said four or five?

Rob Barreca (01:06:40):
Yeah, so we're at 34. We just hired one more,
we’re 34 employees. And we haveI think we have two new job
postings out so. Yeah, well, youknow, within the next couple of
months, we’ll probably be 36.

Jim (01:06:59):
Well, again you mentioned meat, you know, meat products is
part of what you offer now. Andso it's the kind of all things.
So what's next, I guess? What,what do you see in the next few
years, we talked about the webplatform, but I do see expanding
to other islands beyond Oahu? Iknow you're working with
producers on the Big Island, butI don't think there's a FarmLink

(01:07:20):
on any island for deliveryexcept for Oahu. So just going
to, what do you think? What doyou see coming down the pipe?

Yeah, well, I think one aspect, you just reminded
me, we do so many things, andlike sometimes i i forget to,
you know, touch touch on them.
But I do want to talk about themeat thing for a second because
it's something interesting we’redoing now. And also kind of,
there's a expansive bit of that,but a lot of folks maybe don't
know, we have butchers on site.

(01:07:50):
We actually do all of our ownlike, or a lot of our own meat
processing. We work withproducer ranchers, on Oahu and
on Maui and Hawaii Island. Andwe will get you know, we we
purchase the whole animal often.
So, you know, we're purchasingwhole beef carcass, whole pig
carcass. And, you know,sometimes those are, like, you

(01:08:14):
know, cut into, like, primal,you know, so they can like fit
in a big box. But, you know,we're getting that raw,
essentially raw product in andthen we have amazing butchery
you know, actually expanded theterm, it's culinary department,
that are like cutting steaks,making sausage, roasting bones,

(01:08:36):
making bone broth, lard. So allkinds of amazing stuff there.
And you know, that a lot of thatis, you know, our, our, again,
our producer mission side ofwanting to you know, the rancher

(01:08:56):
wants to just be able to sell awhole animal not have to deal
with all the processing and onlysell the high value cuts in the
middle and then be likescrambling trying to figure out
what to do with the rest, likethe best thing for them sell the
whole animal and they can focuson you know, producing really
fantastic meat and everythingelse on their farm. And so that

(01:09:16):
department, you know, we sort ofdid that out of necessity just
because there there wasn'tanother meat processor that was
doing it and of doing it a) forsome, some smaller animals and
b) you know, even for beef doingit in a way that met our
standard. But we are starting toexpand that department. And so

(01:09:41):
another wild interesting story.
We were purchasing from NakedCow Dairy on Hawaii Island, from
Monique there and you know,unfortunately, she had to, she

(01:10:02):
was shutting down the businessshe had she, you know, has to
move on. And they're really likethe only cow dairy in the entire
state that was like producingbutter, at least, you know, that
we know about. If there'sanother one out there, please
contact us. And she was yeah,making this amazing product and

(01:10:25):
purchasing cream from fromfantastic partners now at a
Meadow Gold dairy over there.
And, you know, we wanted tocontinue to have butter. And so,
you know, we asked Monique, ifshe was open to selling us some
of her equipment, and coming andtraining our butchery staff to

(01:10:45):
to make butter. And so you know,I think last month we started
making, you know, few weeks ago,even we started to learn
literally churning butterdownstairs, you know, and then
other times, cutting up wholepigs, among everything else

(01:11:05):
that's going on. So thatdepartment is really expanding,
and we're trying to figure outwhere, where are the gaps in the
marketplace where there's not aproducer making that product
already? And does it make sense?
And should we and can we, youknow, do that in house, at least

(01:11:27):
even for a short period of time,you know, if you found a
producer that like wanting totake that on, and we could
simplify our operation and focuson kind of getting something
else from zero to one, you know,like, like starting starting an
industry, you know, not anindustry but developing that
product, kind of like anincubator. So, so the culinary

(01:11:50):
is kind of a area that we'reexploring more and figuring out
what what to do there. And thenI think, you know, another area
on the supply building side thatwe're we're really interested in
is to, again, you know, continueto play a more active role in

(01:12:13):
helping producers increasesupply. So, you know, we did a
pilot project, we've actuallyhad a pilot project between
Kamehameha Schools who was aninvestor and amazing partner,
also the tenant for HawaiiBanana Source, you know, the
farm that Gabe’s running thatI'm doing the QuickBooks for,

(01:12:33):
and FarmLink. And so, you know,KS has just been on a tear and,
you know, really just doing somany amazing things across the
ecosystem. And, you know,they're, they serve a ton of
meals to on on their, theircampuses here in the campus
here. And, yeah, they wanted toget more local bananas. So they

(01:13:00):
actually pre purchased 80,000pounds of bananas, because
because we said, hey, we've gotthis farm, Hawaii Banana Source
that needs upfront capital, wehad to fix, you know, fix a
tractor, purchase a new tractor,get, you know, manure spreader

(01:13:23):
and, and trailer, just like allof these, these capital
intensive things that we needto, you know, do it in any kind
of efficient way. And we alsohave a bunch of plants in the
ground that like we weren'tgonna produce fruit for, you
know, 12 months. And so, KSsaid, Hey, we will give you the
capital, and you can pay us backover time, on flexible terms,

(01:13:49):
you know, flexible, like timing,over the next five years in
bananas, and that is just like,it's, it's, you know, such a
transformational thing. Becauseit's, it's a, it's a vote of
confidence, for sure. And thenit's saying, like, Hey, you
don't have to figure out whereto market that. It's not just

(01:14:09):
like a loan that you got to payback on this fixed schedule,
even though like plants justdon't operate like that,
especially, you know, maybe in30 years, you know, we'll have
it all super dialed in down to,you know, the day of the week,
you're gonna get that thing butlike, things happen. It's hard,
like growing and building afarm. And they really understand

(01:14:29):
that at Kamehameha Schools andso yeah, like, Kiachalk, and
Tyson and the rest of the teamthere. Then hey, let's let's do
this, and FarmLink is actuallysort of like the facilitator in
that. So, you know, we like thecontract is kind of with
FarmLink and then FarmLink has acontract with Hawaii Banana
Source. And so you know,FarmLink if, if needed it can

(01:14:54):
find another banana producer,you know, in periods of, you
know, low, low yield on on thebanana on Hawaii Banana Source’s
farm. And, you know, like, it's,there's a lot of logistics to
work out and just likeaccounting and like making sure
all of that's, that's good, butyou know, we've, we've started

(01:15:17):
to kind of like figure all thatstuff out. And that's been
really powerful and we want towe want to find other producers
to do that with either matchthem up, you know, directly with
funders, like we don't need tobe in the middle of it. But for
this case, it made sense, youknow, sort of from a delivery
logistics standpoint, so forsure, you know, just trying to

(01:15:39):
be more active in supplybuilding. Yeah, it's, it's a
really exciting and just neededthing. And yeah, it just, it's
got so many so many positiveimpacts on the, you know, local
economy and ecology to and just,you know, our future growth

(01:16:01):
plans to have that product nextyear, or the year after

Jim (01:16:06):
I'll add my voice to kudos to KS for what they're doing for
the Hawaii food systems in somany ways. We have a couple of
podcasts, actually Seeds ofWellbeing podcasts that we've
done with the folks at KS andone of them is talks a little
bit about the their goal ofhaving 50% local food by 2025.

(01:16:28):
And so I think that sounds likeyour banana initiative is maybe
a piece of that puzzle for them.

For sure, yeah. And I was pretty impressed. They're
already they're already, youknow, I forget what the number
was, but I think it was like20ish percent. Like they're,
they've made a lot, a lot moreprogress than other folks who I
think are, you know, have this,yeah, have more lip service than
actual action on the ground. Soyeah, I'm stoked on it.

Jim (01:16:59):
And then on some islands, especially, I think, because,
like, and l’ll ask, another timejust maybe selfishly, because
I'm on the Big Island. But doyou think that you think that
FarmLink we'll ever have fooddelivery on the Big Island or is
that, like, you got to get a fewyears to make sure things are
stable on Oahu, before you lookat expanding or maybe never at

Yeah, you know, we a lot, we get this question from
all.
all the islands, all the, youknow, pretty often, we don't
have any plans to do that yet.
You know, there's, you know,most of the population is on
Oahu, and, you know, we're not,you know, financially full
disclosure, like we are, we arenot a profitable company, we're

(01:17:42):
not breaking even, we're stillheavily dependent on grants,
grants and investments. So, youknow, we really want to want to
figure our stuff out here,where, where most of the, the
density is. And if we nail ithere, and there's no other folks
on the on the neighbor islands,that, you know, we can help lift

(01:18:03):
up, because maybe there'ssomebody trying to do it over
there. But maybe we can helpthem on the software side and
best practices and, you know,folks can get consumers can get
the same benefit that we don'tnecessarily need to expand. So,
I mean, that's an option, butlike, who knows, you know, we
might we might expand down theroad when we've got everything

(01:18:27):
figured out. But yeah, we'll seeone one step at a time,

Jim (01:18:33):
Well you can't blame me for asking. I get it. Maybe that'll
be on my list of questions toask you in a couple of years as
well. But But this the Seeds ofWellbeing podcast that that
we're recording this for, isfocused on helping Hawaii ag

(01:18:53):
producers on all the islands. SoI guess any, any words of advice
or any parting wisdom you'd wantto share with our target
audience before we sign off?

Yeah, I mean, I don't know if it's anything
novel that hasn't been sharedbefore. But I'm even, you know,
we have lots of challenges thatwe see at FarmLink, and, you
know, this week, this week is nodifferent. You know, it's always
always some, some new challenge,but I, I would, I think, just

(01:19:28):
encourage, encourage folks to,you know, focus on building
versus excluding or destroyingas, as I mentioned earlier,
like, try to try to combat anycynicism of, you know, thinking
like, Oh, those people overthere, they're, they're evil or

(01:19:50):
they're, they're doing somethingwrong. I don't want to work with
them like you can always savethat for later but like, try to
like encourage and credit, justencourage everybody to, you
know, if you think a farm isdoing something you don't like,
or a company is doing somethingyou don't like, or a human is
doing something new like, like,instead of just like writing

(01:20:12):
them off, be curious, try topush the cynicism first step
two, and just go engage, try tobuild something and create
something and be collaborativeand be communicative and
transparent. And like, put theeffort in, it's harder, it's
more uncomfortable, but theoutcome is so much frickin

(01:20:34):
better. And then if it turnsout, they really are an asshole,
then, okay, you can go to theother thing, like there's,
there's nothing stopping youfrom doing that. But yeah, try
it, try to create something, tryto do it together and, and just
be open and curious. Andpersistent. Jim, you're, you're
super persistent. And I thinkthat's, that's such an essential

(01:20:57):
attribute to like, it's noteasy. You're gonna hit a million
challenges, but try to just, youknow, relish that moment and
those challenges and try tosurround yourself with, with
people either, you know, insideyour company, or is you're just
a single operator in your socialnetwork. You know, shoot me

(01:21:17):
shoot me an email, whoever,surround yourself with people
that, you know, help help youcontinue to do that. And, yeah,
we we can do it again. I'm waymore optimistic than than ever.
And yeah, it's there's there's alot of exciting stuff to do

(01:21:37):
together, for sure.

Jim (01:21:39):
We want to thank Rob for sharing his manao, and sharing
his story of FarmLinks past,present and future. If you want
to know more about some of thetopics we discussed. Look for
those links in the show notes.
I think we've shown here proventhat you're a geek for good but
it sounds like maybe a farmerfor good to as well. So,
Yeah, I definitely try to do itfor good. I am a geek, I'm a

(01:22:01):
recovering farmer. That's what Ilike to say. Gade and there all
crew and Laarni growin’ flowers.
They're yeah, they're the realfarmers. My my fingernails are
real clean nowadays.
Well, thanks for all that you'redoing for for the island, for
the islands, and for the farmingcommunity. It's, it takes all

(01:22:24):
the pieces right and, and someof it farmers, ag producers
don't want to do like you'vebeen describing. And like we
kind of all know we're we don'treally want to have to do it all
but are kind of required to ifyou're small scale. The things
that you bring, can reallyalleviate some of the, or take

(01:22:45):
off, take the things off ourlist that we really don't want
to have to do, many of us. Sothanks. Thanks again.

Yeah, well, thank you. I mean, telling the story
and getting the word out thereand bring to, bringing people
together like like you do. It'ssuper important to it's totally
part of it. So yeah, Iappreciate you and what you are
you doing here.

Thao Le (01:23:08):
The intention of these podcast series is to create a
safe space for respectful andinclusive dialogue. With people
from across a broad and diversespectrum involved in growing and
making accessible the food weshare together. A diversity of
voices perspectives andexperiences can serve to deepen

(01:23:28):
mutual understanding, to sparkcreative problem solving, and
provide insight into thecomplexities of our agriculture
system. If you, our listeners,have experiences with Hawaii
agricultural ecosystem fromindigitous methods, permaculture
smallholder farmers to largeincluding multinational

(01:23:48):
agricultural, industrialcompanies, and everywhere in
between, and you would like toshare your story, please contact
us. We welcome your voices andperspectives.

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