Don't feel shy about calling farmers and trying to organize sales in your area, either through a CSA or some kind of buying club. If a CSA isn't delivering to your area, for example, you can call and ask why. Maybe you can attract one to your neighborhood, if you can gather a certain number of customers for that farm. Most farmers will appreciate a little help rallying a new set of buyers.
That said, don't forget to be patient when trying to reach your farmer(s), either by phone, fax, email or plain old snail mail. In our experience, even the most friendly, responsive, otherwise-consciencious farmers take a while to get back to their customers sometimes. And few seem to check their email every day. This may seem counterintuitive, given that farmers need to sell their wares to somebody, and those somebodies who bother to call will probably make outstanding customers. But good farmers are often better at farming than marketing. And they are very busy! Of course, farmers can provide excellent customer service, and there's no reason to expect otherwise. We're just noting that it's nice to give them a break when it's high season and the fence needs moving, the tractor needs fixing, the animals need feeding, the crops need planting, or irrigating, or harvesting ...
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