Sprawled inside an industrial constructing on the Century Metropolis Enterprise Park on Milwaukee’s northwest facet is an city farm often known as Hundred Acre. Run by New York-based startup Planet to Plate Inc., the imaginative and prescient of the enterprise is to deal with meals insecurity and construct a extra sustainable provide chain for meals companies. Already in its 14th month of operation, the farm has struggled to maintain up with demand for its flagship merchandise: salad combine and Italian giant leaf basil. In a latest interview with BizTimes Milwaukee reporter Ashley Good, Planet to Plate founder Chris Corkery shared plans to open a second facility in Milwaukee by the tip of this 12 months, permitting the farm to scale manufacturing by 400 instances its present quantity of 1,500 kilos per week. The next parts of their dialog are edited for size and readability.
Plans for the second location
“The placement of the brand new facility is beneath lock and key, sadly. It’s a bigger take care of an actual property funding group that’s trying to purchase (the constructing) and be our landlord. We’re centered closely on the town limits and can be going into an industrial type warehouse and/or a discontinued sort of workplace house. It’s form of the answer we offer on the true property entrance as a result of these areas are in any other case vacant.
“On the finish of the day, farming is closely tied to actual property. If we are able to do it at one location, why can’t we do that in a number of places throughout southeastern Wisconsin, and even simply Milwaukee, and develop a full-scale community of indoor manufacturing services?”
What in regards to the current facility?
“The intent is to maintain the present facility operational as a coaching and analysis and improvement lab. We’re dedicated to that group. We’re dedicated to every location we go into. We’re not trying to enter one (location) to then construct one other and depart.
“Usually, we’ve developed a outstanding coaching program for people who wish to get into the world of city ag-tech. It’s not simply the variety of jobs (that advantages the group), however the elevated entry to this type of contemporary meals system, with the tutorial packages that we run on a weekly foundation.”
New partnerships
“Hundred Acre exists as a fast response to an ailing meals system. The catalyst was the pandemic. You had numerous unused actual property, distribution issues from A to Z for varied merchandise, rising environmental considerations and social unrest rising throughout the nation. We thought this was simply bringing numerous issues collectively and addressing numerous points with each old style and new faculty options.
“We simply landed a contract with the Milwaukee Brewers, so we’re the salad provider throughout American Household Subject, which matches by an incredible quantity now that they’ve revamped their meals packages. Final 12 months, in our first 12 months of enterprise, we grew, harvested and distributed 20,000 salad parts to underserved communities domestically by our new accomplice Feeding America. We additionally rolled out our retail providing with accomplice Outpost Pure Meals. We’re centered general on growing the provision, consciousness and consumption of domestically grown contemporary crops.”
