FarmsFood & Bev
Women
Riverbird Farm
Jo: "This funding helps a first-generation pastured poultry farm expand infrastructure and equipment for the 2023 season."
Shelton,
WA
Investment type:
Loan
Target raise:
$10,000
Minimum investment:
$25
$25
End date:
Mar 15, 2023
Mar 15, 2023
ended
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We are a small first-generation farm raising pastured poultry in the South Sound region of Washington State. We operate on 7 leased acres of pasture surrounded by forest. We take great pride in raising our animals with a hands-on approach from nurturing day-old chicks in the brooder to raising them out on pasture, to processing, packaging and delivering the birds ourselves. We process our birds with care at a WSDA-licensed facility leased from a nearby farm in McCleary, WA.
During our first full season in 2022, the farm sold weekly at the Olympia Farmers Market, supported a 22-member CSA, and provided direct-to-customer bulk orders, restaurant wholesale orders, and regional home delivery through an online market service. Over the course of the 2022 season, we grew from 50 chickens per week to 100 chickens per week to better accommodate the demand for our products.
In 2023 we plan to increase our scale and establish new enterprises. First, we plan to scale our poultry enterprise from 100 chickens per week to 150 per week during the season, which we anticipate to be the maximum scale for our poultry enterprise at our current location. In addition to poultry, we plan to add a small group of pigs and sheep with the intention of growing both of those to enterprise scale in the coming years.