CSA

A CSA is a two-way seasonal commitment between you and your local farmer(s). Each CSA member pays for a seasonal share of food, and in exchange receives an array of mixed seasonal produce every week; some CSAs include dairy and other prepared foods as well. It is similar to a membership or buying club – each member becomes a part of the farm’s local food community by supporting their local farmer and committing to eating locally all season long. Members in the Greensgrow CSA visit our farm in Kensington each week (or every other week) to pick up their share of the region’s bounty. We also have satellite pick up locations in the summer in Old City, West Philly, and Camden.

The acronym “CSA” traditionally stands for Community Supported Agriculture; here at Greensgrow we like to call it City Supported Agriculture since we are an Urban Farm in the heart of Philadelphia. City Supported Agriculture’s goal is to bridge the urban/rural divide by providing Philadelphians with the finest and freshest the region has to offer while supporting our local family farms and neighboring small businesses. Greensgrow actually operates a cooperative CSA – since our urban footprint is so small, and our membership is so large, we fill our CSA share by working with a network of local farmers and food producers that we have vetted through our own evaluation process to ensure that each box is full of high quality and healthy products. If you click on our farmer profiles and vendor pages, you can see more information on our partner farmers and producers.

Greensgrow’s CSA
We have modeled our own CSA around how people truly cook and eat, catering to our distinctly urban following– there’s no other CSA quite like ours!  We include a diverse spread of fruits, vegetables, and dairy or vegan protein options, whereas our friends who belong to CSAs with single farm models may receive windfall portions of certain veggies throughout their peak season, with less variety because they only see food from one farm. In the winter we also offer a local meat option. This gives our members a breadth of foods that our region has to offer, bringing together the best of urban and rural: a neighborhood farm, food fresh from the country, and Philadelphia’s own unique epicurean traditions, including the occasional locally prepared food such as preserves or bread. Our members tell us that our CSA is more user friendly than others because of these factors.

Additionally, belonging to a cooperative CSA helps to mediate the risk of joining a CSA because you are receiving food from many farms. If you join a single farm CSA and they suffer a major crop loss from weather, pests or some other factor, as a CSA member your share will be smaller or skip a week; with a cooperative CSA, we can reach out to other farms to keep your weekly box full of value.

CSA Pick Up Options
Greensgrow’s summer CSA runs from late May into November with full share and half share options. The full share members pick up every week on the same day all season long (Thursday or Saturday) for 25 weeks. Members select their pick up location and day of the week during signup. The half share option allows members to pick up every other week, 13 times over the season, and also commit to their location and day of the week at signup. All of our summer CSA full share members select a “vacation week” in advance, which means that during one week of the season you won’t have a share. That week is built into our pricing structure. Our winter CSA includes 10 pickups from December through April, twice a month, on set Saturdays. There are no vacations during the winter season since we only have 10 pick ups. If you join after either season starts, we can pro-rate your share so you won’t pay for what you missed.

CSA’s are not the right buying vehicle for everyone. If you are considering it, we suggest that you start with a half summer share to see how it works for you and your household. Sometimes neighbors and families split their share as well, so they don’t feel over-committed.

To read all of the particulars of the CSA share and our agreement, please read about our Summer CSA and Winter CSA.

Thank You for Supporting Greensgrow and Local Farms!

If you have any questions, contact the CSA hotline at 215.380.4355 or csa@greensgrow.org.

Eat well. Eat local.