Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
From Shipping Container to Kitchen with B3 Roots
235 Plays3 years ago
In this episode of the Direct Farm Podcast, we get an education from Blake Bennett of B3 Roots about "container farms", hydroponic systems, and creating sustainable agricultural practices with technology. B3 Roots is a hyper-local pesticide free vertical hydroponic shipping container farm in Apex, North Carolina that specializes in sustainable leafy greens and herbs.
https://www.b3roots.com/
https://barn2door.com/resources
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Direct Farm Podcast
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to the Direct Farm podcast, the weekly listen for farm selling direct. We'll talk about the four levers for farm success, which are quality, brand, price, and convenience. We'll hear from outside industry experts and producers like you to delight your customers, save time, and to increase your direct farm sales and business. We're glad you're here.
00:00:25
Speaker
Welcome to the direct farm podcast. I'm Rory, your host for today's
Unique Farming Approach of B3 Roots Farm
00:00:29
Speaker
episode. We've got a great conversation for you today with Blake Bennett, the owner and operator of B three roots farm in apex, North Carolina. Welcome Blake. Great to have you here. Well, thanks for having me. I'm excited to, uh,
00:00:42
Speaker
Talk about what I'm doing over here. Yeah, let's get into that. To start out, B3 roots isn't like most farms. If somebody was to walk over to your farm and look at it, what would I see if I walked over to your house to check out your farm? Really, all you see is a metal box, a big white metal box that you probably wouldn't have any clue what's going on inside other than the fact my logo says hydroponic grade. Most people just walk by, but yeah, it's a big metal shipping container.
00:01:07
Speaker
Other than that, you don't know what's going on inside. That's awesome.
Hydroponics Explained by Blake Bennett
00:01:11
Speaker
I guess to start out then, yeah, you're growing hydroponically out of the shipping container with a shipping container from freight farms who we've talked about before, but could you maybe give a brief explanation of the thinking behind hydroponic and vertical growing? Yeah, absolutely. So hydroponics is the cultivation of plants, but without the use of soil. So I guess it's not really cultivation. Cultivation is using soil.
00:01:36
Speaker
So the growing plants were just using water. It's been around for a long time, but really the technology is just really ramped up in the past few years. So with the landings so expensive around here, or even poor soil quality all over the world, it's become a natural meeting of the two. Our land prices have gone just way up. And so going up, you can utilize more of the space there is without having to go out.
00:01:59
Speaker
And so every square foot counts. You can fit a lot more into one little area. How much space does your freight farm take up and about how much produce do you approximately grow in that? So the containers are 40 foot by foot, not a foot tall, 320 square feet. A little small area of land that I've got off a farm outside of the rural area. But yeah, within that 320, it's reduced as much as a traditional two and a half to three acre farm.
00:02:28
Speaker
Wow. That's what I'm, that's what I'm at. So yeah, we've touched on freight farms, which is a, is a newer technology in the world of farming and freight farms as a partner of barn to door. But could you tell me a little bit about how you came across them and the company and what about that kind of piqued your interest? Back in February, last year, I didn't exactly know what I was going to do, but I didn't like working in greenhouses. It's something I did when I was in school, I worked in a greenhouse for four years. And I always liked to do that.
00:02:58
Speaker
But when I got out of school, the jobs that were available were more in the landscaping world. So that's what I did from the time I graduated until last year was the landscaping industry. So I just started looking around at what was out there. Greenhouse work and hydroponics was something that definitely piqued my interest. And I just started researching a lot and came across vertical hydroponics as something that's up and going. And freight farms was one of the names that came up. Seems like their technology is one of the
00:03:27
Speaker
more advanced technologies out there to style farming. So we contacted them back in February and I guess the rest of history, I was really impressed with what they were doing. And yeah, after that, that's well, who I went with. Yeah.
Transition from Landscaping to Farming
00:03:39
Speaker
Wow. Did you have, I mean, you kind of touched on your, your background in landscaping. Did you have any background in, in farming or in that world? No, none whatsoever. That's a lot of what the, uh,
00:03:50
Speaker
The banks were asking me, they were asking, are you a farmer? I was like, no, not at all. But I do like to make the argument that working in the landscaping industry, you're trying to grow multiple different types of varieties of plants over different types of soils, climates, different sun exposures, different soil types. And so, you know, landscaping is kind of farming in an aspect, but it's not farming for something that's edible, it's just farming for aesthetics.
00:04:19
Speaker
So I do have a background in farming, but just for different reasons.
00:04:23
Speaker
Yeah, that's really interesting. I think kind of a cool way to look at it. I mean, it's still when it comes down to its plants, you're trying to grow them. So you touched on you looking at freight farms there. And it is pretty crazy. Cause if you go check out freight farms work or website, it looks like, I don't want to say Apple, but it's like a tech company, um, our space. Yeah. Yeah. It's really out there. Yeah. And so how does the technology in a freight farm, how does that help you grow high quality products for your customers?
Technology and Automation in Freight Farming
00:04:53
Speaker
all the betas there. That's where if you're someone who is a data person who likes to go back and look at statistics, what you did on this crop or what you did on that crop, the system just, it just collects all this data for you so you can automatically know when something went wrong. And another aspect of that is it's very automated. The farm really takes care of itself. There's a few manual things that you have to do, like the seeding yourself, transplanting yourself, adding some fertilizers for the injections.
00:05:22
Speaker
But as far as everything else, it's just, it's a very automated system. So you can focus on just going over the plants and making sure they look good. So that's one great part of the software is it's lots of automation and it's remote. You can check on your farm from anywhere.
00:05:36
Speaker
Yeah, that's really cool. And when you check out Freight Farms website, they do kind of almost have it as two different products that they're offering their customers. There's the farm, there's the box, but then there's also the software that goes along with it, which you touched on with a lot of that data and such. But so how does that software go with their unit and how does it compliment that? And how do you utilize that in the growing process? Well, I use the software just about every single day. First thing I do is when I go into the farm is I check all my levels of
00:06:05
Speaker
It tracks my CO2 levels. It tracks parts per million for both the cultivation tank and the seeding tank. So yeah, everything's there. Just make sure it's doing what it is doing. You do have to calibrate it every once in a while just to make sure that your sensors are in line with where they should be. So it's just a kind of a double check. That stuff's always working in the background, but you still have to make sure it is what it's supposed to be doing. But you just let it do its thing and
00:06:30
Speaker
It mimics daylight, daytime and nighttime. The temperatures go up when it's daytime and the temperatures drop when it's nighttime, which is actually the reverse of us. Right now, my farm is about to go into daytime and it will allow the temperature to go up to about 70 degrees. And then around eight o'clock in the morning, the lights will cut off and it will drop my temperatures down to about 65 degrees to try to mimic real life, what is actually going on. So the plants get a rest period and they get a growth period in a 24 hour period.
00:06:58
Speaker
That is pretty wild. That's incredible that it can do all that and just automatically that's all built in. Wow. So how long have you been, you've been at this now about a year? Well, I started working on the entire process about a year ago or a little over a year, but yes, getting the financing and getting location, location was a tough one. Zoning is difficult in the suburbs. I feel like maybe some of the larger cities would maybe look away.
00:07:25
Speaker
from you know what it is but the the city's in my area like are you agriculture or are you industrials we can't figure it out what you're doing is inside agriculture but what you're doing on the outside is industrial so that was really difficult so yeah it took a long time that freight farms had about a six month build so I had to wait a little bit for the farm to get here so I finally got here in December and then the power company was another 11 weeks wait to get the power hooked up
00:07:51
Speaker
So finally in February, I got everything up. I think this week just finished my sixth harvest. So yeah, I've been harvesting for six weeks, growing for middle of February. Okay. That's awesome. That's really cool. What has changed over the course of that time? And maybe one of the things you've learned. Learning wise is definitely try to figure out what it is that people really want. I thought lettuce was going to be a big hit and lettuce has not been the bigger hit that I thought it was going to be.
00:08:21
Speaker
Uh, so, uh, leafy greens, my Asian greens and those kinds of things. What I really, um, I'm focusing on that. Um, so that's what I've been learning right now. Well, and I know freight farms are also very compatible for microgreens as well. Have you, have you tried those out or have you thought about doing those? No, absolutely. I've got a rack that I get a little spare space in the very back or behind the, uh, seating tray.
00:08:46
Speaker
and I've got racks back there. And so I have been playing around with the microgreens and they've been very popular. They are definitely something that gets me in the door. People try out the microgreens and then they're like, okay, let me try out everything else. So yeah, the microgreens have been a great addition.
00:09:01
Speaker
Yeah. That's so interesting that you say that because that's something we see with so many farms is just like the in the door product and it can be microgreens. It can be, I feel like a lot of times with protein farmers, it's something like, like bacon or like a New York strip or something like that. But everybody has those products that gets the attention of a customer, but then you hope that they then sign up for all your other products. Have you added or stopped growing any products in the time that you've been doing this?
00:09:29
Speaker
Uh, you have radishes and they took a little bit longer than they thought they would. Radishes were one of the first things I did. I'm just harvesting a bow. So I'll do it at one time. And, um, and I think everything else though, I've had great success with, I would say my mixed green bags, like a cut greens, 10 ounce bags. Those have been my most popular, but then everything else I sells you can buy about the house. They've been doing well. So the, the lettuces were not as big of a hit as I thought they would be. That could change, I think maybe in the middle of summer, but I think in the wintertime,
00:09:58
Speaker
There's lots of competition for lettuce. So I'll continue to do the lettuce, but just not near as much as that. Yeah. Well, and that's kind of an interesting thing that you mentioned. There's like the seasonality that most other farmers deal with doesn't affect you as much. Could you maybe speak to that a little bit and how you plan for that? Yeah, that's a great point. There is no season in the farm. Um, every single day is 65 degrees and 70 degrees. So yeah, I can grow collards in the middle of summer or just about any type of leafy green I could do.
00:10:26
Speaker
anytime I want. I'm experimenting with some pansies or violas right now for edible flowers. Um, but yeah, just about anything can go anytime a year. So there, there will be no season for me. Wow. That's so interesting. At what point did you start looking at selling and using barn to door to do that? When I started this, I wanted everything to be pretty automated. Farmers markets are great places to sell, but one of the reasons I've decided to switch is I wanted
00:10:51
Speaker
Time with the family on the weekend. So I wanted something that was very automated, something to work in the background, but I'm doing other things. So I started looking at software for just online software like Shopify and anything like that. Nothing really hit what I wanted. Nothing was very specific and happened to run across an article maybe in the Wall Street Journal about Barnador.
00:11:16
Speaker
checked it out and I was like, you know what, this sounds pretty good. So it fits the niche market. Yeah, I don't regret it at all. That's good. We like to hear that. And I was going to say too, because one of the features that you're utilizing in the store that I think is always a big one for farmers is subscriptions. But you kind of have this unique advantage with subscriptions and being able to know
00:11:37
Speaker
all of your grow times and really have that down to an exact timing, which plays nicely into the subscription format. So how does having those specific grow times contribute to your subscriptions? It's fantastic. Um, I can predict five weeks out and what my harvest is going to be. And the majority of the mixed greens are cut greens as I go in, cut the leaves off and then regenerate. And I know that those plants are going to last for about eight weeks until they need to be changed out. So I can just plan everything out that far ahead.
00:12:06
Speaker
And I've got a good estimate of what each panel, so the freight farms have panels inside. I can get so many ounces per panel per week. And so it's just, I can really have a great forecast of what I've got coming up. And so really don't run out of inventory. I can really estimate what, how much inventory I have on hand. And if I start seeing that one product getting close to selling out at any point, I can ramp up production of that one product or many products for the mixed greens would be
00:12:36
Speaker
five or six different greens that go into the bag. And so yes, I can really forecast what I need coming up. I love it. Yeah, that's really nice. And then also knowing that you have those sales already spoken for is great. You're growing those things knowing that they're already spoken for. I love the subscription because it just automatically hits them.
00:12:57
Speaker
You know, Friday or Monday or whatever sales made, and I can just be throwing the Frisbee for the dog and I'll get an email and say, here's a sale. Yeah. That's great. So what all are you doing subscriptions with right now in terms of your products? Do you have mixed screens, microgreens? Right now the subscriptions I'm doing are just a mixed green bag. Uh, that's a 10 ounce bag, which actually comes to five ounce bags. I don't have a bag that's 10 ounces. So it's two pops.
00:13:25
Speaker
And then I'll do that as a weekly basis or either a biweekly basis. Some people don't get through that much, so they'll do every other week on that. Then I also have just a mix of head lettuce. So when I harvest heads of lettuce, it comes with the roots and everything. So that's my other subscription you can do as well. So just to right now, I'm trying to find a chef that maybe can come up with a good mixture of greens for me, have like a spicy mix, a regular mix, and then just something that's very unique. So I want to have about.
00:13:53
Speaker
Three different mixes of the mixed green bags. Cause that's what I am seeing sells the most right now. I'm kind of curious, like thinking through this as a customer, has there had to be any conversations with your customers that are like, how the heck is this guy getting these things out of a shipping container?
Challenges and Customer Engagement
00:14:09
Speaker
What has that been like? And are most people pretty interested in how you're doing this?
00:14:14
Speaker
Yeah, I think most people are pretty much in all about it. They're like, I've never heard of anything like this. I think for me, it's just funny when a lot of people have never heard hydroponics. I've got the horticulture, agriculture backgrounds, and it's something that's been common to me, but there's a lot of people out there just don't even know about hydroponics. So that's the first thing, just like you've lost me there. Yeah, it can become a long conversation.
00:14:36
Speaker
But they're always very interested, especially when the pictures start coming out, basically the blues and the reds and the technology behind all of that. Yeah. Everybody's very interested about it and probably a little bit, maybe not trusting it yet until they try it. Then they try the greens and they're like, wow, there is a difference. How have you maybe combated some of that like buyer distress of being like, what is this? Do you usually kind of try and communicate that through social media or something?
00:15:01
Speaker
I am doing a social media, but I think it's still, it's just the taste. Once someone tastes the product and not the hydroponics of it, that's when it really comes full circle. Seeing is believing, but the tasting is probably even more of a truth be told to that. Because you can see it, the product looks really good. The red vein soil is just absolutely amazing, the colors of it. But once you finally bite into it, that's when they're like, okay, yeah, there definitely is something different about this.
00:15:28
Speaker
It's a funny thing to have to explain, I guess. I think a lot of times, you know, explaining your practices to customers is a common challenge for a lot of farmers and getting to understand why they should be buying from them versus the grocery store or something. Yeah. I think two things that are maybe a little bit of a hurdle is buying produce online.
00:15:47
Speaker
you know, instead of going to the farmer's market, be able to touch it better, be able to taste it, you know, walking through the line and looking at things almost like the first time I bought something from Amazon. I was a little bit strange about not buying it from the store, but yeah, just clicking a button. And that's the one thing I like about buying the door is very easy. You just click a button and it shows up however many days later. So that's been a little bit of a hurdle of getting people used to that. The way I'm doing hydroponics inside of a shipping container is very strange.
00:16:12
Speaker
Yeah. Something you touched on there is this idea of clicking a button and it's on your doorstep and you do offer a direct home delivery. So I was curious, like, how does that combined, especially with something like a subscription, just make that even more convenient for your customers to get those microgreens and the mixed greens and such? I think that it's really easy for them. They just, if they go through my shop, I'll try to keep the inventory updated about three times a week. I go through, we'll just check on things, make sure I've got
00:16:39
Speaker
the right numbers in there and they'll shop and buy things and it just shows up. Once they get used to it, they really, they really enjoy it. Yeah. How are you going about delivery at the moment? I think you're probably in the early stages of starting a delivery program. And I think a lot of farmers are looking to maybe start delivery. You know, it's, it's a big new fulfillment for, for a lot of people is being able to offer that to customers. How has that process been going for you and where are you at in that process?
00:17:07
Speaker
I prefer the delivery because it lets me manage my own schedule. I've worked in garden centers before. I know sometimes if you just have people stopping by to pick up things, it can really sway your schedule. I fully enjoy talking to people about the farm, but sometimes you can get the person to stop by. And two hours later, you're still talking about what you're doing there. I really enjoy showing people what I'm doing out there.
00:17:29
Speaker
But as far as a day-to-day operation, since I'm a one man show, I just really like having delivery service because I harvest everything, but the day it is delivered. So it's less than six hours from the time I cut it until it shows up to the door and just schedule everything out, deliver everything, start for the next day. Wow. That's really cool too, that you can get it to people so quickly. And I'm sure part of that is you're using a freight farm, so you can be a little closer to some of those more populated areas, which is nice.
00:17:57
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. The farm's only, it's only about seven minutes from my house. So I can be there really quick. The other Friday night, not too long ago, I had a restaurant text me and say, Hey, we're out of the micro greens.
00:18:09
Speaker
It was about seven o'clock and I was like, okay, give me about 30 minutes. I'll be there. Yeah. Wow. That's awesome. That's crazy. It's just so quick. You've started this from scratch really without much of a background in farming, but it seems like you've dove in headfirst and are really doing a good job of kind of adapting to your marketplace
Advice and Future Plans
00:18:29
Speaker
and such. What kind of advice would you have for other farmers that might be doing the same? Expect roadblocks.
00:18:36
Speaker
It seems about every single step of this process is not going like I thought it would. The financing, the insurance, location, good gosh, so trying to get electrical run. Just about everything has been somewhat of a roadblock. Dealing with freight farms and dealing with barn to doors probably been the two easiest things that I've had to deal with. Both companies are fantastic, but every single aspect of everything else that I've done has been not as planned. So that's my advice is don't expect it to go like it's going to be planned because it probably will not. As far as like
00:19:05
Speaker
The marketing start early. Getting into the restaurants has been difficult for me in this area. I have not figured out why, but that's been one of my hurdles. The homeowners have been no problem at all. I remember growth has been fantastic with restaurants. I just can't seem to grab onto the product yet. Yeah. Yeah. But start early with marketing.
00:19:24
Speaker
Yeah. You, you make a really good point there though, because I've looked at your Instagram, for example, and you mentioned you didn't get your freight farm until December, I think, and you weren't growing until February, but your posts are dating back way before that. And this is from the, the B three roots company, Instagram account. So yeah, was that a very conscious choice to be promoting and letting your community know that this is coming months in advance?
00:19:53
Speaker
Yeah, I wanted to create some kind of buzz, some kind of buzz about just to get the name out there and it's on the way and we'll look out for it. So yeah, definitely wanted everybody to know about it because I wanted to hit the ground running with this thing. I've got some great aspirations for it to be more than what it is today. Yeah, that's great to hear. What is kind of on the horizon for you? What's next for B3 Roots? Definitely to grow my market. I think I went to Durham, North Carolina for the first time this week.
00:20:21
Speaker
So that's the market I'm excited about. The restaurant scene in Durham is extremely strong. Lots of great chefs out there. Yeah, for this year though, just to really grow that. I think I'm running around 25% capacity, probably less than that right now. So I've got a lot of room to expand as soon as I can max out what I'm doing with the one farm. Definitely the second farm is coming.
00:20:44
Speaker
Wow. Yeah. And it's pretty cool. I've seen the pictures of that on freight farms website, but we'll stack the shipping containers or, or have a bunch side by side. It's pretty cool how you can build that out and, and add acres to what you're growing. Yes. Yes. It's a very scalable practice. One of the thing lands, all you got to do is put it together and, um, put some seeds in some water and you know, do you do the exact same thing you're doing in the other farm? Yeah.
00:21:08
Speaker
Wow. That's really cool. Well, it's been great to hear from you Blake and about the process that you're doing. And I wish you the best of luck moving forward. Thank you so much for having me. I really, really appreciate it. Enjoy it.
00:21:19
Speaker
I want to extend my thanks to Blake for joining us on this week's podcast episode. Here at Barnadore, we're humbled to support thousands of farmers across the country, including farmers like Blake, who are implementing sustainable agricultural practices and supporting their local communities. For more on B3 roots, you can visit b3roots.com. To learn more about Barnadore, including access to numerous free resources and best practices for your farm, go to barnadore.com slash resources. Thank you for tuning in and we'll see you next week.
00:21:51
Speaker
Thank you for listening to this episode of the Direct Farm podcast. You can subscribe anywhere you listen to podcasts to automatically download new episodes. For more free resources that you can read, watch, and listen to, visit farntador.com slash resources. Thank you again for tuning in and we'll see you again next week.