Village Bakery: A Local Sustainability Initiative

The Village Bakery was started in 2002 by Bob O’Neil and Christine Hughes. Both previously worked at Casa Nueva, Bob for 10 years and Christine for 5, and formed close relationships with the local farmers they contacted for Casa (Hughes). During their employment, Bob and Christine were able to take Casa from 20% local food use to 75% through their search for local farmers (Hughes). Bob and Christine opened Village Bakery because they wanted to do something beyond what they were doing at Casa, and they also wanted the freedom to experiment. The goals of the organization were to sustain the community through the use of local, organic food products and to increase demand for wholesome, real food through example and education. (Village Bakery) The Village Bakery consists of a café area and bakery, and the adjoining Undercover Market, which sells a variety of locally grown produce, fair trade coffee, tea, and chocolate, as well as regional cheeses and microbrews (Village Bakery). Other environmentally-friendly gifts such as clothing, bowls, jewelry, and water bottles are offered as well. The Undercover Market opened about a year after Village Bakery, as Bob and Christine wanted to enable their customers to buy and cook locally at home, and to showcase other varieties of local goods (Hughes). They stated that they like to consider themselves “food detectives,” that seek out and find the best “real” local food for their consumers (Hughes).

Village Bakery focuses on achieving its goals of local sustainability by buying locally raised produce and meat from farms such as King Family Farms, Sassafrass Farms, and Shade River Farms (Hughes). They do not, as stated on a sign in the café, “participate in corporate agribusiness that destroys our access to real food.” Bob and Christine define sustainable produce as that which comes from a “small-scale farm and produces food with a positive effect on the environment” (Hughes). They provided an example of the mass amounts of produce grown in California that may be a “local” food to people buying in California, but the farms that grow these goods are by no means sustainable and have a negative impact on the environment (Hughes). In other words, sustainable doesn’t always mean local, and it is important to consider both aspects of food production. Though both Bob and Christine agree that it is much more expensive in the short term to use local food and avoid cheap, mass-produced goods, they feel that in the long run, the choice to use nutritional and sustainable food is less costly. When determining the “true cost of food,” they factor in the environmental damage done by pesticides, the health impacts of homogenized, cheap food, and the cost of shipping, as well as the huge subsidies granted by the government to food conglomerates (Hughes). Considering all of these aspects of mass-produced food, it is easy to understand why Bob and Christine see “cheap” food as costing much more than local, sustainable goods.

One of the major obstacles that Village bakery has to face is a financial one. Because they are a business and not a nonprofit, they need loans from banks. The banks however, are reluctant to finance an organization, such as the Village Bakery, that doesn’t fit the “typical” business profile (Hughes). Christine said that it was important to them that the café wasn’t a nonprofit dependent on grant money, and that they wanted to provide an example to other activists that activism and business can work together. While both Christine and Bob acknowledged that financial support was an issue, they stated that they were “here for the long term,” that Village Bakery was an investment. They stated that “the consciousness is out there and growing, and we want to help build knowledge about what is possible” (Hughes).

Part of their goal of knowledge building is Village Bakery’s focus on community involvement. They started the Green Plate Club in local schools, through which they educate children about the importance of healthy, natural, and local foods, and have managed to expand with a chapter in Columbus as well (Hughes). They also donate to other nonprofits with similar goals, such as Rural Action and community food initiatives. Some of the local farmers that Village Bakery deals with also help out by offering tours of their farms to schoolchildren (Hughes). It is clear that the Village Bakery takes its goal of supporting the community seriously, and in turn the community gives back. Bob and Christine stated that they like the community to feel a “sense of place,” a pride in the Bakery’s originality. Their intent was to make it as much the community’s café as it was theirs, and they said that they have seen a lot of support and loyalty from their consumers as a result.

The owners of Village Bakery feel that working within a framework guided by local sustainability and organic food is very important, both for the health of people and the environment. Their assertion that people can change the world by choosing to eat locally and sustainably is something that they take seriously. The focus on providing accessible, real food for everybody is a mentality that should be seen in many more restaurants and cafés. While they are happy with the progress the Village Bakery has made, in the future their plans include helping other activists go into business, and growing more of their own produce on the premises (Hughes). Village Bakery is a unique, local sustainability initiative that offers both delicious food and a way to help change the world one meal at a time.





Sources

Hughes, Christine and Bob O’Neil. Personal interview. 25 Feb. 2009.
The Village Bakery and Café. 20 Feb. 2009.


Interview Questions

1. How did Village Bakery get started? What specific issues or needs were they hoping to address?
2. Was the Undercover Market started at the same time or did that come later?
3. What is the mission? How do they plan on achieving this?
4. Why is eating locally important?
5. How does their commitment to local, organic, sustainable agriculture benefit the community?
6. Do they interact with the community in other ways?
7. Do they think they are making a difference? Fulfilling the need for local food?
8. Have they made progress? Is this where they expected to be? Future goals?
9. Do they use anything that isn’t local or organic? If so, are they moving towards phasing this out?
10. Has the public/community been supportive?
11. Have they seen other businesses move towards a local, sustainable approach?
12. What is the goal of the Undercover Market?
13. What types of goods are sold?
14. Why is it called the Undercover Market?