Rumbleway Farm: Delivering a Taste of the Farm

From farm to feast, Rumbleway Farm delivers a menu of diversified products and business strategies, with owners Robin and Mark Way continuing the legacy of their historic farmstead outside Conowingo in northeastern Maryland by reinventing itself for today's marketplace.

Mark grew up in a farming family, while Robin was a city girl from Philadelphia. Both longed for a rural setting in which to raise their children and create a livelihood. So when a 62-acre property that bordered Mark's childhood home came up for sale in 1992 as they were getting married, the Ways jumped into a new life setting, complete with a 200 year old stone farmhouse, original milk house and fifteen foot deep icehouse.

"Our first venture was custom-cut meat from beef cows and pigs. Then we added chickens raised on grass in moveable shelters, similar to what Joel Salatin was doing in Virginia. Eventually we added turkeys, rabbits and goats which are processed two to three times a year," explains Robin. Today, Robin manages the certified organic farm operations during the day balancing Mark's off-farm job as an Army lab technician which brings in needed health family benefits for their three children. Mark's work schedule enables him to be on the farm for meat processing days and on evenings and weekends.

Thanksgiving brings a busy season to the farm, processing over 350 turkeys in a 72-hour period before the holiday. Some turkeys are processed in the early fall. Raising primarily white turkeys that typically grow from ten to around 30 pounds and have plenty of white breast meat that customers typically want, Rumbleway Farm also raises specialty heirloom turkeys, smaller birds that reach 12 to 14 pounds and have a more delicate, fresh poultry flavor that has a blended chicken and turkey taste. "Very few of the over 46 million Thanksgiving turkeys are heirloom. These dark-feathered birds have nearly disappeared from production as the white turkeys are more efficient for the mainstream poultry industry, growing faster and heavier," Robin explains. Increasing media attention on heritage turkeys and the interest in local, organic heirloom foods have increased customer interest in these birds in recent years. "Our customers start placing orders in May," adds Robin.

As a long-term investment in the business, Robin and Mark installed an on-sight processing area for poultry in the late 1990s. In 2000, they upgraded their building and added a commercial kitchen, while working with various state and county agencies to ensure the building was up to code and would meet state and USDA organic certification standards. "Meeting these standards with our own facility now means we can sell meat and processed foods across state lines. As we're located close to the Pennsylvania and Delaware borders, this opened up business opportunities for us," explains Robin. Robin and Mark can process their poultry on-site with the beef, pork and goat meat still needing to go to a USDA certified butcher. Walk-in freezers and space for an on-farm store enable Rumbleway Farm to facilitate all their sales on-site. "Meats are hard to take to farmers' markets given their refrigeration and freezer needs," Robin adds. "This way, customers can pick out the cut and weight they want and I can still get my work done on the farm in-between."

Thinking of ways to diversify further, Robin and Mark added a commercial kitchen to the processing facility building project and three years ago started "Dinner on the Farm," open public dinners on the farm that showcase the meats and produce raised at Rumbleway Farm. "From November through March, when we are not processing meats, we turn the processing area into a dining room that can seat up to 25 people. The building itself is pretty professional and plain, so we do different things to dress it up a bit. We move out the processing equipment, add rugs to the cement floor, drape swags on the piping, use light covers to cut down on the fluorescent light glare, add curtains and use nice linens and china," explains Robin.

Typically held on two Saturday nights a month, between November and March, the $25 per person fixed menu dinner changes monthly and guests are all seated together at long tables. Courses are served family-style to encourage interaction. "I serve appetizers and desserts buffet-style to give folks a reason to stand up and mingle. Menus are based on what is in season and what I'm in the mood to cook," smiles Robin. A self-taught enthusiastic cook, Robin recently started taking some cooking classes at a local community college to increase her technique in culinary areas for which she was unfamiliar, such as breads, fish, candy and soup. Having done some regional advertising, Robin has found most of their dinner customers come through word of mouth which also brings customized catered events to the farm such as anniversary parties.

The commercial kitchen facility also enables Robin to sell her jellies and crock sauerkraut, a specialty product with the homemade kraut pounded into crocks and stored in the old ice house for six weeks to mellow in taste before it is canned. These types of facilities, in Rumbleway Farm's case including both processing and a commercial kitchen, vary in cost depending on the types of equipment used and the amount of in-kind labor and materials. A facility like the Ways' could run between $90,000 to $100,000, with basic processing-only facilities costing closer to $25,000.

"Regulations and codes explaining what can and can't be done at different types of facilities vary a lot state to state. Some things operate on county levels while others run on state levels. We asked a lot of questions and talked to a lot of people before starting to build our processing area and kitchen," explains Robin. "We've also found our extension service to be a helpful resource as we were getting started to talk about what there was a market for locally. Part of the reason we started with chickens is that nobody else was doing them around here." Free small business resource networks, often organized at local community colleges, along with volunteering at existing farm are other ways Robin recommends to learn about starting a business before jumping in. "A friend visited with us for a while to help us and learn what we're doing," adds Robin. Today Bob runs The Old Ackley Farm in Blue Hill, Maine, and processes his own chickens.