First, here's an interesting article on this topic. Just a couple of weeks after I posted on small, artisan foods, Adam Davidson of Planet Money wrote an article for the New York Times on artisan, craft foods. "Don't Mock the Artisanal-Pickle Makers," it's called. Davidson says, "Contrary to popular belief, the revival of craft manufacturing isn’t just a fad for Brooklyn hipsters," and describes how some artisan food craftmen are able to scale up and run a healthy American manufacturing business. Davidson makes a compelling case that "craft business is showing how American manufacturing can compete in the global economy." Specifically, craft businesses avoid "direct competition with low-cost commodity producers in low-wage nations" and instead, create "customized products for less price-sensitive customers." This is a very hopeful article, and I like economic optimism.
Second, my big artisan food news is that my husband and I have decided to try our hand at becoming "artisanal food craftsmen" ourselves! We have just launched a new company, Flying Granola - as you can learn in my other blog, http://flyinggranola.blogspot.com/ - and hopefully we will be making our debut at a local craft/food fair sometime this spring. Stay tuned!
And bringing it all together, here's a link to the story of Bear Naked Granola. Personally I just like to cook, eat, and feed others, but certain other founders of Flying Granola are very inspired by success stories like this. Success in this case being 0 to 60 - that is, $60 million - in less than six years.
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