The Tipping Point and Scaling Up

It is my experience that at some point in the life of a business or an organization things come to the tipping point ... the to the edge of a cliff. Once they are at that edge or tipping point there are a few things that can happen. Number one ... they can realize that they don't really like the direction they are going and either reboot or just plain pull the plug. Number two ... they can just stay the course that they are on and probably slowly fade over time because of attrition or lack of passion and excitement. Or, number three ... they can dive in even deeper and take things up a notch or two (of course that assumes things don't blow up in your face). Realize that I'm not organizational or business management expert, so those are just my non-technical observations.

The farm (Crooked Gap Farm) seems to have hit that tipping point or the edge of the cliff (depending on which mental image you would like to have). We started out with herd of Dexter cattle (a herd that was too big for my lack of expertise) and just six hogs on the farm the first year. From that point we have grown by adding enterprises, markets, and transforming our woodlot raised heritage breed pork into the centerpiece of our farm. Now we are at a point where I feel we either need to make some major steps to scale up the farm and the production or scale back down to a "hobby" level and produce enough food for us and a few others with the leftovers.

My pride says, "Let's kick it up a notch or ten and get going!"

My fear says, "You know it wouldn't be so bad to just have three pigs, a couple of cows, and a handful of chickens ... plus I wouldn't have to get up at 4:00 AM 26 weeks a year for the farmers market!"

My gut says, "I think we can do this ... maybe ... with some help ... I think ..."

Of course scaling up and jumping in even deeper means some changes and a different approach to many aspects of the farm ... all of that will take lots of thought and planning! I'll be taking some time over the next few posts to dig into the ideas ...

Do you have thoughts on scaling up small scale farms? I'd love to hear them!