In the space between 4/20 Legalize Weed demos and Wednesday’s Earth Day, the Washington Post hopefully explains “How shipping containers are making fresh local produce a reality during bitter winters“:
An ambitious attempt to change the way we eat is playing out in a shipping container plopped in a parking lot in Minneapolis.
Ryan Sweeney, who owns the container, isn’t your typical farmer. He relies on LED lights, not sunlight. He monitors his crops on his smartphone. He doesn’t used pesticides or soil. But he’s growing basil year round with a healthy profit margin.
Sweeney had no farming experience when a Kickstarter video about hydroponic farming inside a refrigerated shipping container caught his eye in 2012. Sweeney engrossed himself in research on hydroponic farming, and then took the plunge. There were early hiccups. He had to redesign the irrigation system on his Freight Farm, which arrived that spring.
Initially he sold basil in bulk to wholesalers for $8 a pound. Now he sells for $40 a pound straight to co-op groceries. He says he has a 50 percent profit margin before interest, amortization and taxes…
Brad McNamara and Jon Friedman co-founded Freight Farms with hopes of letting anyone become an urban farmer. The idea is to produce fresh local produce year round. They looked into rooftop farming and greenhouses before concluding that refurbishing refrigerated shipping containers was better.
While traditional farmers plant one or two plants per square foot, a Freight Farm can allow for 240 plants per square foot. Growing in a shipping container, where the light and water can be controlled exactly, allows farmers to deliver a consistent product no matter the season or city.
This spring they’re releasing their third-generation product, the Leafy Green Machine. Its starting price is $76,000 and costs an estimated $13,000 a year to operate before labor and insurance. There’s actually a stereo system built into the shipping container…
While Freight Farm’s economic viability may still be an open question, my inner sci-fi kid finds the concept thrilling. (Nope, I did not see Silent Running back in the day… )
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Apart from dreams of greenery, what’s on the agenda for the day?
satby
Wow. I wish I could get one now.
danielx
Soon to appear: horror stories about how owner/operators of these things are being “closely investigated and monitored” by DEA and local authorities like pretty much everyone else who starts hydroponic operations, for fear they might be growing the demon weed.
OzarkHillbilly
Being out in the sun, where all growing things should be.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
The sun is so 20th century.
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: True, except for the 8 months of the year when the sun comes out and shines on the tundra around my house.
OzarkHillbilly
@OzarkHillbilly: Oh yeah, and “Get off my lawn!”
OzarkHillbilly
My great state of Misery makes me soooooooo proud:
Michael Brown memorial tree cut down in Ferguson park less than 24 hours after dedication
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
This proves we are a post-arborial society.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
I’m trying to decide whether or not to hire someone to do Kickstarter publicity, like these guys. After a decent first day (setting aside what my parents gave, which would distort all figures) there’s been basically nothing for the last 24 hours. Right now it doesn’t look promising at all.
I’m also trying to figure out what to say in updates. There’s a big one planned when I get the first chapter back from the editor; I’ll be putting up a link to it. Other than that, though, what is there to say? Anyone looking at the page can see how much progress I’ve made. And there’s not much to say about the progress I’m making on the book itself; “Today, I edited chapter 15.”
I really fucking hate marketing.
germy shoemangler
Today’s Onion headline:
“Man Pleased To Find Most Of His Mid-’90s Anti-Hillary Rant Still Usable”
PurpleGirl
I saw Silent Running when it played and then went on to a Luna Con. I don’t remember if I saw it opening day but it was during the initial run of the movie. I was hanging out with the NYU Science Fiction Club at the time and members of the club introduced me conventions.
Iowa Old Lady
@germy shoemangler: As Paul Simon once sang, still crazy after all these years.
germy shoemangler
@PurpleGirl: I remember seeing Silent Running when it first opened. Then a few years later, when I saw the trailer for the first Star Wars movie, I thought it was a sequel, or at least by the same filmmakers.
Here’s how long ago that was: We were sitting in the balcony smoking cigarettes.
Gindy51
Slap a solar array on this baby and that’s all you’d need.
germy shoemangler
@Iowa Old Lady: still crazy after all these years.
A commenter on a different blog said that the reason Elizabeth Warren isn’t running for pres is because she doesn’t want to end up like Vince Foster.
The commenter was serious.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: I’ve been awake since 2, up since 3, and I really feel like going back to bed. Not because I am tired, but because the stupid, it hurts.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
I’m sorry. I’ll try to do better.
germy shoemangler
@OzarkHillbilly: I decided to try some of my wife’s zee-quill a few nights ago out of curiosity. It knocked me out for about three hours, but then I did the usual 2am awakening. But I kept nodding off after that to some vivid dreams.
Tried it again last night and it did nothing.
OzarkHillbilly
@germy shoemangler: Maybe she just doesn’t want to end up like Obama. The most vilified man in America.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
Was it the Parma cops? They’ve got a lot of time on their hands.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
I’m sitting at McDonalds, caffeinating myself and using their WiFi, and I’m surrounded by a bunch of idiots wearing Tea Party Patriot paraphernalia and loudly discussing how we should get rid of the Muslims in America, including Barack Obama. Thank god I have really good Bose noise cancelling headphones.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: I know you know, but I feel the need to know you know I know you know: You do know I ain’t talking about you, don’t you?
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
I know.
Mustang Bobby
I’m back at work after a weekend in Sam Brownback’s Utopia where the schools are broke and store clerks say “Have a blessed day,” to which I mumble “And you have a hell of a day…”
@danielx: My brother started a very successful software company back in the early ’80’s funded by his sales of said weed grown in such a manner.
germy shoemangler
Someday future generations can say “My brother started a very successful weed company back in the early ’20’s funded by his sales of software.”
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: It’s nice to know, you know?
danielx
@Mustang Bobby:
Everybody has to get their (ahem) seed capital from somewhere.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
I know.
WereBear
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Are you on social media?
I know, hate it — thousand suns — etc but without it, you are a mere blip on a very large radar screen.
To get your project to assume the shape of a plane, you need to develop a network. But it’s online, so it shouldn’t hurt all that much. And see what you can do to draw in hockey fans, especially young ones like the protagonist?
ThresherK
@germy shoemangler: One of the not-so-priggish things we Americans can see on TV now are ads for spirits.
Just for a chuckle, imagine the TV (sic) commercials of the future for the debbil weed where the brands boast of their olde tyme tradition, beginnings and history. Think of Bacardi or Jack Daniels sports today.
WereBear
@germy shoemangler: Ya’ll should try some niacin (straight stuff, dirt cheap, no time-release or nothing) because it’s amazing.
I’ve got five people sleeping better on it already.
PurpleGirl
@WereBear: When should you take the niacin? Before bed time or any time during the day?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@WereBear: I’m on Facebook so all of my friends (~150) have seen me post about it plenty of times. I set up a Facebook page for the project but I don’t really know what to do with it. I did try the Boost Post thing for the post announcing the launch of the Kickstarter. That cost me $20 and I consider it to have been a complete flop; I got about ten page likes and no pledges from it.
I’m not really sure how to find other groups that might be interested and I really don’t like the idea of barging in somewhere and hitting them with a marketing spiel as the very first thing I do there. I sent an email to a couple of people who are also on the U.S. College Hockey Online message board for women’s hockey as to whether or not it would be appropriate to post it there.
That’s on of my biggest issues: it’s not just that I don’t know how to market, but also that I’m terribly afraid of crossing lines I don’t understand if I do so. It’s just an expression of my biggest irrational fear of imposing on people. It’s one of the reasons I’m thinking about hiring someone to do some marketing for me, because they don’t have that fear.
Gene108
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
When I click on the Kickstarter link on your blog it takes me to the Kickstarter main page and I am not sure where your project is listed.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@Gene108: Thanks for letting me know. I had the link going to one of the reports I can see about it and since you aren’t me, you just got kicked to the main Kickstarter page. It’s fixed now. The address for Becoming Phoebe is here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1282165987/becoming-phoebe
OzarkHillbilly
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Humility is not profitable. One of the strangest things I ever learned when I worked for myself was that the more I charged for a job I really didn’t want (up to a point) the more likely I was to get it. If I thought I was worth $100 per hr, the more likely others were to feel the same. It’s human nature.
That’s why hucksters make so much money off of a gullible public. People want to believe. They just fill in the blank.
Mike E
@OzarkHillbilly: A coworker was tired of house/babysitting for a particular client, told her she was changing her availability for this year (she was focusing on herself, she said) then, finally, bumped up her rate by 50%…no luck. She still ‘sits for the family, if more so now. Heh.
Bobby B.
@OzarkHillbilly: Martin Balsam’s medicine man made a great speech to that effect in “Little Big Man”.
OzarkHillbilly
@Bobby B.: It is a trueism as old as religion.
satby
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Ok, tweeted, shared on FB, and will kick in a bit when I deposit my paycheck later today.
When fundraising for the spay neuter group I hired crowdsourcing marketers and it didn’t help us at all. YMMV.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@satby: Thanks, both for the pledge and the advice.
WereBear
@PurpleGirl: Any time. WIth a B complex and some C for best results.
I’m loving it!
WereBear
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Oh, I hate marketing too, but it’s like politics… we haven’t come up with an alternative yet.
However, you do need a way for fans to find you. And you do want a fan base! So it’s a bit lucky you don’t have to do it in person.
Personally, I don’t like Facebook and am fortunate that Mr WereBear handles that for me. I like Twitter, though, and happily do my own. Do you have a blog/website? Telling your story of the book — how it came to be, personal stories, etc — on a blog will give you something to put on your Facebook and Twitter.
And you can do it from a coffee shop.
J R in WV
Regarding sleep, Mrs J’s Drs. have recommended a “vitamin” called melatonin, which you take a couple of hours before you want to go to bed and fall asleep. It seems to help some. I’ve also heard about the B vitamin helping, so we take a b complex with the melatonin.
J R in WV
More regarding sleep:
I learned that historically many people way back in the day commonly split their sleep into two sessions, with an active awake period between them. So now when I wake up and don’t fall back to sleep within 10 or 15 minutes, I get up for a little while, read some, have a glass of milk, which also helps me sleep, and go back to bed after an hour or so.
Our internet link, which is a sat dish, doesn’t count traffic nbetween 10 midnight and 6 am against our quota. So often I check for OS updates or install or download stuff while I’m up in the wee hours. As well as check to see if there’s others with the same awake issue on B-J at 3 am.
You know who you are! Hi guys!
Off to P-T now, and then seeing the tax accountants. Whee.
Cervantes
@OzarkHillbilly:
David Brooks disagrees.
Robert Sneddon
The other big feature of this sort of tinned agricultural operation is that pests and weeds can be excluded meaning no need for pesticides or herbicides. If weed seeds or pests do get in (usually on the operator’s clothing or when the doors are opened) the entire growing system can be steam-cleaned and returned to sterile conditions.
This means less cost for consumables and also the ability to sell into the boutique organic end of the market at a serious price hike for your produce.