The Natural State with Dr. Anthony Gustin

170: Charley Cummings - Fixing a Local Food System by Connecting Farmers with Consumers

10 snips

Mar 6, 2023

Charley Cummings, founder of Walden Local and Walden Mutual, is on a mission to connect farmers with consumers and turn the local food system on its head. He shares his transformative journey into agriculture, emphasizing the importance of small-scale farming over industrial methods. Charley discusses the obstacles he's faced, including challenges in financing for farmers, and reveals surprising insights about the impact of banking choices on the local economy. His work is about balancing sustainability with community engagement, urging listeners to rethink their food and banking habits.

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ANECDOTE

Charley's Farming Journey

Charley and his wife moved from California to New England and began working an organic diversified farm for nearly ten years.
This hands-on farming experience led Charley to realize the unsustainability of industrial agriculture and inspired new local food solutions.

INSIGHT

New England's Ecological Advantage

New England's climate is ill-suited for row crops but ideal for pasture-based ruminant animals.
This regional ecological fit creates a unique advantage for pasture-raised meat production locally.

ADVICE

Solving Local Food Distribution

Connect consumers to local farms by building user-friendly distribution and delivery systems.
Optimize whole-animal use by matching consumer preferences and developing wholesale markets for less popular cuts.

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Charley Cummings started his business Walden Local as a way to connect farmers with consumers. He also worked to address and fix the issues in the entire food supply system in his local New England area, and now it proudly serves 30,000 families there.

His business tackles everything from raising and processing animals to hand delivering the meat to consumers.

In this podcast episode, you’ll hear all about what led Charley to start this business, the problems he’s addressing, the obstacles he faced, and so much more.

On top of building Walden Local, Charley also created Walden Mutual, which is a bank that supports the local economy and, more specifically, the local farming community he works with.

You’ll not only hear about how Charley started Walden Mutual in this episode, but you’ll also learn about the true impact of your bank deposit dollars — you’ll be surprised by this one — and why you should pay more attention to where your money goes.

Here’s a look at some of the topics Charley and Dr. Anthony Gustin discuss:

Charley’s story and how he found himself in this local agricultural movement space
Charley’s experience that made him realize something more needed to be done to connect consumers with local farmers
What Charley’s business Walden Local does
The pivotal point that shifted Charley’s thinking on addressing global environmental issues and how he still uses this thought process today
How Charley wanted to play a role in tackling environmental issues
Why there’s no silver bullet to climate change and what can be done instead
The problems Charley initially set out to solve and what that looks like today
How Charley addressed issues like moving massive quantities of ground beef
Why Charley doesn’t ship his meat and the delivery approach he uses instead
Some of the challenges farmers in his area faced and what he did to help people overcome them
What happens to your money when you deposit it in a traditional bank
How to change where your deposit dollars go and why you’d want to do that

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Charley Cummings’ Walden Local website
Charley’s Walden Local Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook
The bank Charley started - Walden Mutual
Charley’s email - Charley@WaldenMutual.com