S1 E5: Green Dirt Farm Talks Scaling to Achieve Economic Sustainability

Maven Minds: Trailblazers of Modern Business

Sarah Hoffman is blazing a new trail in agri-business with her grass-fed, sheep dairy farm. With a strong team of women to support her endeavors, she’s gone from a sheep farmer to cheese maker to restaurateur. Throughout the years, Green Dirt Farm has garnered accolades as one of Food and Wine’s best artisan cheese makers and has won several awards from the American Cheese Society.

While staying true to the handcraft tradition of cheese making, Sarah talks about how they’ve evolved their process to make the most out of the low volume of raw materials that sheep provide.

“We are constantly looking for ways that continue to celebrate and use the old methods, but also improve on those and create more efficiencies in the process.” – Sarah Hoffman, Green Dirt Farm

In this episode, Sarah Hoffman discusses:

• The challenges of offering a unique product that’s not well known to consumers
  
  
• Creating efficiencies and techniques that celebrate an old-school craft while still accommodating scale
  
  
• Utilizing a team to increase opportunities to expand their product

Thought starters: How can I apply this thinking to my business?

• Are you making your product available in a cost-effective manner?
  Are there other ways of getting your product into the hands of people that could be more cost-effective? Can you find distributors to hold your product? Can you get other people to talk about it and get it into the hands of customers? Can you partner with a shop? Can it end up on a menu? What are some other creative ideas you have?
  
• What are you doing to educate your customers?
  Do they need it? Do they need to know more about your product or the process, or the benefits? Is it understandable out of the gate? Do they know what your product is or how it works? What questions can you answer for your customers? Are they confused in a spot that you didn’t quite realize? How can you help them along? How can you help them complete that purchase journey?
  
• Where are the responsibilities on your team?
  Where is the structure? How are you creating operational efficiencies across those? Do you have owners, champions, and people leading? Do you have the support you need to get everyday tasks done?

Key themes

• Operational efficiency
• Scalability
• Consumer education
• Brick and mortar expansion
• Niche product

For extended show notes, resources, and ways to connect, learn more at: mavenminds.com/season-1-trailblazers

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Podcast Editor and Strategist: @episodeready