SF photo fb Bruce Manns in the field gh

Bruce Manns says, “It’s not a bad thing to be a business person in the inner city.” Doesn’t sound like your typical urban farmer do-gooder, and Bruce isn’t. Sure, his York Fresh Food Farms shares the same mission as other non-profit farms, but he’s following a different playbook. He knows grant funding is fickle, and inner cities need commerce as much as charity. So he’s building up a mobile market business and mentoring an inner city entrepreneur who’s passionate about bringing the good food movement to the ‘hood. He’s also going out of bounds by re-selling tropical fruits because guess what? Non-local can be healthy too. The big reveal in Bruce’s story is that he’s aiming to cover 100% of his farm’s operating expenses with his sales next year.  As he says, “That’s remarkable for a non-profit urban farm!” And a best practice we encourage more to adopt.

Learn from the best minds in backyard farming, like Bruce Manns, whose best practices including not only composting and cover cropping, but also making money, by purchasing our learning programs on turning small plots into cash. If you’re not ready to go all-in just yet, get a taste of what starting a backyard-scale farming business is like from our members with a month-to-month membership here.

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