What is CSA?
CSA Stands for Community Supported Agriculture. It is an alternative to the conventional food system, designed to support local farms and farmers, and connect communities to their food. When you become a member of our CSA, you pay for a share of our farm’s harvest ahead of the growing season, agreeing to share in the abundant rewards and inherent risks of sustainable farming. This provides us with the funds to buy the seeds and supplies that we need to grow your veggies and allows us to focus on growing high quality produce while enhancing the land that we are farming, instead of marketing.
Why CSA?
You get a share of the harvest each week, taking home a variety of super fresh, often picked that day, organically grown produce that has been selected by us for flavor and nutrition. Your membership supports a community based, environmentally regenerative food-system, free of long distance trucking, packaging, and chemical inputs. You are invited to come enjoy nature on the farm. Take a walk, enjoy our pick-your-own crops, take a moment to enjoy the birds, bugs, sites and smells. We will see you each week at pick-up and look forward to getting to know you and give you weekly farm updates!
By becoming a member of our CSA, you truly become a part of this farm. We look forward to growing with you and are excited for 2019!
How Does It work?
Free Choice CSA
We offer a Free Choice CSA model, in which members choose what they take home each week using a simple point system. Each member has 10 points per week to use. Harvest items will be assigned an amount of points based on availability, and you get to choose which items you want to make up your 10 points. A point may be a big bunch of kale, a few pounds of tomatoes, a bunch of radishes, or a head of Chinese cabbage. This way, you can take what you want and what you are most likely to eat. Want to make a batch of your famous pickles this week? Use your points to get more cucumbers! Tired of kale? Get extra lettuce instead! You will have 9-15 items to choose from every week, as well as access to Pick-Your Own (PYO) crops like cherry tomatoes, beans, peas, herbs, and flowers. See below for a full list of what we will be growing! Occasionally we will limit the amount of a certain item based on availability.
We will also offer a Farmer’s Choice selection each week if you don't want to decide on your own and want the option of a more traditional CSA share.
In addition to our veggie shares and PYO crops, we offer some add-ons from other local, sustainable businesses. We also plan to stock our farm store with value-added products like pickles, ferments, cheese, soap, flower bouquets, dried herbs, and salves, made by us from farm-produce, or by local purveyors.
When are Pickups?
Our CSA runs for 23 Weeks, from June 8th through November, 12th . You can chose from two pick-up days on the farm or pick up at Outdated Cafe in Kingston:
On-Farm Pickups:
475 Milan Hill Road, Red Hook, NY 12571
Tuesdays 3pm-6:30pm
Saturdays 12:30pm-4:30pm
If you cannot pick up your share during distribution, we will package the Farmer’s Choice share for you to pick up at your convenience in our cooler.
Outdated Cafe
314 Wall St., Kingston, NY 12401
Tuesdays 3pm-6pm
Members picking up at the cafe will receive the “Farmer’s Choice” share and are welcome to visit the farm for you-pick flowers and additional veggies during daylight hours M-Sat.
Delivery to your Door is available for all shares for an added fee.
How much does it cost?
All shares include Pick Your Own flowers as well as snow and snap peas, beans, and cherry tomatoes.
Our Full Share is $700 for 23 weeks, or about $30/week.
Do you eat veggies with every meal? Are you a family who often cooks at home? Do you like to entertain? Are you interested in canning, fermenting, or preserving produce to enjoy year round? If so, a Full Share is right for you! Do you cook at home and entertain, juice, or do preservation projects? Consider adding a point to your share. See more about adding points below.
Payment Options:
Pre-pay in full for $700. Paying the full amount all at once is extra helpful to us as we make purchases to start the season off.
Pay in two installments of $350, making both installments before the season begins on June, 1st.
We will offer a limited amount of work-share options for people who want to spend some time getting their hands dirty in the field and save some money on their veggies. These shares cost $575 and ten hours of pre-scheduled work on the farm over the course of the 23 weeks. You will work with a farmer on a task appropriate to your skill and comfort level. Expect to be challenged and learn something new, whether that is how to prune greenhouse tomatoes, or how to get lost in the mediative act of hand weeding.
Pay for the work share in full at $575 or in two installments of $287.50 made before June 1st.
Half Share: Don’t eat that many veggies? Only want to pick up every other week? A Half-share may be right for you, and with our points system, you can always add-on additional points if you're not sure! See more about adding points below. If you sign up for the Half Share, you can pick up a full share every other week, or a half-share every week.
This year we are trying to grow our CSA community, so if you would like a half share but might know someone who would take the other half of your share, we would love for you to help us spread the word!
Pay for your Half Share in full at $350 or in two installments of $175 made before June 1st.
Add Points:
An extra point may get you an additional bunch of greens, head of lettuce or bunch of carrots per week. $70 extra will buy you an extra point per week for the whole season, and you can add as many extra points as you like. You will also be able to add points after the season begins.
We try to keep our shares as affordable as possible. Our share price is based on the real amount we need to generate in order to cover our operating expenses and basic cost of living. Our profit is getting to do what we love in community. In signing up for a membership, you are purchasing high-quality produce, herbs, and flowers, as well as sponsoring an alternative, sustainable, and environmentally friendly food system for farmers and consumers alike.
Add-Ons:
Threshold Farm Fruit Share:
Threshold Farm, located in Philmont, NY is a biodynamic orchard that has never been sprayed with synthetic chemicals since its inception in the late 1700s! Biodynamic methods have been used since 1993. Spray materials for the orchards are all on the OMRI (organic materials) list. Compost comes from their own herd of cows.
If you sign up for their fruit share, you can expect 5 lbs of fruit/week, beginning with Shiro plums at the end of July, then peaches, apples, and pears, plus some apple cider and apple cider vinegar. This share will run through early-mid November.
The share cost for the season is $225 and can be picked up at any of our vegetable CSA distributions, on the farm or at Outdated Cafe.
Miracle Springs Cheese Share:
Miracle Springs, located in Ancram, has a small herd of goats, which they tend, graze and milk. They collaborate with Rory, the expert cheesemaker at Chaseholm Farm, to make some seriously delicious cheeses. We have tried them all and were impressed by the diversity and variety of flavors. Even if you typically shy away from goat cheeses, you will love these. Their mission is to," regenerate the land by producing uncompromisingly delicious fresh and aged cheeses. We contribute to the local economy, to community health, and to the well-being of our ecosystem."
When you sign up for a cheese share, you will receive 3 cheeses/month from June-November. Check out their website to find out more about their products. The cost is $250 for the season. Half shares are also available for $130.
Payment Options:
In our first year operating Great Song Farm, we will work on building our capacity to offer subsidized shares. If you are passionate about participating, but cost is going to be a limiting factor for you, or an extended payment plan would make our CSA feasible, please contact us.
Pay by cash, check, or card. We accept SNAP benefits. Credit card payments will incur a $10 transaction fee for full-season payments and $5 for half payments.
