What do you get when a traditional buyer’s club collides with a modern CSA in the tech age? Crowd Carnivore, that’s what.
This Australian-based grassfed meat retail system capitalizes on popularity of crowdsourcing to help conscious consumers purchase whole meat animals together, thus eliminating waste and reducing food costs. It was founded by Zachary Sequoia and Dan Tarasenko, who wanted to use the power of the crowd to help farmers committed to raising meat animals humanely and ethically.
“Crowdfunding the whole animal is economical for the farmer and butcher—they don’t have to worry about what to do with the meat that is not a prime cut steak, which is what everyone wants. The whole animal is already sold and accounted for,” Tarasenko told Huffington Post.
Crowd Carnivore participants buy their animal “on the rail,” meaning they get the whole animal, not just the premium cuts. Because a whole cow is pretty much impossible for a Sydney-dwelling resident to fit in their freezer, people in a given area go in together to purchase the cow, divvying up the resulting beef. Once the entire cow is sold, it’s taken to the butcher and then delivered to the participants. If the entire cow can’t be sold, you don’t receive your meat—but you get your money back. And this goes for other meat animals, like sheep, available on the website, too.
A photo posted by Crowd Carnivore (@crowdcarnivore) on
The best part of all, the customers get to (digitally) know their farmer and learn more about the husbandry practices used to make the meat top-quality and healthier than the grocery-store alternative.
Do you think that a “cow-funding” system like this would work for your farm’s bottom line?
