Are you a local Grower?
Do you grow food and are willing to sell it to your local community? If the answer is yes, then join the Trade Shack.
We building a network of those who can and those who cannot become self-sufficient. It takes land, time and skills to grow food, and not everybody has time. This is where Local Growers and Backyard Growers networking comes in.
The Trade Shack provides the tools to reach those looking for supermarket alternatives and shortening the supply chain. Buying Growers Direct, seed to plate.
How to sell my vegetables or meat?
Growing food is rewarding, so it is needless to say that wasting it is not an option. Hence the question, “How to sell my vegetables or meat?”
If you are a commercial grower, you most likely already have an outlet, but you can make more money selling direct. A backyard grower with more vegetables than they can preserve does not have those established distribution chains.
There are a few ways of getting food to consumers:
- Create your market. This will take time, something you most likely do not have.
- Work with local restaurants, which can work, but they most likely require delivery. Which can be a time-consuming affair.
- Sell at Farmers’ Markets. This works but can create a lot of waste if you do not sell what you bring.
- Reach out to small stores, this again is time-consuming.
What if you could sell before you harvest?
Meet all customers at one spot or have them come to YOU.
Welcome to the Trade Shack.
Our goal is to bring local growers and backyard growers together with consumers. Create short and cheaper supply chains. Using postcodes as the geographical footprint, but not restricted to only that area.
As growers, you can set up your business listing so you can get found and create “classifieds” of the products you have. Simple and effective. Sell what you have on offer.
If you are a commercial grower or have a steady supply all year round, you can complete your business listing reflecting that.
How to start?
A few steps get you started, subscribe to the Trade Shack, and after that, you can set up your local grower business listing and enter your adverts/classifieds. We do the rest. We make sure you get linked to your postcode community (not restricting you to that community) and advertise your listing on social media.
Introduce yourself
After you sign up, you get access to your dashboard. Using the Dashboard, you can set up your details as a local grower.
It is like every other typical online business (local grower) directory, people can search for your name, what you grow and where you are.
It answers the question “Who are the local growers in my area?“,
Grow food
As part of your, local grower listing you can say what you grow, like animals, vegetables etc.
To keep your potential customers “in the loop” we encourage you to either post in the forum or use the Trade Shack Facebook page. We recommend the forum simply because Facebook is selling your private information.
Each Forum is targeted at a postcode area.
Advertise
Post what you have on the forum and/or in the classifieds. This allows the customers to purchase your produce/product.
You can use the classifieds to set the expected harvest date and accept orders from the public.
Exchange
You can specify if the customers should come to you, you deliver or meet at a designated spot.
For example, REKO has a set time and place where on a weekly basis, vendors and customers meet. You can arrange the same setup, we can facilitate a place and time to exchange the goods.
How does a customer order?
Anyway you want, either by phone, email or order form. Or all of the above.
Each listing you create will get its unique order form, the customer enters the details, and the Trade Shack will send you an order with the customer details. You can use it to update your inventory and contact the customer for payment and delivery preference.
How does payment work?
That is up to you. We do not sit in the middle of the payment transactions. We do not charge a commission, and we do not handle YOUR money. That is between YOU and YOUR customer. We do this so you know what you get, you decide if you want to be paid in cash, barter or just use your eftpos.
What does it cost?
Next to nothing, for $2 per month, you get a business listing, and you can list 10 different products for sale. That is all.
We do not keep track of how much you sell, and to whom you sell, all that information is yours, and for that reason, we do not save or store it.