AKA “A Partial Recap of Family Farmed Expo’s First Day”

The events opened with a morning keynote speech from Gary Hirshberg of Stonyfield Farms. He talked about how he got his start in organic dairy farming, specifically in yogurt, and where the money came from and where he is today. It was certainly an amusing speech, and I think the dairy farmer behind me got a lot out of it.

Basically, the seed money for Stonyfield came from all sorts of people that Hirshberg repeatedly asked for money. He spoke of calling his mother-in-law fairly regularly to help him out with payroll. He spoke of begging from anyone he could think of and how “anyone in a tie” was fair game to ask for a loan.… Continue reading →