Farms you can visit

Consumers like you are inundated with advertising and pitches of all sorts from large companies begging you to purchase their meat by offering gimmicks such as ground beef for life, free ribs, free rib eyes, or free shipping.  We all know nothing is actually free, and that the cost for these “free” things are built into the other products being sold. 

These companies also go to great lengths to make sure that their products are third-party certified which we discussed last week.  You will typically see on their customer-facing content a lot of buzz words such as regenerative, non-GMO, heirloom breeds, and so on.  While these claims are definitely true for many of these companies, in our opinion nothing is better than a direct connection with the farm and the consumer.  

This is one reason that Watson Farms has purposefully steered clear of some wholesale opportunities through the years, and made a conscious effort to better serve the consumer directly.  Many of these buzzwords have good practices behind them, but many of the certifications don’t actually cover the important parts.

So if we put all the fancy wording, incredibly large ad budgets, and highly paid P.R. and design teams aside, there is at least one thing that these fast-growing startups (often with venture capital backing) can’t usually contend with:  the ability for the consumer to visit the farm.  

We feel like this direct connection between producer and consumer is the Holy Grail of eating better.  We love connecting with and getting to know you, and we hope that you enjoy connecting and learning about us as well.  Nothing excites us more than a new 5-star review.  To us, that is worth far more than any third party certification.  

This is one reason that we opened our on-farm store where customers new and old can come by and enjoy the scenes of the farm while picking up food that they can have confidence in.  Take a look at this video from Kelly showcasing our new store!

This is also why we are working hard to offer more tours.  Time and labor has been a limiting factor this year as it is many years, but we definitely intend to offer more opportunities to personally show our customers around on more tour days this year.

Also over the last 15 months we’ve greatly expanded our home delivery offerings in an effort to serve customers directly but with the convenience that they need.  About 5 million people live in the zip codes across NC and SC that we serve with our own refrigerated delivery van.  If a small fraction of the potential customers in those zip codes continue to shift their purchasing habits from grocery stores to farm-direct, then we see great potential in the years to come for farms like us. 

Raising livestock on pasture while also direct-marketing is definitely not easy and goes against conventional wisdom in many ways, but rest assured we are working hard in continuing to transform our farm to be even more transparent and customer-friendly.  After producing our first grass-finished steer 14 years ago, we are now committed even more to producing the best proteins on the planet while also serving our customers with honesty, convenience, and friendliness. We’ll likely never have the budget for acquiring customers like some of the aforementioned companies do, but we know that pleasing the customers we have now will lead to a steady stream of new customers through word-of-mouth.  This will provide the growth our farm needs to continue this transformation to a more effective carbon-sequestering, customer-centric and entirely pasture-based farm.

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Organic Produce Box!

Below is an unboxing video of what each customer got this past week who ordered a produce box made possible by Wild Hope Farm!

This is some of the finest USDA Certified Organic produce that there is, and it’s grown about 15 minutes from our farm!

Each box will contain 8 to 13 delicious items.  Only a limited number is available so hurry up and reserve yours.  

The deadline each week is Tuesday at 5 pm and the next boxes will be ready for pickup or delivery Thursday, July 29. 

We are only able to offer this produce box for Farm Pickup, GSP, and Charlotte/Fort Mill/Rock Hill Home Delivery customers right now.  (We hope to be able to extend it to Charleston and Columbia customers soon.)

Reminder for Premium Herd Members: With your premium membership, you get free delivery for a produce box just like for any other products we offer!

Head over and check it out and pass the word along!

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Product Spotlight

We finally have a good bit of ground beef and mild sausage in stock, and we’ve made available our 20- and 40-lb bundles once again!  These allow you to save some money while stocking up.  Save $.25/lb when you order the Ground Beef 40-lb bundle and $1.00/lb when you order the Milld Sausage 40-lb bundle.

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Referral Program

If you enjoy our products please consider passing the word along to your neighbors, friends and family!  We don’t spend a lot of money of advertising but rather depend on customers like yourself to advertise for us if they are amazed by our products and customer service.

All you have to do is refer someone to us and when they place an order for the first time they will get a link to a form where they can say who referred them.  You and the new customer will receive a $15 credit!  So make sure they tell us your name.  Hit the button for more info!

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Order Deadlines

Charleston: 12 noon Mondays
GSP: 12 noon on Wednesdays
Charlotte/Rock Hill: 12 noon Fridays
Farm Pickup:  Please wait until you receive an email stating that your order is ready to be picked up (usually 1 business day from when you place your order).  Farm Pickups will now be done during our store hours: 

• Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday: 10am to 6pm
• Saturday: 10am to 2pm
• Closed Sunday and Wednesday

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Did you know that we have a webpage that displays all the reviews we have received?  

Check it out!

Check out this ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review:

“Watson Farms has been wonderful to work with. We have enjoyed cubed steak, hamburgers and a standing rib roast so far. All of them were great quality!”

We would greatly appreciate it if you would be kind enough to leave us a review.  It helps first-time customers purchase with confidence.

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Thanks again for being partners in this endeavor of local, pasture-raised proteins that has truly transformed our farm.  We look forward to continuing this transition while serving you long into the future.

Sincerely,
The Watsons

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Pasture Posts is written by Matt Watson.