18 November 2009

Is there a genuine desire for fresh seasonal fruit and vegetables in Canberra?

| chokubaijo
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[Ed – we covered the opening of Choku Bai Jo previously here]

If you have not heard of us already Choku Bai Jo is a Fresh produce store located in Nth Lyneham, Run by Local Canberrans and supporting Local Canberrans. This is not an advertisement for our store however we are interested in what Canberra has to say to a question we have.

If we were to start delivering fresh, seasonal, local Fruit and/or Vegetable boxes(available in both conventional and Certified Organic) twice a week:

1) would people be interested?
2) What price point would people be happy to spend?

The reason we are asking is because we are looking into ideas in how we can support more local farmers and also to provide an opportunity for consumers on the southside of the city to purchase veg for their evening meal picked earlier that same day.

We would really appreciate the feedback of this astute local discussion group(Riotact).

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Hi Mate,

Would surely be interested in the service, Just a drive to the markets is an overall 1 hour of time. Any thing to save time would be a big plus !

The last cafe I use to work we had our supplies from http://www.regionalfruit.com.au/ who were located in Fyshwick at that time. I believe now they have moved to Hume.

I guess they did it more to the commercial businesses and you are looking more into the residential.

My 2 cents.

^ Yep, the Hawley’s boxes are awesome – check out their website

Hawleys fresh food is doing local fruit and veg box deliveries.

yeah, so what happened, almost universally acceptable to the 20 odd people who replied but the vast echoing silence was our payback.

Great customer service, remember, always include a feedback loop in your surveys people, not that hard

I’d like to see posted the evening before the proposed contents list for the box, with an email reminder and a yay/nay option, and the option of a more expensive tailored box instead. I know from experience that the fixed regular box deliveries can be a hassle (for said “eat out often” type reasons).

AinslieGarden5:17 pm 23 Nov 10

This is exactly what I’ve been looking for. I don’t want to sign up for delivery boxes from halfway across the country, I want local! I’d be happy to pay $40 to $50, including delivery, with a mix of whatever fruit and veg are good at the time. Any updates now that it’s been a year since the last post?

Thanks for all the great feed back.

I will try to add a bit more info and clear up a few things listed above.

1, Gleann na Meala is our family farm owned by Dave and Hideko Pentony, Ben Pentony is also Involved in the growing of veg on the farm.

2, Southside farmers markets are a great place to shop, Gleann na meala does have a stall at the martkets in the outside section. These Markets were set up by Pady Pentony on of te owners of Choku Bai Jo (we no longer run the markets).

3, We would not be able to sell the full range of Organic Produce at the Markets due to the current rules, although I think there may be a retailer of other organic groceries already there.

4, Our current website is not great sorry I agree.

5, re the store staying open later on saturdays (until 4pm) that is something we may look at next year maybe trial after the Christmas break when every thing returns to normal again.

6, We would probably set up a new web site that you could order on and make direct deposits for boxes. We would set up a range of standard boxes ranging in price and fill them with a range of what is in season and good to eat at that time.

7,We probably would not have itemised boxes for people to tailor for themselves. this would keep costs down. We would also deliver to offices and homes. We would use white strofoam boxes for deliveries.

Thankyou to everyone that has had imput into this we will look at our options over the Christmas break and hopefully do something in the new year

If you want to do fresh bread, you’d want to do 3 runs per week per suburb/region.

If just doing F&V, 1-2 runs per week per suburb/region per week would suffice.

Direct debit with boxes stuffed full of seasonal produce FTW.

PS Price point for me for a week is usually $30-40 for delivered organic juicing stuff, plus another $30-40 for other vegies etc

I’ve tried organic delivery from a few places and get it maybe once a month. There are more places doing it in canberra now than 12 months ago.

Last one I got was ordered online and as a simple juicing box plus (apples, organges, beetroot, ginger, celery, carrots) and another box of seasonal vegies, but have now found out that they get sourced from QLD, so probably not again.

My advice is have an online ordering system, delivery one day a week with orders placed by a certain day. Put together some set plans, ie juicing box, vegies box, salad box, provide a couple of different size boxes. Cuts down on admin and people will still be getting what they want.

lemon delicious10:14 pm 20 Nov 09

I would love it. $50 per week from us at least. Problem is, we’re in the deep south – would you come out here?

I’m currently using Canberra Organics. I’d be happy to support local business if the value is there. Good Luck

Sounds like a great idea – maybe add bread and milk and you could have a real success! Might be worth having a look at http://www.aussiefarmers.com.au/ which seem to be doing the same sort of thing in other states.

Yes, I would be very interested in either conventional or organic home delivered produce to the tune of $30-$40 a week. Do it, do it, do it!

I’d love a weekly delivery of say $30 for a small box or $50 for a large box. Living in Queanbeyan and working at the AIrport makes North Lyneham, and both Northside and Southside farmers markets a bit far to drive.

Food miles from farm to store are worth keeping in mind. However, 2 tonne of fruit n veg in a 2 tonne truck for 1000km is way less environmentally damaging as 10 kilos of fruit n veg in a 1 tonne car 10km.

rosscoact said :

Absolutely, I can’t get to the shop and only sometimes get to your stall at the farmers market.

Sign me up for $50 per week

Sign me up also… any order over $50 if free delivery yes????

emd said :

Snarky, Choku Bai Jo is also Gleann na Meala

Thanks emd, I didn’t know that. Turns out they’ve been supplying our Bok Choy and salad greens for quite a while already!

I would love this and have been looking for an option to have the delivery for work and for personal (at home).

I would pay approx $20 – $30 a week or even a fortnight, but would also like the option of sizes… ie if we had family over we could get a bigger box or something along those lines.

I am one of those people that can never pick the right fruit/veg and end up buying a pile of gross food and throwing it in the bin 🙁

Good luck, and I hope we get to see some more info in the near future 🙂

I used to get deliveries from Organic Express and loved it. Now, I carpool with neighbours to go to Southside Farmers Markets, your stall always has good salad greens (Snarky, Choku Bai Jo is also Gleann na Meala). But I would get deliveries again for those weeks when I’m working on market day.

Organic Express used to have white styrofoam boxes and would put a frozen water bottle in the box to keep contents cool if they were delivering when we weren’t home. We paid a deposit for the box with our first delivery, and just had to remember to put the box out for collection with subsequent deliveries. I would spend $50 to $80 per delivery, and would prefer a mixed box of whatever is good with the ability to add extras (like bananas for my little monkeys). I wouldn’t sign up for an every-week thing though, it would be more of a once-a-month when I can’t make it to the markets.

We’ve tried buying F&V as part of regular shopping trips, as part of a co-op we helped set up in Sydney, and at the southside markets. For us the markets work best, because we can pick and choose from what’s on offer.

We used the vegie co-op for about 4 years in Sydney, primarily to save money (bulk buying for 8 families from Flemington markets cut out weekly bill down to less than half, and we got better produce for the effort), but it’s undeniable that buying mixed boxes means there’s always something in there that you personally would have preferred either more or less of.

For us, teh southside markets are the best alternative. It rarely takes more than an hour, including travel time, we can pick and choose, and buy something different if we see it. So, if you’d like to sell more southside to people like us, get a stand at the market.

It’d be a lot more efficient for you too I’d think.

🙂

Absolutely, I can’t get to the shop and only sometimes get to your stall at the farmers market.

Sign me up for $50 per week

You may struggle on the Southside, as people really seem to love the experience of shopping for very fresh fruit and veg at the CIT markets. Many southsiders are fairly loyal to their local F&V too (Chisholm fruit and veg does a roaring trade). Worth a try though.

Inappropriate11:39 am 19 Nov 09

I’d happily spend 20-30 per week for a once a week delivery (a mixed bag of seasonal vegies), provided it was arranged for a time when it wouldn’t be sitting on my front porch for too long.

yes. now we have a mini-astro, timing anything like trips anywhere seems to be blown out the water and this could be a fabulous service. we’d mebbe spend forty or fifty dollars in our order, which we often do/did on our sat am jaunts to nth lyneham… would have a regular-ish list, with some adjustments week to week.

btw, i used to be able to get black sapote in the old greengrocer in civic markets before it relocated; any chance of sourcing this exquisite fruit and mebbe extending to some exotics not otherwise obtainable in sunny canberra?

I seem to remember my (interstate) uni doing this same thing. It was very popular, partly because it was cheep (subsidised by the union) but I think mostly because of the convenience.

I’d be interested in seeing what you come up with. My preference would be to have a few options of assortments with varying price tags, rather than choosing exactly what goes in there. But that could just be me. I think it’s the same theory as getting a banquet when you’re out to dinner with friends, you try things you wouldn’t normally try, and maybe get hooked on something you’ve never heard of.

Delivery to my workplace would be good, but not a sticking point, I think I’d get it regardless.

Personally, I would be after something in the order of $20 – $30 a week (a couple who tend to eat out a lot), even if it’s only once a week. I can see how families would want more, which brings me back to my previous point, have a few options with varying price tags.

Good luck, I’ll be keeping my eye out for it.

Does anyone know of any other places that do this sort of thing? I don’t care about organic.

I’d personally be more interested in your staying open longer on Saturdays, maybe till 4pm?

And doing something about that horribly-designed website.

You might like to approach businesses.

Where I work in Sydney the company gets (many) boxes of assorted fresh fruit delivered and spread all over the building, every week. Good for employee health. Seems to be pretty good quality stuff, too, and none of it is wasted

I’d be interested. I used to get a delivery with another organic business, but they went out of business.

I prefer to pay a set price like 50.00 and just get a small mixed box of fruit and veg so I can just have direct debit set up and don’t have to order stuff every week, and make payments. but I know other people like to choose specific things.

Anyway – I’m very interested.

Hell yeah. Anything to save me my Saturday trip.

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