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- JenEhr Family Farm Focusing on Expansion, Community
- By Jane Metcalf
Wisconsin Correspondent
- Paul Ehrhardt and Kay Jensen view the 2001 growing season - the third year of their JenEhr Family Farm - as “Quantum Leap Year.” As set down in their business plan, it’s the year in which they will double their crop acreage and develop more efficient systems and yet, they stress, maintain product quality.
Ehrhardt and Jensen hosted the Wisconsin Fresh Market Vegetable Growers Association field day at their farm in Sun Prairie, Wis. in Dane County in May.
About 10 years ago, Ehrhardt and Jensen decided farming was the lifestyle in which they wanted to raise their family. Both had grown up on traditional dairy farms - his in Dodge County in south central Wisconsin and hers in St. Croix County in the northwest part of the state.
Both had graduated from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at the University of Wisconsin (UW) - Madison, and both later earned master’s degrees - Ehrhardt’s in soil science and Jensen’s in business administration.
Ehrhardt was a high-school ag teacher at Laconia High School in Rosendale for three years and, for the last nine years he has worked for Wisconsin Foundation Seeds, an auxiliary program of the university which provides foundation seed for certified seed growers. He currently is director of the program, and since March, has worked in that position half time.
Jensen, an ag journalism graduate, worked for a number of publishing companies and Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation after graduation. She currently teaches technical writing in the Life Science Communications Department (formerly ag journalism), plus teaches speech and writing courses for UW-Madison’s Farm and Industry Short Course.
As they considered where their place in agriculture would be, Ehrhardt and Jensen considered many options and even came perilously close to operating a dairy farm in Texas. Ultimately, though, their direction was dictated by what was best for their family.
Their son, Isaac, now 9, needed a special-education curriculum, and they knew Sun Prairie and Madison both offered excellent programs. With the pending adoption of a baby from China, they also knew they wanted to live in a community tolerant of differences between people. Their daughter, Sarah, is now four years old.
“We knew what we wanted was to grow food,” Jensen adds. “. . . We knew it would have to be something that was consumer-direct just because of the margins. And we knew we wanted to do something that was organic because that’s what we, as consumers, wanted.”
Ehrhardt and Jensen spread the word among farmers near Madison and Sun Prairie that they wanted to buy land, and five years ago, bought 110 acres of bare land four miles northeast of Sun Prairie. They rent out part of their acreage to a nearby farmer, and raise fruits and vegetables on slightly less than 10 acres.
JenEhr Family Farm markets organic fruits, vegetables and pasture-raised poultry direct to consumers via community-supported agriculture (CSA) subscriptions and a Madison farmer’s market. To further diversify their marketing, they sell wholesale direct to local food stores and upscale restaurants, as well as to Chicago and Madison food stores and restaurants via Home Grown Wisconsin, a food-marketing cooperative.
While many operators of newer farm businesses have developed business plans to satisfy farm lenders, Ehrhardt and Jensen have made planning - and operating from that plan - a priority. Their farm’s operation and enterprises are based on their mission statement, and decisions about capital investments also go back to their business plan.
“We wanted to have overriding principles that would give us ongoing growth,” Jensen explains.
In addition to the day-to-day planning which takes place, Ehrhardt and Jensen slate a two-and-a-half day planning retreat at a nearby monastery every year. They take their seed catalogs, records from the previous year, and talk about what was successful and what wasn’t. It allows them to get “the big picture,” Jensen says, and it allows time to help refocus their faith.
Hand-in-hand with their mission statement, they also have considered what they call their “drop dead date”.
“The day before you die, what do you want to have done?” she explains. “Once you know that, then you start planning backwards.”
Ehrhardt and Jensen readily admit they have experienced a sharp learning curve, and that curve is far from complete. They currently raise over 30 fruit and vegetables species, most in successive plantings. They have over half an acre of strawberries and 500 row-feet of raspberries. They’ve recently put in asparagus and rhubarb.
“It’s a mindset change to go from a traditional operation to here,” says Jensen. “Way too many producers are producers only, and this is a producing and marketing business, with emphasis on the marketing.” They’ve had to buck their traditional farm upbringings a number of times. Instead of buying a piece of equipment because it could perform a specific task, they are more likely to ask themselves what else it could do in addition to that task before making a purchase.
Both Ehrhardt and Jensen have attended workshops and conferences put on by UW-Madison’s Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems, Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, the Upper Midwest Organic Farming Association, Wisconsin Fresh Market Vegetable Growers Association (WFMVGA) and the Wisconsin Berry Growers Association (WBGA). Jensen currently is vice president of WFMVGA, and Ehrhardt is vice president of WBGA.
Just as they have sought to learn through conferences and interaction with producers there, part of JenEhr’s mission statement is to educate consumers. They believe there has been a separation of people from the land, and there is a pent-up demand for consumers to reconnect with the land - as evidenced by the national growth in farmers’ markets and JenEhr’s own budding success with their CSA and farmers’ markets.
A growing number of consumers want to buy their food locally. By selling direct, JenEhr can educate consumers about agriculture and foster a sense of trust.
JenEhr’s 50 shareholders pay a set fee for a weekly box of produce. Shareholders got their first produce boxes during the last week of May and will continue to receive boxes of food through Thanksgiving.
CSA shareholders pick up their produce at the farm or at the Prairie Athletic Club in Sun Prairie at set times. JenEhr also has a produce stand at Prairie Athletic Club on Wednesday afternoons, plus they sell at the Hilldale Farmers’ Market on Madison’s west side on Saturdays.
This year, Jensen and Ehrhardt will raise 2,400 pasture-raised chickens, and while poultry shares are available to CSA members, most of the chickens - which are processed at a state-inspected facility - are sold direct from the farm and to Madison restaurants. They are raising turkeys - for CSA members only-as well this year.
With a mission statement and goals, the one constant at JenEhr Family Farm is change. Ehrhardt and Jensen expect their production systems and marketing mix to change yearly to some extent. For example, they began growing tomatoes in a new 30 x 95-foot hoophouse this spring, and they are working towards offering a weekly share of flowers to their CSA members. As their customer base grows, they will have up to half an acre each of raspberries and asparagus and 1.5 acres of strawberries. And they are making plans to grow blueberries.
“We want people to think of us as their farmers, and we want people to get in the habit of coming out to the farm. . ,” Jensen says. “If they come to the farm, they see the change in seasons, and they understand how seasons and weather affect their food.”
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