New Jersey Boy and the Chickens

Today the blog turns over to NJBoy and last weeks rumble down I-40 on an errand for wife, (he tried to get out of it, I swear):

I was riding down route 40 today going about 70 mph. In front of me was a flat bed tractor trailer with what looked like giant egg crates, many of them cracked and broken.  As I got closer I could see that the crates were actually plastic cages stuffed full of chickens.

It appeared that they could not move and the “breaks” were actually wings sticking out.  The crates were stacked about six across, about 10 high and as long as the trailer, about 50 feet. I imagined how terrifying the wind and noise was for the birds as they rocketed down the interstate.  I assumed this was their first and certainly their last ride.

I have nothing against the person who raised the chickens, nor the driver of the truck, nor the folks at their destination. It is in the increasing of efficiency, the economy of scale, that improve productivity and “improve” our standard of living. I am certain that all those involved work their butts off every day.  

One way or another, the two of us just starting our food business have to compete.  We are happy to compete on the quality of our products and our ability to give exceptional customer service.  We get our butts kicked on the cost side, no way around it.  We hope to grow big enough to get our costs down so we can make a living.  (Just like everyone else.)

My wife is a vegetarian, which pretty much makes me a vegetarian.  I like BBQ in just about any form (yes, even BBQ tofu).  But now, today, after seeing those chickens, I want to make a deal with you:

Sometime during 2011 let us all buy one organic, free range, cage free, pyramid treated and blessed chicken, one that was raised and killed by the same hand.  Let’s each have one less chicken stuffed in a cage going 70 mph down route 40 to the slaughter house.

Anyone who knows me knows I have many favorite saying, but I only have one favorite fortune cookie.  It was left for me in my cubical at my first real job.  A SMALL DEED IS BETTER THAN A BIG INTENTION.  Let’s go hunt up some local, small farm raised chicken and have a BBQ.

Bye Bye 2010! We'll Miss Ya!

Again with the Christmas Carols. This time breaking into the early Saturday morning alarm clock radio. It's the last Saturday before Christmas and we have a few hours to prepare for an outdoor Holiday Bazaar where we'll hawk our Pizza Kits along with other weary but festive entrepreneurs. 

Artists, all of us. Artisan food, candles, decorations. Hand made gifts of wool from sheep, felted hats, jewelry. Cheese from their goats, meat and eggs fresh from the farm, homemade chocolates, jams and sauces. A multitude of local goods, gathered together for the very last day of our Farmers Markets for 2010. 

But back to the early morning preparations. The sun is up, but just barely, rising into a cloudy morning and leaving the pink and red of the horizon behind. NJBoy and I work like a well tuned clock, each marching through our tasks in mostly silence (it's too early to talk), gathering the nuts and berries of our festival performance. We're packing an amazing amount of supplies into our little Subaru Beast, a task we've repeated many times before. And packing the Beast is the one task that I never cross the line on. Meaning that it's a job for an engineer, not an artist. Every square inch is packed in a very meaningful order. Nothing can be altered and it's best to keep my distance. This day we've added a new product, our Gluten Free Pizza Kit, so we're bringing extra cases and another table. The Beast is behaving badly, defiant, not wanting to carry more. Things begin to slide out, not unlike a monster from a closet.  Did I mention it was the week before Christmas? Snow flurries and frozen fingers. 

NJBoy is fighting with the supplies and the Beast. I'm hiding out in the kitchen mixing Pizza doughs and filling tubs of water. We're both pretty much surrounded by well ordered chaos.

It's less than perfect, but I know in a few hours this battle will be behind us, we'll be all set up at the Festival and making lots of friends by giving out delicious hot Pizza cooked on the grill. It's always rough getting to the Farmers Markets. It takes several hours of work. There is a lot to gather and we can count on forgetting something every time, only adding to the frustration. But today I'm a little short on patience as it's cold and early and I want to be sleeping. So when NJBoy crabs in my presence one too may times, I snap back. "You know, you are just going to have to get used to this! You are just going to have to learn how to have fun with this!" And his response? "FUN?! You want me to have FUN AT FESTIVALS?!" 

And with this we both start laughing, breaking the tension of this cold winter morning. 

Benefit of the Markets: Booty! 

On this last day we got a 9' fresh cut Christmas tree!

The Long and the Short of the Days Before Christmas.

When I was a little girl growing up in southern California, the short but warm sunny days before Christmas were met from sunrise to sunset with anticipation of the big day to come. My mom worked, so that meant my brothers and I did pretty much whatever we wanted. Thank goodness the only electronic distractions were the TV and radio, so most of our time was spent outdoors playing in our city neighborhood, running in-and-out, in-and-out, in-and-out of the apartment all day.

Of course our Christmas tree was already up, glorious, yet barren underneath, except for a few small packages that had arrived from a stray distant relative. The challenge was to shake and shake and shake the one Christmas present under the tree with a tag with my name on it! This developed into trying to unwrap and rewrap it stealthily - no one would know.

But wait! I LOVED getting Christmas cards in the mail! Maybe one would have a $5 bill in it! I'm pretty sure $5 couldn't even buy a Barbie doll back then, but it could now. (Merry Christmas China!) I enjoyed the long-life versatility of Christmas cards: I would cut up last years cards to make into whatever 7-year-old masterpiece I could with scissors, tape, glue and crayons. The current years cards would be hung next to each other to admire and pick the best one of the bunch, updating my selection if a bigger, brighter, more glittered treasure arrived that day.

Today, at least in our house, the Christmas card is all but waiting for the nail in the coffin. Except for a few hold-outs and those 'yearly letters' that I love to hate (NJBoy likes them). They're always from people whose grade-schooler Madison DaVinci won an award this year for their presentation on String Theory. When my kid was that age their science project featured Michaelangelo, Leonardo, and Donetelo but they were Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and they lived in a sewer.

Plus I'm jealous because they all have paying jobs.

Most of the Christmas cards we receive are from businesses like insurance companies, real estate agents, etc. I'm no better. The last cards I sent were NJBoys' and my first Christmas as newly-weds. We'd been up in New Jersey for Thanksgiving and went to New York City for my first visit. The MoMA gift shop had amazing cards and I couldn't pass up the black and white photograph of a striped tabby cat standing on his hind legs to rub his whiskers on the stick-arm of a dirty melting snowman. In black and white the snowman was kind of gray. We loved it. I had my address book with me, so we passed the hours our long drive home by filling out our cards. It was a valuable distraction with NJBoy and I coming up with fun and clever things to write inside the cards, then toning it down a bit.

Since I'm the Highest Level Officer at GalloLea Organics, I've made an executive decision that GalloLea Organics will NOT participate in the Business Christmas Card sending. No, Christmas cards should not be from businesses and agents thereof, but from friends and family. And this is only my opinion, and it's certainly colored by my marketing and advertising background- to see it as one more 'marketing tool'. One that I've helped out with my own clients! (insert shame). But if you're reading this, and you've done business with us, then THANK YOU and HAPPY HOLIDAYS and may your New Year be MOST PROSPEROUS! And if you are reading this and you're friend or family, don't bother looking in the mailbox for a card from SoCalGal and NJBoy either. We missed that opportunity on our last 12 hour drive home from Thanksgiving.

Maybe next year.

My favorite Christmas card this year! Made for us by Lisa (the Mighty Quinn)

GalloLea Organics: In The Beginning Before the Beginning

SoCal Artist Gal relocates to Asheville, North Carolina, via 15 year stop-over in Atlanta, Georgia. New Jersey Boy transfers to Asheville, NC by way of 10 year derailment in Spruce Pine, NC. Both flying their own separate coops in search of better jobs and more rewarding lifestyles.

They both land in Asheville the same week, each setting up their own nests in the same little neighborhood unbeknownst to the other. A few days later, late in the evening on a long June day NJBoy is out on his bike, not too far from home. SoCalGal is also out, wandering the streets with map in hand, looking for a hilly walking route. It begins to rain, her map dissolves into blurry lines and she waves down the nearest cyclist (NJBoy) to assist with directions home. Unfortunately for her, he has just moved to the neighborhood and is of little help directing her home. But they chat, turns out she too has a bicycle and so the new transplants exchange e-mail and she eventually finds her way home.

Fast-forward three years. SoCalGal and NJBoy ride their bicycles up to a high-point of the Blue Ridge Parkway, say their vows before friends and family, and ride back down on a tandem bike to start their new life together, employed in the still thriving economy of spring 2008.

Super-fast-forward to spring 2009, the economy has crashed and burned, and both our SoCalGal and NJBoy are unemployed and searching for new financial meaning in life. Thus is born GalloLea Organics and the Pizza Kit.

Any Italian NJBoy worth his salt and his pasta is going to have his signature recipes and our NJBoy is no exception. NJBoy has his grandmother's 'gravy' recipe, so he tweaks it slightly to use it for pizza. The quick rise whole wheat crust takes them a year to develop and (I really can't stress this enough) a LOT of pizza eating, to get to the final recipe for the GalloLea Pizza Kit.

And here, readers, is where my blog begins. I'll fill you in on the agony and the ecstasy of starting and building a food business in a trashed economy, the exploits of our duo as they continue to learn, one day at a time, how to make a living and not kill each other by the end of each 25 hour day.