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NetSquared is an initiative ofTechSoup
NetSquared enables social benefit organizations to leverage the tools of the social web.
Grow Link
Challenges Entered:
Grow Link is a social marketplace to host wholesale-direct trades between regional farmers and food buyers. It will enable traceable product aggregation and distribution, through both existing distributors and contracted logistics providers.
Grow Link (working title) builds off eight years of Farmer-Chef Connection Conferences and product sourcebooks hosted and produced by Ecotrust and the Portland Chapter of the Chef’s Collaborative in Portland, Oregon. With Portland’s farmers markets booming and virtually every restaurant paying closer attention to product sourcing, Ecotrust is working on several fronts to facilitate local/regional purchasing among higher volume buyers: schools, hospitals, and so on.
Grow Link is a web-based platform to host wholesale-direct trades between regional farmers and food buyers. We think of it as a social networking engine overlaid on an e-commerce platform, overlaid on a logistics network. It will enable traceable product aggregation and distribution, through both existing distributors and contracted logistics providers.
Ecotrust has secured commitments with some of the most progressive retail and institutional buyers in the region to help design and test Grow Link. A key value proposition for these buyers is product aggregation. In many cases, they cannot accept smaller, individual deliveries.
That aggregation will enable smaller growers to meet the minimum order requirements of wholesale distributors. For all growers, Grow Link will provide the traceability that is lacking in current wholesale distribution systems and is fundamental to product differentiation, including differentiation by food miles, organic standards and other best practices.
Ecotrust will work to introduce its network of 400 growers and buyers into the online Grow Link platform. The platform will allow current business relationships to be maintained, as well as enhanced through sophisticated order tracking and rich data collection. Social networking features will encourage new relationships to be forged online.
The Farmer-Chef Connection Conference model has successfully spread to many other rural/urban areas around the country. We are designing Grow Link to be similarly scaleable. Key partners on the project include Washington-based 21 Acres and the Web Collective.
WHAT WE NEED:
The project is seeking approximately $250,000 over the coming 12 month period. We would also appreciate expertise and insights into how to build and maintain an online community that supports real world community, as well as how to value the services we provide.
Location
Portland, OR
United States
See map: Google Maps
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an important initiative
web technology offers deep value at facilitating the decentralized coordination of economic activity. this is an invaluable initial example. one of the key features is that rather than transferring living relationships into virtual ones, the project supports and expanding networks of face-to-face communities with the aid of the web as coordinator. i look forward to participating in this and related movements towards a more holistically facilitated economy!