LocalHarvest Newsletter
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Oct 1, 2002
Oct 1, 2002
LocalHarvest Newsletter -- October 1, 2002
http://www.localharvest.org
Hello, and welcome to our newsletter! It's been an exciting few
weeks since the last time I wrote to you here. Our Web traffic has
been booming, We've made some major upgrades to the site's software,
and we're working on a couple of very promising new partnerships that
we will be announcing in our next newsletter. Read on to learn more
details on what's we've been up to, to visit our featured farm, and
to learn about our new members...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CONTENTS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1) Growing and Growing
2) Pumpkin Extravaganza
3) Featured Member
4) New Members
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1) GROWING AND GROWING
***********************
Traffic to our Web site has been growing wildly during the last few
months. We are now getting an average of 1500 visits per day, which
translates to about 10,000 daily page views. Our traffic almost doubled
from July to August, and then almost doubled again from August to
September. This is very exciting, since the more traffic we get, the
more business we generate for our members, the more members we attract,
and the more comprehensive an information resource we become, which
brings even more traffic, closing the loop. We've been busy adding
new features and improving old ones, while keeping the ship in top shape
and very able to withstand even much higher traffic. Our quick growth
is very good news for America's family farms and related small
businesses. Many of them are struggling in these times and can
certainly use all the business that we can generate for them!
We recently released a new version of our search engine, which is not
only much faster, but more user friendly and intuitive as well. We're
sure that you will like it! Just give it a try and let us know if
you would like to suggest any changes or new features to either our
search engine, or to the rest of our Web site.
2) PUMPKIN EXTRAVAGANZA
************************
One of the reasons for our newly increased traffic is the recent release
of our "Pumpkin Patches" page. (http://www.localharvest.org/pumpkins.jsp)
This page has been attracting hundreds of visitors daily into the
LocalHarvest Web site since it went live just a few days ago. We
feature in it a custom search form that returns all pumpkin growers in
your area. We only list 340 pumpkin growers now, which we know is just
a small subset of the real number. If you are a farmer and have a pumpkin
patch open to the public for the Halloween season, or if you just grown
pumpkins and want to advertise it in our Web site, make sure to update
your LocalHarvest listing to reflect this! Hundreds of people are
searching for *your business* on LocalHarvest every day, make sure they
do find you!! If you know of a pumpkin patch that should be on our
search engine, please tell them about us so that they can create a
listing with us.
3) FEATURED MEMBER OF THE WEEK
*******************************
Blue Bird Acre CSA Farm
========================
(http://www.localharvest.org/farms/M3948)
Bethany Pepper, our featured farmer, writes:
Blue Bird Acre Farm is a community supported agriculture,(CSA) farm
in Mississippi providing fresh vegetables, herbs and flowers to
shareholders year round.
Only organic practices are used on this sustainable agriculture farm.
My daughter works and plays right along side of me so I want the
healthiest environment possible for her!
Mississippi's mild climate and long hot summer allows for a huge
selection of fruits and vegetables from around the world. Crisp
Korean melons, Luffa sponges, Crowder Peas, & Kiwano/horned melons,
are a few of the specialty crops I grow.
No genetically modified seed is used and I use a high percentage
of American & European heirloom seeds. You know the 'old timey' kinds
of veggies that were grown for -FLAVOR- not '-shipping qualities-'!
Bethany Pepper
4) NEW MEMBERS
***************
Since our last Newsletter, on September 11, LocalHarvest has grown by 29
new members, all of them direct additions into the Web site via the
Internet. Here are their names and member numbers:
4661 | St. Martinville Creole Farmers Market
4662 | The Garlic Patch
4664 | Shillington Farmers Market
4668 | Watauga County Farmers' Market
4670 | Harrison's Chef Prepared Foods
4671 | Pelletier's Sugar Farm
4672 | Lee Farmer's Market
4673 | Spirit GardensCSA
4674 | Rancho Gordo
4675 | Angelica's
4676 | Ironwood Farm Organic Produce
4678 | MaryJanesFarm
4680 | Craigie Street Bistrot
4681 | Harper Valley Farms
4682 | College Park Grower's Market
4684 | Tortilla Flats
4685 | Purchase College Food Co-op
4686 | Free Earth Farm
4687 | Warrup's Farm
4690 | Dusty's Nursery & Company
4691 | Alderspring Ranch
4692 | Brenda's Organics
4693 | Pleasant View Farm
4694 | Rumbleway Farm
4695 | Cloudland Farm
4696 | Orlando Organics
4697 | Northfield Farmers' Market
4699 | Year Round Bounty of Schoharie County
4700 | Olmo Apiaries
We encourage you to visit their LocalHarvest listings. To do so,
just enter their member number (the number on the first column above)
into the "Name/Description" field in the LocalHarvest search form.
Thank you for your continued support.
Sincerely,
--Guillermo Payet
Executive Director
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