Fascinating. I'm wondering if there's an opportunity for a tech startup to replicate this network more generally. I could see the network connecting the sellers with the farmers directly, plus coordinating delivery of the veggies... it's an easier problem than ubereats delivery as you've got fewer nodes. Maybe you even skip the sellers entirely, which basically gets you to CSA boxes but those always felt expensive to…
The problem is that like anything in corporate American business models, scaling up doesn't always scale. As groceries have consolidated, you need to focus everything on industrial agriculture to deliver a consistent product.
So as a society, we do stupid things like growing lettuce in the desert and flying it across a continent while fertile land down the road goes fallow. But when you have 5,000 wal-marts to stock, it makes more sense to focus on a few big suppliers than a bunch of little ones. I purchased lettuce in February grown in upstate NY in the middle of winter -- for 50% less than stuff in the market.
It's one of the massive inefficiencies that drives me nuts about the current American mutation of capitalism.