Great New Products & Food Resiliency

Greenhouses for Food Resiliency

Starting this spring, Shed Windows and More will stock modular greenhouses. Having a greenhouse on your deck or backyard helps you grow food for your family year-round. We will be carrying sizes as small as 4 feet, which could fit on an apartment or townhouse deck to whatever size you want for your backyard or commercial operation. The beauty of these modular greenhouses is you can add to them over time because they are expandable!

Our greenhouses hold up to 130 mph wind and up to 6’ of ground snow, or an 80 pounds PSF of ground snow. Our standard greenhouse withstands winds up to 110 mph. These greenhouses are built to last and are sturdy enough to withstand the weather. Greenhouses come in the original modular style, and also raised bed greenhouses, and barn- style greenhouses. The barn-style greenhouse can accommodate taller plants since it’s 6.5 feet tall.

Extend your garden anytime with our proprietary extendibility. Modularity allows you to add-on to your greenhouse anytime and makes it easy to move. Extend your garden anytime with our proprietary extendibility. Modularity allows you to add-on to your greenhouse anytime.   Order a 4′ module, unscrew a few bolts, and you have extended your greenhouse in under 2 hours. So even if you rent, you can invest in a modular greenhouse to grow food for your family, because if you move, your greenhouse can move with you!

Why Food Resiliency

Why is food resiliency important? We’ve been down this road before during COVID and we found if we were prepared that our family’s food supply was more secure and our budgets didn’t get rocked as much from economic changes and food inflation. Food resiliency is why we wrote about backyard farms, having your own chickens for meat and eggs, and growing your own vegetables.

With egg prices so high and inflation still an ongoing factor, growing your own food makes good sense on many levels. With food as close as your backyard, you drive less so your gas bill goes down and you have a readily available food source you can depend on.

Starting a Food Co-op

Starting a food co-op is easier than you think and you can save your family and community up to 60% on your monthly food bill. Starting a food co-op can be as easy as a few families deciding to buy from local vendors together to reduce prices, or it can have a storefront and be an ongoing business for the community. The type of food co-op we are discussing today is a simple version where a small community comes together once or twice a month to distribute food together.

I have formed two food co-ops in the past within small communities. One food co-op was established in our local church, and the other was a group of mothers that decided to band together at Mommy and Me group to start a food co-op. Some of my fondest memories are when we were outnumbered toddlers to adults three to one. We loved getting organic food at a fraction of the cost and it also formed a tight community of families that helped each other out in many ways over the years.

How to Start a Food Co-op

We offer some thoughts today on how to start a food co-op in your local neighborhood or community. There are now so many organizations supporting food co-ops big and small, along with some amazing publications. You’ll have a lot more support for your co-op than we did years ago. Here are some things to think about in your planning:

• Assess if there is a need among your friends or your community. You might be motivated to start a food co-op due to inflation and the high cost of food. You see your family’s food bill climbing each month, and you still want to provide nutritious food for your family. many times, if you have a need, others do too! Maybe you want to source more organic food but don’t want the increased cost. You might be motivated to deal more directly with farmers and ranchers to provide food for your family. You would like gluten-free options, but almond flour and coconut flour are costly. Or you might want to cut down on so many trips to the grocery store to save time and money.
• Find a group or form one if you don’t already have one. Social media can be a great way of connecting with your local community. Also, community bulletin boards, your children’s school, 4-H, and after-school sports can be a way to connect with other families that want to access better food for less money. You can also ask everyone to put out the word to their friend list to get interest in forming a local food co-op.
• Find your suppliers. Check with people who you know. It’s amazing how connected we are along with our friends and community. We made a list of people we knew and we were amazed how many contacts we had that could supply our local food co-op. Restaurants are a good first contact or small vegetable stands because increasing their orders can help bring down their pricing and options. There are also several suppliers that you can find with a local search. Look for wholesale produce suppliers, meat suppliers, grains and staples, and dairy suppliers. We have so many of these suppliers that are local to our community, but in other communities these products need to be trucked in.
• Figure out distribution. Will you have a monthly order and pickup? Does twice a month work better for your group? We had a monthly pickup and everyone got together with containers and utensils to help divide products. We had hanging scales and other scales to weigh containers and product. Everyone paid for their order ahead of time and we divided the cost, including products, taxes, and shipping cost, between everyone. We liked to keep things simple so there was no storage involved. You can make this process as simple or as complicated as you want. We wanted simple. Currently we are talking to a restaurant that is open three days a week, and we would use their location to divide and distribute products. It’s good for the restaurant for marketing and outreach, it also helps them increase orders and lower their overall costs.
• Set up your details and distribute your order. You can set up a banking account and take checks from everyone. With the ease of the internet, you can take payments through Zelle or Venmo to the back account that pays for orders. If you want to be totally online, people could place their orders and pay online. Keeping it simple will keep the stress low and the benefits high.

Setting up a food co-op helps lower your family’s food costs and builds a strong community. Not to mention the other opportunities that might spring from forming a food co-op and more community involvement.

Be sure to browse the Shed Windows and More 2025 catalog to see all our new products for your outdoor buildings, home, and garden. We look forward to helping you build your next DIY project!