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Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

harvestsignal.com

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Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#51

Post by styfle »

JoeDaDude wrote: post #45

Very nice! Next step: steer users to where they can get the produce. I would suggest teaming up with Community Supported Agriculture [1] where people can buy stuff right off the farm with subscription. [1] https://www.localharvest.org/csa/

I've used a CSA before and it was nice to get random assortments of fruits/vegetables that I otherwise wouldn't buy. But the convenience of just shopping online for what you want is lost.

That's why my friend started Market Wagon[0] which acts as a middle-man between farmers who have crops and people who want to buy the food. The experience is like shopping on Amazon but you're buying local.

[0]: https://marketwagon.com

Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#52

Post by nemo44x »

This is great - cool idea. I'll register as this is something I really care about and this saves me research and time. It also helps me consider which meals I'd like to make.

I'd be willing to pay a small monthly fee for this data being curated for me when you get the database a bit more fleshed out.

Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#53

Post by roshanr »

swalsh wrote: post #41

Very cool. Not sure if your motivation is to "promote local eating" or if you're trying to build a cool product that would bring in some cash... but if you're looking to monetize, I'd pay a small amount (about the cost of a magazine) for a HIGH-QUALITY set of recipe suggestions that use 6 ingredients or less, and take ~1hr to cook. (because I cook for a family every day, I don't have all day to cook, and I don't want…

This site has recipes like that. Most of them have 5 or less ingredients and take less than 30 minutes http://thestonesoup.com/blog/start-here/

Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#54

Post by flanbiscuit »

JoeDaDude wrote: post #45

Very nice! Next step: steer users to where they can get the produce. I would suggest teaming up with Community Supported Agriculture [1] where people can buy stuff right off the farm with subscription. [1] https://www.localharvest.org/csa/

> Next step: steer users to where they can get the produce.

This is very location specific to NYC but I've always used this site to get local farmer's market info: http://www.whatisfresh.com/

Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#57

Post by codingdave »

gabemart wrote: post #19
codingdave wrote: post #3

No, not quite accurate -- the only results it returned are apples and cherries. Apples are 100% correct. Cherries are not. And there are a plethora of squashes and pumpkins recently harvested, as we just had our first frost last week, so the list is clearly incomplete.

The database is definitely incomplete - I have a ton of work left to do. There is also the problem that just because a certain produce item is being harvested within x miles doesn't necessarily mean that produce is available at local stores, and vice-versa. My hope is that if I can get some early adopters, I'll be able to concentrate improving the data in a smaller number of targeted areas. This is the first time I'v…

Ah, see, I wasn't thinking this was about local stores. Because frankly, stores ship food in from wherever it is in season, so I don't need this info... I just look in the store and see what looks good. The better use case, for me at least, is to know when it is worth going to my local farms/markets and not even bothering with the store.

Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#59

Post by zodPod »

dbingham wrote: post #4

Neat! But you've got some work to do to get the data in there. I put in my Southern Indiana zip code and got 12 results back. Only one was actually anywhere near my zipcode (or even in my state). The rest were anywhere from 200 - 500 miles away. Sorry, but I don't consider Maryland to be local to Indiana. I would suggest you work on getting data about local farms in there, and then tighten up the constraints for what…

I think part of the problem you're finding is just that nothing is in season in your zip code, maybe? I don't really know Southern Indiana but I wasn't surprised that there were no real local results around me here in SW PA.

Re: Show HN: Fruits and vegetables in season in your zip code

#60

Post by mikeash »

The results are kind of confusing. If I put in zip code 22003 (not mine, but close, and the results are the same) it tells me "1 Result from Georgia" which is bell peppers from a place 611 miles away, then "10 Results from other states" including one place 14 miles away, and another 36 miles away.

The wording seems to imply that it thinks 22003 is in Georgia and the top result is the best, but it's in Virginia and the top result is the most distant one.

I'd also suggest making the on-page results a bit more prominent. My first reaction after typing a zip code was that I was required to give an e-mail address to view the results, and nearly gave up and left the page before realizing they were also displayed at the bottom. (The fact that only the "1 Result from Georgia" was above the fold didn't help, since it looked unrelated.)

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