Category: Stories

Dear Harvie Community,

I want to share some frustrating news. A $1 million USDA grant we were awarded for local food infrastructure—funding for cold storage, trucks, and equipment—has been stuck in limbo for months with no end in sight.

This “middle of the supply chain” infrastructure is costly, and without it, independent food can’t compete with the massive legacy food system.

And we’re not alone. Across the country, nonprofits, small businesses, and local food organizations are seeing vital funding disappear as government budgets shift. Over $1 billion in local food funding was canceled just this week. It’s a major blow to farms, food infrastructure, and efforts to feed our communities.

For Harvie, we were counting on these funds to expand our infrastructure and serve more farms and producers. Now, we have to find a different path. We hope the funding will eventually be unlocked, but for now, we have to move forward without it.

The good news? People are waking up. There’s an independent food awakening happening, and more folks are shifting their food dollars in ways that matter. Harvie is growing fast because of this. Your support—your orders and commitment to real food—keeps us going.

As we grow, we can slowly invest in the infrastructure we need over time. Last year, we put almost $10 million into Pennsylvania’s independent food economy. This year, we expect to put at least $20 million in. We can do more. With your support, we will.

When you choose Harvie, you’re putting real money back into farmers’ hands. In the legacy food system, only $0.14 of every dollar spent on food goes back to the farmer. With Harvie, about $0.50 of every dollar goes directly to our producers.

Here’s how you can help:

• If you’re already a Harvie member: Consider adding a second delivery or shifting more of your grocery spending from big food to Harvie.
• If you’re not a member yet: Join Harvie today. More deliveries of independent food help us invest in cold storage, trucks, and equipment.
• Tell your friends and family about Harvie: word of mouth is our best way to grow, and we’ll give both you and your friend $40 credit.
• Buy from independent farmers and food producers: visit a farmers market or buy a CSA share.
• Support other organizations in need: for example, the Pennsylvania Association of Sustainable Agriculture is furloughing employees amid a funding freeze.

While we have the support of this community, we won’t stop fighting for food that serves our bodies, our land, and our local economies.

Thank you for being part of the independent food economy.

-Simon Huntley
CEO & Founder, eatharvie.com

Mighty Small Seedling Planting Info 2025 (1)

Food is not just fuel. Food is how we connect with each other, how we build community, and how we shape our world. This truth was at the heart of Whole Foods Market when it started as a small natural foods store in Austin, Texas in 1980. Back then, it wasn’t about quarterly earnings or shareholder value – it was about bringing good food to people who cared about their health, taste, and where their food came from.

I’ve spent the last 20 years trying to answer one simple question: why don’t local farms feed local people? Whole Foods once seemed like it might be part of the answer. They built their brand on connecting consumers with local producers, telling the stories of farmers and artisans, and making organic, sustainable food accessible to more people.

When Whole Foods went public in 1992, something fundamentally changed. The pressure to deliver consistent growth and profits began pushing against their founding mission. Store by store, year by year, the original vision of a community-focused natural foods market transformed into something else entirely – a high-end grocery chain more focused on premium margins than producer relationships.

The 2017 acquisition by Amazon wasn’t the beginning of this shift, but it was the final chapter. Now Whole Foods is just another arm of one of the largest corporations in the world.

But here’s the thing: we don’t really want a local and independent food economy built around one giant corporation anyway. People who care about local food aren’t looking for another centralized system with a different logo. What they want is an independent food economy based on direct connections between the people who grow/produce the food and the people that eat it. They want to support small and medium-sized independent businesses. They don’t want a few large corporations controlling what they eat.

We can build a new independent food economy driven by direct connections between farms/food producers and the people that eat the food. This isn’t too much to ask for.

Every meal is a choice of how we want to live, eat, and work together. While Whole Foods may have lost its way, the spark that inspired it – the desire for real food grown by real people – is still very much alive. It lives in farmers’ markets, food co-ops, CSAs, and innovative new models that prioritize direct connections between producers and consumers.

Together, we can build a food economy that rebuilds the connections between rural and urban communities. One that supports farms like the one I grew up on, so a farm kid like me sees a future on the farm. One where we know who grows our food, and they know who they’re feeding.

We don’t need another Whole Foods. We need thousands of independent food businesses, each one deeply rooted in its community, each one helping to weave together the fabric of a more resilient, more connected food system.

This isn’t just about food – it’s about the kind of society we want to build. One meal at a time, one connection at a time, we can create something better than what we’ve lost. Yes, we’ve lost Whole Foods from the independent food economy, but it was never really about Whole Foods anyway. It’s about something much bigger – our deep desire to eat good food and produce good food in our country, to create meaningful connections with each other through the food we share. That’s what we’re building toward, and that’s what can’t be bought or sold.

Dear Harvie Community,

Eating healthy, building connections with people you love, cooking at home…

We’re told it’s too hard. It’s too time consuming. You’ll mess it up.

Just order from GrubHub, eat a premade meal, go out to dinner… they say.

That’s a lie to get you to spend more money that disconnects you from your food and the people in your life.

It’s not hard to cook at home for the people who matter to you. It’s worth it.

And to make it easy we’ve put together three new meal kits for next week to make your connecting with people in your life over food easy…

• Lemon garlic Chicken Orzo – $25.99: with Locust Point Chicken and Turner’s milk (feeds 2)
• Turkey sandwich with Cranberry Compote & Herbed Ailoi – $24.99: with Mediterra bread and Route 11 chips on the side (feeds 2)
• Black Bean Quinoa Bowl – $22.99: with ingredients from Frankferd Farms, Delallo, and Stalbush Farms (feeds 2)

We are all looking for more connection in our lives and more special moments with the people we love.

Gathering around a table and eating good food is the easiest way to build strong, meaningful connections.

At it’s core, this is what Harvie is about.

We don’t have to change our whole lives to do this. Life is busy and complex — I get that as a father of two young boys.

Let’s start with one meal per week.

And this first meal is on me.

Join Harvie at $99/year with coupon code ONEMEAL by Sunday Dec 16th and get a free meal kit on me.

You’ll get top quality ingredients with everything you need for your meal from independent farmers in fully returnable and/or compostable packaging — no waste!

Once you sign up, email me back and we’ll make arrangements to get your first meal kit delivered to you!

Change starts with a single step,

-Simon Huntley
Founder, eatharvie.com