Willy Street Co-op to offer produce boxes to help local farmers

MADISON, Wis. — Willy Street Co-op is introducing a new way to support local farmers.

Starting the first week of June, customers can get a monthly subscription to local vegetable or organic fruit boxes. The boxes will be available for weekly touchless pickup at any of the Willy Street Co-op locations.

As customers get fresh produce, they’re also able to help local farmers who have more produce than they can sell.

“Any other year, we wouldn’t consider offering a local vegetable box because we don’t want to compete with local farmers’ direct sales through CSA boxes and farmers markets,” said Brendon Smith, Communications Director at Willy Street Co-op. “This year, however, many of our farmers have more produce than they can sell due to reduced demand from restaurants and farmers’ markets. We asked both our local farmers and FairShare CSA Coalition if they supported this idea, and they were overwhelmingly in favor.”

Each box will have seasonal assortment of fresh fruits or local veggies as selected by the produce team at the co-op. Fruit boxes will have things like berries, rhubarb, cherries and peaches. The June boxes will have asparagus, salad greens, radishes and fresh herbs.

The boxes cost $100 for four weeks of produce. Each box is about $30 worth of produce.

You can place orders online here.

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