There are a lot of businesses that I understand are technically family owned, but just like every other buzzword and every other marketing slogan there’s so many different interpretations for that phrase.
On our farm when I say that we’re family owned I mean that mama is out there moving cows with a baby strapped to her back with two little kids following her during the week and then on the weekend dad is out there with us driving tractor, fixing fences, all of us following along in this big circus of Giggles and mud and picnic baskets and trying to get chores done with little kids climbing up your leg and it’s beautiful chaos all the time.
We don’t have a team of people helping pack and ship orders it’s me and a shed full of freezers with the kids, trapped in a pack and play while my five-year-old hand me the meat that I asked for and then we all box up the orders and deliver them together.
Picking out the cow that’s going to the butcher next is a family event. The kids and I pile on the side-by-side and call the cows to the pen and big Brother watches the babies so I can sort cows until we select that we want to process process and then separate that off and get it loaded and then it’s a family field trip taking it to the butcher.
And when there’s a big pile of bags or boxes going out that week there are a bunch of happy toddlers dancing around the pile singing because they’re so excited that people supported us and bought from our farm this week.
There are a lot of ways that family owned can be interpreted, but that’s our version.