Chipotle Goes Loco for Local

Chipotle, the fast-food chain that has been making strides with sustainable meat, is now ramping up local foods with a promise to source at least 25 percent of one produce item from small and midsize farms within 200 miles.

The company is getting a lot of publicity with the move, but it's not alone. Bon Appetit Management Co., the less well-known food service company that runs more than 500 cafeterias for places like Oracle, Yahoo, Seattle Art Museum, and my alma mater, Reed College, sources about 40 percent of all its supplies locally (though that may include bread from a local bakery).

All of this is great news for local farmers, whose biggest challenge now is meeting the robust demand. And it also creates a challenge for upstart food distributors which will feed the markets with local farm fare.

Let a thousand new local businesses and farms bloom.

- Samuel Fromartz

Comments

[Katherine from Bon Appétit Mgmt Co]

Let the local farms and communities bloom indeed!

We actually received a letter from a farmer in the Midwest, Eric Klein from Hidden Stream Farm (http://www.hiddenstreamfarm.com/catalog-hsf/default.php), telling us his story about how he and his family were able (and needed) to expand their business after connecting with Bon Appétit. In addition to providing flavorful, local meats to three Bon Appétit locations in the area, he also collects our used fryer oil to fuel his pickup truck! It doesn't get more sustainable than that, does it?

Local farmers really are the stewards of the land and we should do everything we can to support them. It's stories like the Kleins' that really keep us going here at Bon Appétit!

Cheers,
Katherine

[Organic George]

So is it 200 miles from farm to store or 200 miles round trip?

This is the problem with Local, everybody gets to define what it means.