A Reflection on Time

written by

posted on

October 28, 2025

Does anyone feel like they blinked and the summer was over?

More than once this season I joked with our stewards (our 'stewards' are our summer intern program team-members, here with us for just 5 months) that the summer is like a ball rolling down a hill - it starts off slowly but quickly gains speed the further it travels.

Our summer farming "season" runs from May 1st to October 1st each year.

I remember a few years ago, when I was a steward, the month of May felt long. Not because I didn't enjoy it, but because everything was new.

Once we hit June, my team and I had a broader knowledge base and a greater sense of routine. Not surprisingly, June went by much more quickly.

As I chatted with our crew about this past summer, many of them agreed that each successive month (of their five months here) seemed to go by more quickly than the last!

What is it about the human condition that makes us feel like time goes by slowly or quickly? We don't gain or lose a minute regardless of how we feel.

Everyone has the same amount of time in their day....but how we choose to spend it differs widely.

This season, the stewards spent time moving broilers, tending to pigs, processing hundreds of chickens, building structures, making hay, and working with cows - just to name a few things!

As I reflect on our summer season, I am challenged by this thought: "Am I putting my time where my values are?"

Are we as a society rushing around trying to keep on top of things that feel urgent yet neglecting the important things - the things that really matter to us?

This is no easy paradigm shift. Often, it takes a series of painful "no's" (to things that are often good) so we can say "yes" to things that are better.

As the days get shorter and nature invites us to slow down, let's take an inventory of where we are spending our time; it truly is our most valuable resource.

- Melissa

Short of Turkeys and Beef

For the first time in many years, we’ll be short of turkeys for Thanksgiving. Consistent with our policy of full transparency, here is why. And we’ve been short of beef now for some time. The underlying theme of this explanation is to inform you completely about why and what we’re doing about it. Unlike many businesses, we don’t call up other outfits to supplement ours when we’re short. We figure out how to produce more and until then, simply run behind. Because of that, when we explore new markets, we can’t adjust our inventory instantaneously.We’ve had a couple of incredibly exciting market developments this year. We’ve always tried to experiment with new opportunities when markets request product. You never know which ones will be long term, short term, positive, or negative. Over the years, we’ve given away turkeys when we overproduced due to assuming a certain market opportunity would come through; that’s not financially viable. As a result, we’re pretty careful about expansion. Three years ago, a large corporation in Virginia asked us to supply turkeys and Christmas hams to their 300 employees. We had no idea they would hang with us this long, but here they are, happy and showing unbelievable loyalty. We’ve been reluctant to count on them simply because these kinds of things normally don’t last. But isn’t it exciting and even exhilarating that a big company is buying our kind of turkeys and hams for their employees? The other thing that developed—and these things develop slowly—was Azure Standard asked us to supply them with 1,000 turkeys as a trial to see if their customer base would like them. By the time that deal was formalized, we were too late to order more turkeys and did not have the full number for them, but we we did the best we could. Some of you who are Azure Standard customers will no doubt see our turkeys pop up on their sales platform. When an engine going somewhere wants to hook to us, we always try to at least collaborate in an experiment. That’s where we are; if all are happy, this could be an extremely positive strategic client for us in the future. In the same way, we’ve been contacted by a new internet marketing outfit wanting some of our beef. We’ve agreed to let them have five in 2027. We’re hoping ongoing discussions will lead them to carry our poultry and pork as well—right now they’re only beef. None of this is about building an empire. It is about collaborating with the cutting edge of authentic food and circumventing Big Food, Big Ag, and Big Pharma. Innovation comes in many ways. Polyface perhaps leads the world in the production element. But processing, marketing, and distribution are also undergoing innovation and staying relevant is a daily objective. That some of the most creative significant players in the integrity food movement are asking us to play with them is wonderful. They could just handle industrial organic meat poultry, which doesn’t see pasture and doesn’t enjoy the happiness context of Polyface livestock. But they’re talking to us, and that’s awesome. All innovation carries a ragged edge as it develops, refines, and hopefully becomes efficient over time. Thank you for indulging us the freedom to explore these new venues and to collaborate with some of the best players in the good food movement. As you can imagine, growing and experimenting create their own sore muscles. Being short is not fun for either of us, but be assured it’s not because our animals are sick or we’re getting tired of being farmers. You can laugh at that. It’s because, true to our history, we are committed to putting food worth eating on plates held by friends. We count you as friends; that’s why we’re taking you on this little explanation behind the curtain. Hang in there and thank you, thank you for your loyalty and patronage.

Interview with the 2026 Stewards -- Part 3!

Closing thoughts on the Summer of 2026 by Polyface Steward Holly Mitchell.

The Full Circle - Utlizing the Entire Bird

The full circle of the poultry world: September musings on utilizing the whole bird, in every season, at every stage.

A Reflection on Time

More from the blog

Short of Turkeys and Beef

Interview with the 2026 Stewards -- Part 3!

The Full Circle - Utlizing the Entire Bird

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