Young Farmers & DIY Crafters

What do the eager, fresh faced young farmers of today have in common with the clever artists of the DIY craft movement? Everything. 

I've been ruminating on this topic for the past few weeks, spurred by my enrollment in the pasture-based dairy and livestock business planning class and an overdose of DIY holiday arts and crafts. Somehow, from the outside, the idea of being a farmer or crafter is very appealing, and attracts a certain type of person (myself included, on both fronts) - but doesn't always live up to the expectations when you cut to the nitty-gritty of running a small business.

I began noticing the similarities after Thanksgiving, when we headed to Milwaukee for the annual Art vs Craft extravaganza. This craft show is hailed as the end all be all of craft fairs and holiday gift hot spots for people who appreciate local, handmade, crafty home wares, jewelry, posters and letterpress stationery...you get the picture. Housed in a humdrum, beige conference-center-like space at the Milwaukee School of Engineering, this event was teeming with your trusty craftacular favorites: woodcut prints of vegetables, letterpress stationery, scrap fabric goodness, jewelry made from typewriter keys, clever handscreened t-shirts, and much much more. Tables and tables full of unique displays, one-of-a-kind handcrafted projects and eager artisans promoting, selling, hawking and highlighting their wares. There is sometimes a certain desperation. I've made all this pretty stuff. I know you like it. Please like it enough to buy it.

This was no small event either. It was just us and over 3,300 other lovers of crafty goodness who visited this one day craft fair. How's that for a big show of support for small, local artisans? And this is not only a Milwaukee phenomenon, there is a surge of crafty love across the country. There's the Renegade Craft Fair in various locations, Crafty Wonderland in Portland, and the vast internet craft fair on Etsy...just to name a very small sliver of the action. Professional crafters and their DIY counterparts alike (kind of like farmers and their corresponding home-gardeners) are a culture all their own.  

Perusing the tables and tables of inspired crafts, I felt an enormous parallel between these homespun crafters and the wave of new and young farmers taking over the nation. A growing movement of young, motivated, creative, idealistic folks desiring to create their own path in life. And to meet them, a paying consumer base making deliberate purchasing decisions to support the small, the local and the handmade. Sounds like the enormous, and still growing, support for small, local farmers, no? 

Maybe you are catching my drift here. Without referencing the 2007 Census of Ag or the 2010 Census of Craftiness (which I just made up), there has been a growth in both of these industries in the past handful of years.

The parallels between the craft and young farmer populations are significant. These are groups of younger folks drawn to a self-designed lifestyle cultivating seeds and soil or thread and needle into a fulfilling meaning for each twenty four hour day. Energetic self-starters (I hate that term) desiring to engage with the world on their own terms, motivated to carve a niche outside of the existing system. No daily desk routine, no working for someone else, a willingness to live without a steady paycheck and with a certain uncertainty. All with a vision of molding natural resources and personal skills into a sustaining income stream, and with a life-encompassing passion. Read more from last week's NPR piece on attendees at the Stone Barns Center's Young Farmers Conference for an accurate picture on the farmer side. Sure, these are generalizations, but I can say this because I've been there, and I want to be there again - this time on the farm, not in the studio.

From the outside, the lifestyle of the professional crafter and farmer seem appealing - somehow simple and idealistic. You are your own boss, your life is in your hands, it's all about the art of growing or making and you dedicate your time to being lost in your art. Mornings in a heavy flannel shirt, coffee in hand, soaking in the panorama of the fields. Mornings straight to the studio, coffee in hand, to immerse yourself in the creative process. Yes, both are wonderfully sumptuous visions - and also rarely true. 

This is because the truth behind both of these endeavors is that they are small businesses. And the bottom line about a small business is that it has a bottom line. And for the individual who wants to be the solo-act in a small crafty or farm-based business that means being a jack-of-all-trades and dedicating a significant amount of time to actually running the business. There is little to find creative or pleasing in administer the sinister and often forgotten aspects of running a business, like dealing with credit card processing companies, keeping the books, paying taxes, advertising and promotion, insurance, food safety regulations (well, that one's not pertinent to crafters), permits and on and on and on. It can quite quickly put you back behind a desk and away from the things you truly love.

And that seems to be the biggest piece that new farmers miss, and maybe crafters too. The big difference between these two parties is that farming (depending on how you do it) requires a hefty up front investment in either land, equipment or operating costs and it takes a bit longer to raise a pig and get it to market than it does to make an adorable note card on a vintage letterpress and sell it on Etsy. Many going into this field ignore, forget or are oblivious to the fact that farming is more than a lifestyle, it's a business. And a business, especially one as complex as a farm, requires lots and lots and lots of planning. The USDA is throwing money at agencies and non-profits to provide business planning classes for new and young farmers. The classes, which are wide spread and easily accessible in person or online are a wonderful resource, but ultimately only effective if students actually write a business plan...which requires research, sitting behind a desk, running lost of numbers, playing with Excel and feeling a bit disheartened to see a bottom line that is not profitable, at least for a while. But that's what the planning is for. Planning is not sexy, it's not the same as being in the fields, planting tender transplants, creating new designs or perfecting your craft - but it's important. Very, very important.

So here's a toast to the new farmers and crafters that are creating local economies and personal economic opportunities. Thanks for being brave enough to go it alone and create beauty and tastiness and self-fulfillment. Just don't forget about the less-palatable stuff along the way.

On our end, we're preparing as much as possible for our venture-to-be. Business planning, time working for other people, being smart about investments, networking, conferencing and researching - a lot. It's hard to balance the impatience of wanting to farm now, especially during these winter months away from Dreamfarm, and finding a contentedness in where I am now. I guess patience, and planning, are key!

The Hip Young Farmer Boom

"Why doesn't my hair ever look that good when I am out in the field? Or anytime really."

(The anonymity of the source is retained to protect the innocently jealous.)

That's probably my favorite of my friends' comments on the New York Times article In New Food Culture, a Young Generation of Farmers Emerges. The article, beyond the semi-flashy lead photo, paints a semi-realistic demographic of the younger crowd returning to the land and addresses some of the most important issues and barriers facing new farmers today. But, with just one glance at the cover photo, you realize exactly what the above comment is referring to (no really, go look at it): a young couple, with slightly pointed stares, each holding a chicken and standing next to a beautifully dilapidated barn on a classic Oregon winter day. The canopy of the tree above them is bare, the scarves a must to ward off a damp chill and the fly trap above the chicken coop door a necessity. The striking aspect of the image? The well coiffed -literally- duo, sporting leather jackets, a ruched skirt (her) and smart pageboy hat (him), look better suited to attend a show at the Wonder Ballroom in Portland than spend a long day on the farm in Corvallis.When did farming turn into a hip fashion statement?

A snarky response? Absolutely! And I can give you all the reasons why...

1. I am jealous
2. Reality.
3. Am I jealous?
4. More jealousy.

1. It is true, I am jealous. Not of their totally rad style, or even the fact that they have a spread in the Times (ok, maybe a little). I am jealous they get to wake up each morning (style their hair) and start the day off with a never ending list of farm chores: animals to feed, fields to cultivate, pasture to monitor, crops to plan.  They have the one thing I don't: a farm. And as an aspiring farmer, I am envious of their land, barn, infrastructure, market for their goods and the sweet aesthetic of their Afton Field Farm sign. What this article doesn't share with us, however, is the background, training, education and farming skills this young couple brought to the bank when they signed their mortgage (or lease) for the farm.

In the case of Tyler Jones of Afton Field Farms, he grew up with vegetables, chickens and an family-instilled appreciation for agriculture, followed by an intensive apprenticeship with Joel Salatin at Polyface Farms in Virginia. If you haven't heard of Joel Salatin yet, he's sort of the public face for pasture-based farming in the United States with accessible books like Salad Bar Farming and Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal: War Stories From the Local Food Front and cameos in documentaries like Food, Inc. But I digress...The basic point is Tyler was prepared. He had ample training, education and real experience. He knew what he was getting into and had the taken the time to acquire the skills to make it work. Further, he had the wholehearted support of his family...and eventually his future wife Alicia. Unfortunately, this isn't always the case.

2. Over the past two, three years, five years there has been an unquestionable growth in farming. Seems like everyone wants to be a farmer these days, and many are young, idealistic people. Not people like Tyler Jones who were raised on the land. Not sons and daughters of farmers. Not people who grew up in a town with a 4-H club. Not even college-age hippies who like to walk around barefoot. People more like Jenni and Scott Timms, both 28, who left their engineering jobs in Texas to start farming.

I don't know anything about Jenni and Scott other than their brief mention in the NY Times article...but I can tell you this: you can't engineer a farm. You can throw a lot of your hard-earned savings into buying land, a tractor or a herd...but that is very different from being a successful farmer, or even a barely successful farmer. Almost all farmers narrate the horror stories of their beginning years in operation. Most farms have horror stories for the middle years too. But the best prevention is a solid plan, as much experience as possible and some source of continued off farm income. I have heard too many firsthand accounts of people quitting jobs, selling homes, buying farmland and heading off into the country to live that dreamy, idealized agrarian lifestyle of the past. Yea, that one. The one that never really existed. Often, these new farmers find that farming is challenging, exhausting and poverty-inducing.

Much of the press about young people flocking to farms outlines the challenges, but never quite puts them into true perspective. This article mentions "the lack of health insurance, inability to repay student loans and a failed garlic crop." Our generation is conditioned to accept some of these failures, so these barriers don't easily deter. The media rarely gives these challenges the level of coverage they deserve. There is debt. There are also skills needed for farming: obviously agricultural knowledge...but also all the business savvy of a small business woman and the motivation of the successfully self-employed. The problem is, many new farmers have trouble tackling even the first item on this list: successfully raising enough high quality food to sell.

Don't get me wrong. I wish all new farmers good luck, because sometimes that seems to be the necessary special ingredient. And I want all that same luck for myself! What an adventure, what a challenge, what a risk. We must all be crazy to even consider it!

3. Fortunately/Unfortunately, farming has become the cause celeb, the new dream job of the vegan-tattooed-fixie riding hipster, the Subaru-driving educated liberal back-to-the-lander and the spirited venture capitalist looking for a second career. One of my dearest young-farmer friends puts it well in her response to this article, "I ask myself, am I happy that young farmers are gaining recognition and the challenged they face are acknowledged...or am I totally annoyed by foodie hipsters and their "cool" farmer aesthetic...Struggle is NOT a fashion statement." This comes from a woman who has spent years learning, working, managing small farms, her very own farm the last two years. She's the real thing, down to the permanently sore muscle, dirty fingernails and seasonal bank account. It's great that so many people are eager to raise food, but are we idealizing the process and what it means? I can admit I am jealous on two fronts. The first, I fear I have missed the farming boat and that the ship of small-farmer popularity has sailed and is being carried on a brief wave of revival popularity. Have I been left in the dust? By the time we plant seeds, harvest first eggs and slaughter pigs will small-scale farming be passe? Markets swelled to capacity? No more room for our delicious mold-ripened goat milk cheese with the think layer of ash in the middle? It's hard to sit by patiently, computer and concrete bound in Boston, watching everyone else live the dream!

4. And beyond that, not only does everyone want to be a farmer these days, everyone seems to want to write about being a farmer. Juicy, farming reads used to be limited to the likes of Michael Ableman, books with simple images weaving the story of a farm with yarns of personal narrative. The landscape, foggy mornings, beautiful descriptions of food in the field and long wooden tables in the farmhouse kitchen. Then there was a little Barbara Kingsolver with Animal, Vegetable, Mineral and the likes. Now the hottest reads are the likes of Growing a Farmer and The Dirty Life. Even Roseanne Barr is getting in on the action...

In the big picture, it's great that the good word is getting out there about the need for farmers, the hard life of growing food and the beautiful and bountiful rewards too. I'm just a little sour grapes that the time for the soft-voiced farm narrative, brimming with stories of brilliant failure, full-tilt exhaustion, love, equipment mishaps, unruly animals and financial demise is now, not (say) six years from now.

...

But really, it all boils down to the fact that I am jealous of all these good people and their incredible adventures. I want all their ups and downs RIGHT NOW! In the mean time, I'll sit back, breathe a bit and enjoy the slightly longer road to the farm I am traveling on. I'll be sure to take a look out the window and enjoy the view, gather my resources and skills for the on and off-farm jobs often required to make a living in agriculture. And it's not all bad, the time spent in grad school has helped me hone my skills, pinpoint the enterprises I want to undertake (broilers, hogs, goat & milk cheese and a winter CSA), take advantage of the abundance of new farmer training programs and meet a special someone who is just as crazy as me and wants to do this farming together. The hard thing is the patience, the knowing there is a reason to wait for that barn door to open with just the right opportunity on the other side.