Fennel in Ferrisburgh

Course 7 tasks us with designing an app and responsive website for social good. Here's the idea I'm noodling. Our small Vermont community is serious about supporting local farmers. We are ecstatic when the spring produce starts to roll out. Greens, peas, asparagus, strawberries! There are many small farms in our area and a few easily accessible farm stands. And there are more farm stands along rural roadsides. Those are harder to find and don’t come up on Google Maps. The larger farms and farm stands have websites to let you know what produce is available, but the small ones don’t. Farmers, like our neighbor, are crazy busy and have trouble finding time to advertise their products. Consumers, like me, don’t know exactly where to go, and when, to find our favorite food items. For example, last summer I needed fennel for a recipe. I stopped at the two farm stands along my route home from work and neither had fennel. Luckily our neighbor had some, so I didn’t have to drive back into town to go to a grocery store. Imagine if I’d had an app to search for “fennel in Ferrisburgh”!

The author with home-grown fennel in 2014