Food Connects

The Food Hub saw 35 percent sales increase in 2023, totaling 3.3 millions dollars in food revenue. Our partner base to 119 producers and 255 customers in our region. We funneled 1,581,633 dollars to local farmers and sold 403,328 thousand of food to local schools. In addition to this growth, we undertook two major capital expenditures. We began the expansion of a new 10,000 sqft warehouse space, which will soon house 1600sqft of added refrigerated and frozen storage capacity. In addition to, we transitioned our accounting and sales software to Oracle's ERP, NetSuite, allowing us to integrate sales, CRM, inventory, routing and accounting. Not to mention, we added a fourth refrigerated delivery truck, and hired 6 new employees.

Farm to School continues to serve 14 member schools, who pay an annual membership fee for our Farm to School coaching services, and serve an additional 16 participating schools. This program leads Vermont's Harvest of the Month program, which showcases education and use of one harvest per month. In addition, we offered program-related Professional Development to teachers; Trauma and Food Workshops that advance knowledge and practices on the ways food and trauma are intertwined. Lastly, Farm to School continued its sprout kit initiative, delivering 1,146 sprout kits to 18 schools. Each student in participating classrooms received theur own tray, soil, seeds for planting, and watched their plants come to life.