How It Works

“LFM is so open to feedback. There’s always an open door for collaboration, and I can’t tell you how much we feel supported from LFM.” –Emily Mayberry, Sales Manager at WMGC

“We love that Subscription Builder gave our customers even more options. And it gave us a new way to do CSA. Before Subscription Builder we never had the customizable share option, so it was new for us, it was new for customers. I think it gave people a new idea of how CSAs can be run.” – William Jennings, Dreaming Out Loud

“The reason that we are so committed to LFM is that the farm-level reporting is way beyond anything that’s out there. And that’s for a hub that’s critical. Not only can we see reports, but so can the farmers. Producers can log in and see current sales, past sales, comparison to last year, etc. I can run reports at the producer level for pretty much anything. Right now we’re analyzing pricing for our boneless skinless chicken breasts across four different farms. Sales this year, last year, and all the prices. All that data is clicks away. For me to be able to compare multiple farms and what they sold last year and this year and look at their pricing–that is critical for for me. If you’re going to actively manage the hub, that’s critical.” -David Nowacoski, Delivered Fresh

“We’re all about personal connection, and connecting over food. And LFM felt like one of us! LFM isn’t this huge corporation where I’m calling this 1-800 number…I just call Amy! I can just email and ask questions and …we just love working with you guys.” -Lindsay, WFM2Go

“It’s a really great feature to have a payment plan that I don’t have to manage. I really enjoyed last year just logging in to LFM once a month and processing all the cash. It makes cash flow steadier for me, and payments more accessible to the customer. Being able to stagger the payment plans for each share is great—and I spend so much less time invoicing.” -Brittany Overshiner, Upswing Farm

“In the past I’ve worked with software companies that were difficult to communicate with and made the process extremely frustrating. So I’ve been really impressed with how responsible and helpful the folks at LFM have been (and so patient with me as I’m learning!). It really has made a big difference for me as I’m learning the ropes.” -Caitlin Lawrence, Wolfville Farmers Market

“Sales are higher than ever before. I’m using the MailChimp integration to help keep my customer list segmented and target each group differently every week”.
-Rebecca Williams, Market-to-Go at Grow Oak Ridge

“[The LFM Team’s] hand holding was super important. It’s why we’ve been so transparent and willing to help others, as it’s something we didn’t have.”
-Robbi Mixon, Alaska Food Hub

“We started using LFM in 2019, and it’s the only way we could’ve successfully pivoted our business [in 2020]. Without LFM we could not have managed shifting gears from wholesale to delivering CSA boxes as fast as we did. In March our orders shut down, and by April we were already selling and delivering 250 CSA boxes a week.”
-Teresa Kelly, Kansas City Food Hub

“LFM really seemed to fit what we needed to do, and was an excellent decision looking back.”
-Shannon Carroll, High Country Food Hub

“LFM is utilizing a lot of fantastic tools. You make it really easy for your customers to navigate through a what could be a really crazy thing. And you offer fantastic support – I never felt like I was alone with this. If I had issues or questions, LFM were there. You responded so quickly.”
-Sara Johnson, Downtown Marquette Farmers Market 

“[Our vendors find LFM] really responsive. They like being able to go in and check how their sales are, adding more product if that have it, adjusting things. They like the detailed pick lists that come out on Thursday and they’re doing a super job at bring us well-labeled [using LFM labeling systems] and well-organized product. It’s also really easy for our volunteers to pick them out and add them to the customers’ orders as they arrive.”
-Rachel Beyer, Bloomington Community Farmers Market 

“We were looking for an aggregation hub. We were looking for something that was already a success, that worked. We wanted robustness, we wanted a sound platform. We didn’t just need an online store, we needed more.”
-Farmers Market Manager

“It feels good when you have smart people like LFM in your corner. You guys will take a call from me on a Sunday night. It’s not just the ability to customize, it’s that level of care. I know if I’m gonna hop on the phone with Amy, she knows and understands our needs. She’s smart, she’s gonna make suggestions, and she’s always able to help me in a really genuine way. LFM helps us make the software do what we need it to do. ”
-Oliver Gubenko, Harvest Drop 

“I do want to say that our market would not have been able to open without LFM this spring. The online platform has made a huge difference for a lot of small businesses in our community that rely on our farmers market as an essential part of their income. Our market staff, vendors, and the broader community want all of you to know how grateful we are. You guys are a great team!”
-Rachel Beyer, Bloomington Community Farmers Market 

“I often think about how much our workload would increase without LFM. I know some of the folks here in Nova Scotia that are using LFM and we’re all so grateful. I know some markets that are trying to sell online Google sheets or spreadsheets and I’m like…holy moly, I can’t….like, kudos to you for making that work but I can’t imagine it. I can’t imagine orders coming through on an excel sheet, tallying them up, charging customers, figuring out how much they owe and making sure the vendors know what they need to bring in…it’s all too much. With LFM, all of those pieces happen automatically – I don’t even have to worry about it..”
-Lindsay, Market Manager at WFM2Go 

“We loved how much of [Local Food Marketplace] was automated; the pick list, producer payouts, and all the reporting that’s built in – it’s really nice. And the producers can log in and see exactly how many sales they have, they can update and adjust their inventory…all of that really comes in handy when you’re working with 120+ vendors. It makes it so much easier for our staff to do their jobs and ensure an excellent customer experience.”
-Holly, Executive Director 

“We reached out to LFM, and in two weeks, LFM created a way for us to create our routes, download our orders into a program (it’s Routific ) and then it uploads back into LFM and prints out the invoices in the right order and groups them by route.  It’s pretty cool [to get this feature] when it didn’t even exist two weeks ago! Working with a company like LFM – a company that’s willing to respond like that – I mean, that’s a lot easier than calling up somebody that just really wants you to buy some package and do it their way.”
-Andre Cantelmo, Three River Farmers Alliance

“Transitioning to the Local Food Marketplace platform has been a game-changer for Corbin Hill’s Farm Share program. It has allowed us to implement a sliding scale payment model to support lower-income Shareholders and has improved Shareholder retention. Additionally, the built-in reporting functions have made it easier to keep track of year to year data. The LFM team has been exceptional in hearing our concerns about previous iterations of the software and has implemented updates as a result of our feedback. They took a strong interest in understanding our challenges and developed solutions that work. I highly recommend LFM to anyone operating a flexible subscription-based program!”
-Erica Christensen Raml, Corbin Hill Food Project

“We went from working with 25 restaurant customers to over 100 since implementing the software over a year ago. We were able to scale to do 4x as many customers as what we had thought. I wouldn’t have had time to do the marketing side without the 18 hours we save each week with LFM.”
-Jeff Bednar, Profound Foods

“Local Food Marketplace helped us create a beautiful storefront for our online market. Their staff has gone above and beyond to help us with all the unexpected issues that come with a start-up Hub in it’s pilot year. We are extremely grateful to Amy and her team for their support.”
-Cat Wilson, Catskills Food Hub

“LFM keeps this Food Hub spinning! We are able to accept orders 24/7, which is big for a small distributor. The customer interface is familiar for online shoppers, and the backend is easy for novice sellers to manage their products and availability. We’re thrilled to be able to bring fresh local produce to customers twice a week.”
-Cat Olson, Puget Sound Food Hub

“What I love is the integration between the orders coming in and populating invoices, and then with a click of a button generating my harvest list, my pack list, and my labels. That’s what saves me hours every week.”
-Caroline Pam, Kitchen Garden Farm

“I used to spend hours each week before harvest days inputting orders into spreadsheets and then another hour or two frantically invoicing before deliveries. With Local Food Marketplace I don’t have to do any of that. I’m no longer worried about overselling an item, missing someone’s order or making mistakes on invoices. The LFM system has allowed us to focus on other aspects of our business and saved us from doing work that always felt stressful. Having pictures attached to items also seems to help with sales, our customers really like it”
-Farmer

“Our time is so valuable, and it can only be spread so thin. For me, to free up maybe 15 hours a week that I used to spend handling order stuff, that is really important. I can now put those 15 hours somewhere else. Investing in LFM is totally worth it! Even if we were doing half the amount of wholesale we are doing now, or even less, it would still be 100% worth investing in. I just think that the time LFM has saved is invaluable.”
-Danya Teitelbaum, Queen’s Greens

“Local Food Marketplace is so easy to use, it really lets us focus on the important stuff: our farmers, our community, and of course, the veggies. Mahalo for the  great interface!”
-The Sustʻ āina ble Molokai Ohana

“I have loved working with Local Food Marketplace. The storefront is beautiful and user friendly. I engage an array of customers with varying web capabilities, and if the customer can manage an email address they can usually navigate the platform. The customer service is some of the best out there!”
-Amrita Parry, Green Mountain Farm Direct

“Our farmers love being able to list what they have available each week. When Market day arrives, they don’t have to spend all morning selling products. They just deliver what they have already sold!  Our customers love the convenience of being able to shop from home or work at any hour.   In the past 8 years, we have more than doubled our participating producers!  Our customer base and revenue has grown considerably each year!  We couldn’t have done this without LFM!”
-Karen Goodlett, Red Hills Small Farm Alliance

“Without the dynamic capabilities of the software to adapt to our programmatic needs and grow with our organization, we would simply not be able to effectively execute our mission and plan for the future.  In 2014, we were providing 150,000 pounds of food to NY’s Capital Region and this year (2019) we are on track to provide 750,000 pounds, which would not have been possible without our utilization of LFM. Local Food Marketplace is made that much more effective thanks to their regular, thoughtful software updates, responsive customer support services and their fantastic staff who have proven to be creative problem solvers.”
-Will Coté, Capital Roots