A convergence of farmers and food lovers brought us to the Farmer Olympics at the Petaluma Fairgrounds Last Saturday. Amidst the buzz of excitement from the games like hale bale toss, vegetable relays, and T-post pounding, we chatted with attendees about the AgShift app and herbs (our game was having people guess with their nose what 6 different herbs were). For a food literate crowd, participants in our herb guessing game were surprised that they did not know some of the herbs we had to smell (rosemary, sage, oregano, marjoram, catnip, and lemon verbena).
AgShift is a software platform designed to improve diversified farms’ profits and simplify compliance. It’s hard to keep track of everything that happens on a diversified farm like, how much time it takes to do a certain task, how much money is being spent on supplies and labor, when you plant a crop, harvest it, etc. Notes about all these things often end up on soil-stained paper on a clipboard for me and sometimes, if I’m really on top of it, make their way into Excel spreadsheets and Quickbooks.
I’ve been helping the AgShift team over the last year hone in on what software solutions could help diversified farmers save time and money but also quantitatively analyze and understand what cropping sequence gives you the most bang for your buck. The Agshift app features help farmers track farm expenses and income that then become data points that yield helpful insights into the true cost of production that in turn, help guide better decision-making that can help boost farm profits.
Chatting with farmers and farmer support organizations about AgShift at this event was encouraging. The farmers we chatted with could see value in using the AgShift app to help with improving farm profits and simplifying recordkeeping for tracking income and expenses but also aiding in compliance for organic certification and food safety. We had some good conversations with people at the Ecological Farming Conference table about how this app could be useful to growers as well as Sierra Harvest, an organization that trains beginning farmers on the efficacy of getting new farmers set up with business systems that can bolster financial success. Several farms with produce stands at the Farmer Olympics are excited to give the app a try and are relieved to know that it can be used even without wireless connectivity.
The AgShift app will be ready for trials on September 26th. If you are interested in trialing this free app, please get in touch.
Amy Ridout
[email protected]
AgShift is a software platform designed to improve diversified farms’ profits and simplify compliance. It’s hard to keep track of everything that happens on a diversified farm like, how much time it takes to do a certain task, how much money is being spent on supplies and labor, when you plant a crop, harvest it, etc. Notes about all these things often end up on soil-stained paper on a clipboard for me and sometimes, if I’m really on top of it, make their way into Excel spreadsheets and Quickbooks.
I’ve been helping the AgShift team over the last year hone in on what software solutions could help diversified farmers save time and money but also quantitatively analyze and understand what cropping sequence gives you the most bang for your buck. The Agshift app features help farmers track farm expenses and income that then become data points that yield helpful insights into the true cost of production that in turn, help guide better decision-making that can help boost farm profits.
Chatting with farmers and farmer support organizations about AgShift at this event was encouraging. The farmers we chatted with could see value in using the AgShift app to help with improving farm profits and simplifying recordkeeping for tracking income and expenses but also aiding in compliance for organic certification and food safety. We had some good conversations with people at the Ecological Farming Conference table about how this app could be useful to growers as well as Sierra Harvest, an organization that trains beginning farmers on the efficacy of getting new farmers set up with business systems that can bolster financial success. Several farms with produce stands at the Farmer Olympics are excited to give the app a try and are relieved to know that it can be used even without wireless connectivity.
The AgShift app will be ready for trials on September 26th. If you are interested in trialing this free app, please get in touch.
Amy Ridout
[email protected]
Photos from the Press Democrat's Sept 18 Article, 2016 Farmer Olympics
RSS Feed
