with Vandra Thorburn, President of Vokashi
Vokashi is a compost starter that uses Japanese methods of fermentation to compost raw food waste. It’s easier than most composting methods, faster and doesn’t put off as much of an odor. Come to our office for Imagine the Next™ this Friday, July 15th at 12:00 to learn more about this unique composting technique.
The Moderns hope you had a great, long weekend celebrating our wonderful country. Ours was filled with time with family and friends, delicious food and the annual Macy’s firework show, which is always a crowd pleaser. Our founder, Janine James, didn’t realize the fireworks were literally at the end of her street. She ran outside, grabbed ice cream from the organic ice cream truck and watched the fireworks with business partner, Kevin Szell’s three barefooted children (don’t tell their dad!). Next year we know whose cookout we’re going to in Chelsea to get a front row seat to the fireworks show.
Community Supported Agriculture Programs, or CSAs, are mutually beneficial partnerships between farmers and their local communities that allow consumers to receive ultra-fresh, affordable produce while supporting sustainable farming practices. At The Moderns, one of the many ways we Imagine the Next is through our employee benefits. We recently began participating in the Prince George-Norwich Meadows Farm CSA and just received our second share of fresh produce. Every Thursday our staff receives local produce from the Norwich Meadows Farm, a certified organic farm in Chenango County near Binghamton, New York. We have yet to hear of any other company that provides this employee benefit. We are proud to be the first.
How it works
CSAs allow small farms to compete with large industrialized agriculture by greatly reducing the costs and risks involved in small farming. Community participants in a CSA pay in advance for a share of the food that a given farm will produce. This reversal of the usual process—where farmers typically grow first and get paid later— offers a number of benefits. Since everyone gains in proportion to how much is produced, farmers and consumers are pooled together to share the risks and rewards of farming. Small farms become far less likely to be ruined in the event of a poor season, while everyone still benefits from a great harvest. Having money in advance also allows farmers to buy seeds and hire labor without having to take out high interest loans. Plus, because they already know where their food is going, farmers do not need to worry as much about marketing during the growing season, when they may be working 16-hour days.
Volunteering
CSAs are a great way for people to become informed, involved, and connected to their food and food production. In our CSA, volunteering and interacting with others is an important component. It is required for each shareholder to volunteer at least 4 hours. Volunteers can get involved by helping during distribution days, organizing a potluck, or making volunteer reminder phone calls. As an added bonus, we will even have the opportunity to meet with our farmers and talk with them about the food we eat and the growing process!
At The Moderns we Imagine the Next in social, environmental and food justice, not because it is trendy, but because it is who we are. For the past twenty years, we have been supporting environmental and social equity through multidisciplinary work for our clients. Providing our employees with fresh, sustainably produced organic foods is just one of the ways we are improving the workplace and the world – by staying true to ourselves.
To learn more about CSAs, visit Common Ground and Local Harvest.
We are extremely pleased to announce that our space is featured in both the print and digital editions of Contract Magazine May 2011 issue.
The article includes an interview with our President and Chief Creative Officer, Janine James, on how The Moderns turned a catastrophic 8,000-gallon flood into an opportunity to reinvent ourselves and the way we use our Manhattan office space – an event she coined our “tsunami for change.”
The article is particularly timely as it coincides with our twentieth anniversary, which The Moderns celebrated in March of this year. If you are interested in writing about or renting our space, please don’t hesitate to reach out!
The online article can be viewed here.
A very special thank you to Jondi Whitis for presenting at our weekly Imagine the Next series last Friday, May 20th. We were inspired by Jondi’s introduction to EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) and enjoyed collectively learning and exploring the specific techniques of the medium.
EFT is an energy therapy that utilizes several acupuncture points on the body that are located on important nerve ending groups. With roots in ancient eastern medicine traditions, it has a very high success rate due to its elegant and simplified methodology. During EFT, a rating system is used to determine progress made over conquering stressful memories and triggers.
Jondi works and uses these methods with a variety of groups, from small children to returning veterans with post-tramautic stress disorder. She is a certified EFT Practitioner and we are so grateful for her visit and presentation.
Thank you Jondi!
