Farming Hope

1. Secure our Business Model:

We are successfully managing two business arms and our overall organization. We have significant understanding of the “competitors” like private caterers and other CBOs offering contract meals, as well as our competitive advantages: quality food, social mission, customer-centric delivery logistics, professional communication, and competitive pricing. We believe in creating a secure and scalable 3-5 year business plan that relies on the economy of the market rather than the economy of community partnerships. Also on the business side, we plan to grow our Community Meals program to become a major contributor to reducing hunger through nutritious meals, even pathways to employment for some of our diners. We wish to pursue a culture of long-term staff commitment and organizational sustainability to mitigate the high turnover rate of the nonprofit sector. And we wish to more thoroughly document HR processes for faster staff onboarding and organizational scalability.

2.Deepen our Program Impact:
Now more than ever our Apprenticeships are in demand. We negotiated a lease and began fundraising as we opened our second permanent location, called Refettorio San Francisco. To run successful Apprenticeships in this new location, we must double down on program impact by:

Enhancing more holistic programming
Advancing impact measurement
Expanding Apprenticeships and staff

3. Expand our Reach
2021
16 Apprentices trained
70% retain job at six months post-graduation
60,000 meals cooked for food insecure neighbors
10,000 pounds of food rescued (diverted food waste)

2022
30 Apprentices trained
80% retain job at six months post-graduation
90,000 meals cooked for food insecure neighbors
100 daily Refettorio guests (families experiencing homelessness)
15,000 pounds of food rescued

2023
40 Apprentices graduate
85% retain job at six months post-graduation
125,000 meals cooked for food insecure neighbors
100 daily Refettorio guests (families experiencing homelessness)
25,000 pounds of food rescued

Through these activities, we strive to help our Apprentices feel needed and gain the confidence to provide that same feeling to others. Ultimately, we want Apprentices to:

...feel loved and respected by their neighbors.
...achieve stable full-time employment at a living wage.
… be empowered to show others what it means to have a healthy body and soul.

Within three years, the Board, staff, and advisors plan to finalize and begin executing a strategy that allows us to scale through direct partnership with like-minded food justice organizations. We are considering doing this through a new foundation, which would directly help local leaders already attempting to start similar social enterprise kitchens in California. These plans to scale are noticeably advanced by our growing partnership with international NGO Food For Soul, their brand and their network. We believe this model of scaling would be significantly less “colonial” or imposed from outside the community than franchising; instead, it would offer resources and solidarity with existing leaders and local need, within our wheelhouse of food and jobs.

Farming Hope works within a diverse ecosystem of support services and partners to guide our Apprentices on their road to resilience. Our program staff work with Apprentices’ Referral Partners to make sure they get the most out of our 12-week transitional employment program. Both the Referral Partners and the Apprentices remain an integral part of the Farming Hope community long after their Apprenticeship is over. Each component of this ecosystem is indispensable in helping us execute our Theory of Change through providing our Apprentices with:

… on-the-job paid culinary training in our kitchens.
… garden training in our community garden.
… opportunities to feed it forward by cooking for our food insecure neighbors.
… culinary, professional, and life skill courses.
... inclusive community meals and events.

We define and measure success by both outputs and outcomes. Key outputs include:

1. Numbers of people trained
In 2020, we hired and trained 13 Apprentices, 11 of whom completed the full 12-week program.
2. Graduation and employment rates.
84% of our apprentices graduated in 2020. 90% of graduates obtained employment by graduation. All were housed at time of program departure thanks primarily to referral partners’ wraparound services and Apprentices’ own efforts.
3. Number of people served meals.
In 2020, we fed 53,367 San Franciscans experiencing food insecurity through our Community Meals program.

We define outcomes as measures of transformational impact that result from successful activities and outputs. Key outcomes include:
1. Grade improvement in Jobs Readiness Assessments.
Our goal is that Apprentices improve at least 30% from their first to their last JRA. In 2020, 80% of Apprentices improved by more than 30%.