Even a business that dates to Adam and Eve can be profitably reinvented.
Hudson Valley Fiber Farm is raising and shearing goats and sheep as a fiber farm while using computers to create a sort of cyber farm, where the Internet attracts customers who purchase shares in the farm for yarn and participate in farm life, such as the birth of animals, through a 24 hour Web cam and a daily blog posted by the farmer.
Combining savvy marketing and a quality product with hard work results in old-fashioned livestock farming with the new innovation of community supported agriculture (CSA), all enhanced by creating what is in effect a roadside farm stand on the Internet superhighway (www.fiberfarm.com).
The success of the idea has been swift and far reaching. Customers as distant as Hong Kong, Germany and Ireland are receiving fine wool and mohair from Hudson Valley Fiber Farm, turning a one-time hobby into a profitable business.
“It really took off beyond my wildest expectations,” said Susan Gibbs, a former CBS News producer who tired of city life and made a conscious decision to take up country living after a decade of television journalism in New York and Los Angeles.
The Hudson Valley Fiber Farm is in Hopewell Junction and affiliated with Martha”™s Vineyard Fiber Farm, which Gibbs co-founded with her partner Patrick Manning, a former state assemblyman.
Her original goal when she began seeking a business model for the fiber farm was modest “I needed to find some way for them (the animals) to pay for their own feed if not be profitable,” Gibbs said.
CSA is a growing trend where a farmer sells shares of the upcoming harvest to customers in advance, providing farmers with revenue and spreading the risks of farming. Gibbs took the idea to a new realm of agriculture and thinks that the Hudson Valley Fiber Farm is the first fiber CSA anywhere.
“We had just joined our local (vegetable) CSA, purchased a share for the following season, and I woke up and this idea was just sort of top of mind,” Gibbs said. “I wasn”™t planning on it being profitable, but sheep and goats eat a tremendous amount of hay and initially I just wanted to cover our costs for the winter. I obviously hoped we could make it profitable but I had no idea it would work so quickly.”
Using an online merchant called Etsy.com, the farm sells shares in advance of the spring and autumn fleece harvests. Gibbs said she started marketing shares in the fall 2007 hoping to sell 10 shares before winter to help pay for hay. She sold 100 before Christmas.
Etsy.com is an e-commerce Web site for handmade goods with 2.1 million users and gross sales of $87.5 million in 2008. Gibbs said it does not charge large upfront costs, but takes a 3.5 percent stake of sales. And Etsy.com works with PayPal.com to simplify transactions, an added attraction both for Gibbs and customers. “The beauty is there”™s no overhead costs. It”™s very low cost entry to the market,” she said.
While some shareholders literally live around the globe or across the country, “a high concentration live in Boston and New York,” Gibbs said, “And I think part of the reason this model works is people think they will come visit the farm when they buy a share And that is part of what we offer. We say this is your farm; we just run it for you.”
She said maybe 10 percent of shareholders actually come visit. “But everyone thinks they will come.” She pointed out that on the spring shearing day, May 9, shareholders arrived from as far away as Texas and Colorado to share the experience at the farm.
The buyers pay $150 per share and that’s usually enough yarn to knit a sweater, Gibbs said. The product is high-quality yarn and fleece from goats and sheep that are treated humanely and even lovingly by their shepherds. “I”˜ve had these animals since they were babies and they are very precious to me.”
Gibbs has broadened the appeal by posting pictures and having shareholders help name the animals and by writing an almost daily blog of events on the farm that keep shareholders in touch with the flock.
There is also the Lamb Cam, a 24-hour Web cam showing the animals.
“Its amazingly popular; we get about 10,000 hits a day and people are staying on it a really long time,” Gibb said, saying the average duration of hits is 13 minutes. “That”™s a really long time to be on a Web site. People sort of follow the animals and specific animals have lots of fans.”
Gibbs has a trusted sheep shearer to do the twice-annual harvest but said she and a full-time farm manager perform the rest of the farm chores. That includes vaccinating, trimming the hooves, feeding and caring for 95 animals. “When I started this I had two full-time jobs. This is my full time job now and we made a profit our first year.”
She said she had little animal expertise when she started, but that other farmers shared their expertise generously.
The hard work of birthing goats ”“ kidding ”“ was noticed by her online partners. Gibbs said that nearby shareholders began delivering meals to the farm. “We had one couple literally drive from New Jersey with a lasagna,” she said.
Considerable work and thought went into starting the business. Gibbs said she would work her then two jobs and come home and add another two or four hours of Web research and marketing. Once she had her business model, she was a tireless promoter, dispensing business cards, logos and telling everyone she met about her new business.
“When we started having some success, we got an absurd amount of e-mails from people who wanted to know how to do this,” she said, estimating the traffic is now about 100 weekly. She is creating a farm consulting business to help others get started.
