Full Transcript:

[00:00:00] Emily Race: Welcome to the Founding Mothers Podcast, where we're imagining new ways of living with one another and our planet. I'm your host, Emily Race. Today we are in conversation with Wen-Jay Ying. Wen-Jay is a spokeswoman and cultural translator for regenerative agriculture working towards making local food resonate with a growing and more diverse demographic.

By combining a first generation experience with female intuition, she's changing the way small businesses make an impact in this world and bringing urbanites closer to their food source. As the founder and boss at Local Roots New York City, a new kind of CSA and since last year a physical cafe and market space, Ying has for the past 11 years been single-mindedly driven to bring hyperlocal and nutritious food and produce to communities that need it most.

[00:00:57] Wen-Jay Ying: We actually have the ability to change the future of our Earth, and a very tangible way to do that is to buy through a local food system and buy from local farms that are taking care of the earth through organic practices. So yeah, I think people just should know that they have a lot more power than they actually think they do, and that's through our food choices.

[00:01:18] Emily Race: Wen-Jay believes the way we eat can change the world and is dedicated to healing our local food system. She was awarded Entrepreneur of the Year by former Mayor Bloomberg, New Yorker of the Week by NY1, Ones To Watch by Cherry Bombe and was a special guest invited to attend the 50th year anniversary UN Global Goals Gala due to her work in the field of sustainability and agriculture.

Her social impact business journey can be seen in Viceland’s show Hustle. Wen-Jay loves homestyle cooking, red velvet Peter Pan donuts, hiking upstate and in Japan, architecture museums, meeting strangers and diving deep into her friendships.

Welcome Wen-Jay, so grateful to have you with us. You look fabulous, for those who can't see you. Thank you for being with us on the podcast.

[00:02:05] Wen-Jay Ying: Thank you. It's a great alternative to being at the DMV today.

[00:02:08] Emily Race: Yeah. That's no one's favorite place to be. So you're joining from New York City, is that correct?

[00:02:14] Wen-Jay Ying: Yep, in Brooklyn at our cafe called Local Roots Market and Cafe in Carroll Gardens.

[00:02:19] Emily Race: Amazing. I'm excited to hear more about the cafe and the community spaces that you've created through Local Roots. But first, do you mind just sharing a bit about who you are today?

[00:02:28] Wen-Jay Ying: I'm Wen-Jay, the founder of Local Roots NYC. I have just renewed my DMV license, hence my comment at the beginning. I'm the founder of Local Roots NYC. We've been around since 2011, and we are a subscription based farmer's market and a market and cafe in Carroll Gardens with a Chinese farm to table menu. We believe that food can change the world. My life is pretty much dedicated to helping people understand food systems, understand what they're eating, helping them find ways to eat local, get higher quality produce in their life and ingredients in their life, while also supporting local farms. The way that our subscription farmer’s market works is that you order on our website, everything comes from farms within five hours of New York City, all sustainably grown products, then you can either pick up our food at a neighborhood bar or cafe in New York City or you can get it delivered.

That's our subscription farmer’s market side. It's called the Harvest Club. The great thing about it is that it's the easiest access to fresh local food, but you can also put your subscription on hold. So it's really curated for a New York City lifestyle. 

Our cafe we just opened up last year in Carroll Gardens, like I mentioned.It serves a bunch of my Chinese childhood’s favorite dishes. Lots of homestyle cooking, lots of things that you can't really find in America actually. It's all using local ingredients. 90% of our ingredients on our menu are sourced directly from local farms. And the reason why I wanted to quantify that is that a lot of people say they’re farm to table, but I know they are not actually authentic with their sourcing and where they get the food from and ingredients from.

We also do events at offices, so if you ever want to bring a farmer's market to your office or a pickle party or a healthy happy hour, we can do that.

[00:04:08] Emily Race: The offerings that you provide to the community seem to keep growing. I love all the ways that this has developed over the years since you initially began Local Roots. On that point, can you give us a very brief history of how Local Roots came to be, or more so the expression of it as we know it today?

[00:04:26] Wen-Jay Ying: When I was in my early twenties, I was backstage at a concert for the Flaming Lips, which is a psychedelic rock band.

And backstage with them, I was just dancing on stage with them during the concert and then the lead singer asked what I want to do with my life. At that time I was planning on either moving to Iceland or helping with Hurricane Katrina relief in New Orleans. And he had mentioned, I think it's great that you want to help people, but oftentimes we rush to the next natural disaster, and we don't think about what our local community members need, so maybe think about what your actual community needs. I'd thought about that and at the same time, someone had sent me an article about how there's a decline in supermarkets in New York City, how people are going to bodegas and corner stores to get their food and how it's creating health issues, which brings them back to those bodega to get over the counter medicine for this health element of eating processed foods.

From that article, I decided to work at a food justice nonprofit through AmeriCorps, which is like the Peace Corps, but in America, and that's when I got introduced to this grassroots movement of community supported agriculture, which is called CSAs, which are essentially subscription farmer’s markets.

I really fell in love with the local food system. From there I pretty much knew exactly what I wanted to do in my life, and that job didn't exist anywhere. So what I wanted to do was create these markets for consumers that's similar to a CSA model, which is that subscription based farmer's market model.But I wanted to make it more convenient for New Yorkers and more fun.

At that time in 2011, local food, organic food was really just marketed towards one demographic. It wasn't as much of a convenient or accessible lifestyle as it is now.

So I wanted to change that. I don't look like what most of the demographic at the time looked like. I was a lot younger, a person of color, and didn't have buckets of money. So I decided to start my own business on my mom's advice. I thought she was crazy at the time because I had no business experience. I was 25. And that was also back when– I think it's expected or just it's not as strange when you have someone that young starting a business and there's easier ways through social media– but back then there was no Instagram. There weren't really that many local food businesses in New York.

It was all pretty new. I wasn't really sure how people would react to it, but I think my own experience working at farmer's markets, working at this food justice nonprofit, gave a little more confidence in my new business, which was founded in 2011 and we're still around now.

[00:06:56] Emily Race: That's a huge thing to celebrate, because the fact that you've made it even past that first three year mark, where I feel like a lot of businesses make or break it, is a testament not only to your vision and what you've been personally being able to bring into this world, but I'm assuming the community that you've cultivated in a real need that you're addressing.

[00:07:14] Wen-Jay Ying: Thank you so much. I don't think most business owners celebrate their wins, but we probably should.

[00:07:20] Emily Race: And thanks to your mama too, for giving you that little nudge. Thanks to mamas everywhere. In terms of your vision for what's possible for the world, I'd love to start on a broad strokes level and we can pare it down from there.

What would you love to see in the world, whether it relates to food systems or just in general?

[00:07:36] Wen-Jay Ying: I think a very achievable thing is I would like for people to be more curious about their food. Curiosity can lead to an understanding that a lot of the food out there is heavily marketed and not actually good quality and actually bad for your body.

Curiosity can help people understand that there's a very strong connection to the food that you eat and how you're going to feel and how you can be present in the world and how we take care of the earth. Curiosity can lead to people understanding that when spending an extra dollar on an organic bunch of carrots, for example, there's just so much more meaning in that bunch of carrots from an organic local farmer than there is from a conventional, large scale farm. Curiosity might help someone understand that. There's all these different things that an organic bunch of carrots represents.

So that's, I think, a very achievable thing.

I think more of a lofty goal is more people eating local food. People were doing that during the pandemic and it's definitely plateaued again, back to normal. It's a shame because we actually have the ability to change the future of our earth, a very tangible way to do that is to buy through a local food system and buy from local farms that are taking care of the earth through organic practices. So yeah, I think people should know that they have a lot more power than they actually think they do, and that's through our food choices.

[00:08:51] Emily Race: Yeah, absolutely. It goes back to this idea of food sovereignty and we talk about this a lot on this podcast. So you're bringing in a whole other perspective to a conversation I think is really needed. On that point of eating locally, I feel like this is a phrase that's been thrown around more and more lately, which is probably a good thing– it's raising awareness around local eating– but how would you actually define what that means?

[00:09:13] Wen-Jay Ying: We define local as local grids within five hours of New York. Most of our food comes from farms within two hours, even as close as half a mile away from us, so it's hyperlocal. Five hours is a good mark because it's enough time that you could drive somewhere in one day and back. A 10 hour round trip commute is very long, but actually a lot of farms do that.

That to me is considered local, but people should probably remember that the word local has no regulation around how far that is. So anyone can say the word local and throw that word around, and it means nothing.

[00:09:46] Emily Race: Wow. I'm sure that's the case for many other aspects of the food we eat.

Maybe you can share more facts on that as we continue. One thing that came to mind for me when I discovered what you all are doing is this contradiction I felt around an urban lifestyle, like living in New York City– I don't know how more urban it could get– to actually eating locally.

And maybe there's just a rebranding that needs to be done around that. What do you have to say in terms of folks who live in urban areas, whether it's New York City or otherwise, and they're like, I don't know how to find local food.

[00:10:16] Wen-Jay Ying: For people in urban areas, it's actually a lot easier because every farmer is trying to sell to an urban environment because there are more people there. There are more farms that come to these cities. If you're in upstate New York, for example, in the countryside, sometimes you have to drive an hour to get to a farm, and it's very limited products, right? If you're in New York City, for example, LA, most of these main cities have really abundant farmers' markets. They have lots of CSAs. They have all these new kinds of small businesses that are popping up that can deliver local produce spread to your apartment or your home. So I actually think it's easier if you're in the city

[00:10:53] Emily Race: Is there anything to the challenge for someone who's not in the city? I don't know if that falls within your area of expertise, but do you want to speak to that at all?

[00:11:02] Wen-Jay Ying: People that don't live in the city, it's definitely a challenge to drive to places to get the food you want, time as the main hurdle of it. The perk of not living in cities, you have more time to actually cook and less choices to eat out. So you're cooking more at home, whereas in the cities, there are so many options. In New York you can walk down a block and have 10 food options, which is why we opened up this cafe. You can either buy groceries and cook at home with local ingredients, or you can come to our cafe and still get those local ingredients and not have to cook. That was the mentality of that.

[00:11:32] Emily Race: I'd love to hear more about the cafe in a moment. Before that, continue with the stand I've put us on. I'm curious what the benefits are of eating locally for those who may not actually really know.

[00:11:43] Wen-Jay Ying: When your food travels for less time, not only does it maintain more nutrients, it also maintains more flavor, because if you think about a vegetable as a plant, the second it’s pulled from life source, which is the soil, it's slowly dying. It's slowly losing nutrients. It's slowly losing flavor. That's why that shorter travel commute for your food to you is a lot better. If you're buying from farms that practice organic and regeneratively grown growing techniques, which means that they are rotating crops, it means that they are not using pesticides.

It means they have multiple kinds of crops on their farm. That kind of food is scientifically proven to have more nutrients. If you think about conventional farming, those pesticides are essentially stripping the nutrients and the health out of the soil. If your soil isn't healthy, your vegetables will not be healthy.

There is a statistic that, on average Vitamin C levels have decreased by 27% in 20 years due to conventional agriculture. There's a statistic that the UN has that in 60 years, 6-0, we can't farm and soil anymore if we keep this conventional agriculture system going because it's depleting the nutrients in the soil and it's leaving us with no farmland. 

Those are our two main benefits of eating local. And then there's other parts; the feel good of you're supporting a local economy, you're supporting farmers who are really passionate about what they do and how they do it and feeding people. You have a lot more transparency around your food. Your food gets touched and handled by less people. If your food's coming from South America, it's stopping at different kinds of hubs to get to New York. Those temperatures are constantly fluctuating between truck to truck or truck to cold storage unit. That it's affecting the quality of your food.

The food that's harvested from South America to get to you is going to be harvested before it's a peak flavor. So it can travel, it's under ripe so that it can travel for longer, so it's not going to taste as good when it gets to you. I did an Instagram video about this recently about corn from South America. At the border when it gets to America, it can easily be mislabeled and changed to organic, even if it was conventionally grown because there aren't many regulations at the border.

So even if you're buying organic products from overseas, you don't know if it's actually organic. So there's just a lot of moments within that food chain, if you're importing food, that can be mislabeled and you end up with a lower quality product.

[00:14:00] Emily Race: And then there's also the statistics, I don't know them top of mind, but the impact that all of that has on the environment itself through the emissions put out there from that level of transportation. Is that semi accurate?

[00:14:11] Wen-Jay Ying: Yeah, it'd have a larger carbon footprint too.

[00:14:13] Emily Race: This feels imperative then that we start to shift more and more to a local way of eating. But I heard, actually maybe it was in a different podcast, but you shared something around you actually, when it comes to that organic label, you actually feel like it's more important to eat locally than organic. I don't know if I heard that correctly, but I wanted to open up that conversation to bust some myths around aspects of how we choose the food that we eat.

[00:14:35] Wen-Jay Ying: I don't love answering that question because it depends on the product. I did a bunch of Instagram videos about which vegetables have the least amount of pesticides or the most amount pesticides if they're from a conventional farm. If you're getting kale, I would opt to get the organic versus local because kale and collard greens and mustard greens are grown with a ton of pesticides from a conventional farm. It's a vegetable in the top five tier of the most pesticides. But say if mangoes were local to New York or wherever someone is living. Mangoes if growing from a conventional farm have the least amount of pesticides in it compared to other fruit.

So if I had an option between local and organic, I would get local then. So it depends on the product for me. That's kind of complicated and people have to make their own choices. Either way it's a better decision than conventional imported stuff. People should not get tripped up about that and have decision fatigue; they should just either pick local or organic and don't overthink it.

[00:15:32] Emily Race: Thanks for the honesty in that. To your point about decision fatigue, one thing I really like about your approach is you really meet people where they are. Not trying to completely overhaul the way that you shop, the way that you eat overnight, but starting with some of the small steps. So what are some of those small steps that people could potentially take?

[00:15:49] Wen-Jay Ying: Picking one item that you eat the most of and getting that a local and sustainable farm. For me it would probably be eggs. I eat a ton of eggs. It's the easiest thing for me to add to a meal. That one I always opt for a local pasture raised egg farm, I'll pay the extra money for it.

Think about what you've cooked the most with or what's the most easily accessible thing to spend your money on.  It's easier to spend eight bucks on a dozen of pasture-raised eggs than it is to spend maybe 30 bucks on a cut of steak from a grass-fed, grass-finished local farmer. It's more like taking little steps and not feeling like you need to overhaul your whole pantry and fridge.

But realizing even a little step is going to make a difference in your body. And the more you do it, it's like working out. The more you work out, the more conscious you are of how your muscles feel throughout the day, how your body feels, you become more aware of it.

Same thing with this; the more you put these higher quality products into your body– I don't want to say higher quality, I want to say the cleaner products into your body– then the more you'll be conscious of how your body feels if you are eating that conventional produce,

[00:16:54] Emily Race: With the term conventional, since you've used it a lot– I also don't want to assume that listeners know what that is because maybe they don't. So can you define that for us in your own perspective?

[00:17:03] Wen-Jay Ying: For me, I'm saying conventional if people are spraying with pesticides or not growing organically. Conventional, I also use as a generic term to also equate to these larger mono-crop farms like factory farming. You can still be a local farmer, a family farm, and still be conventionally growing.

People would just assume that every small local farm is organic, which is not true. Most of them are not. So you still have to ask questions too at the farmer's market.

[00:17:29] Emily Race: I'm assuming with the model that local Roots has, you all are asking those questions on behalf of your customer base?

So then for folks who have access to purchasing their produce through you, that's one of the benefits. And then what you're suggesting is if that's not the case, we could all be empowered in asking these questions as we build relationships with our local farmers, whether that be through farmers' markets in our area. What are other ways that folks could build relationships, actually visiting the farms or what have you found to be successful?

[00:17:59] Wen-Jay Ying: I guess that is a huge benefit of why Local Roots exists, is that we do a lot of research. We do all the research for our customers, and we go to all of our farmers. We go to the farms. I think if you're at the farmer's market, definitely ask them questions like, do you grow organically? Do you have multiple crops on your farm? Oh, why aren't you organic? Things like that, with vegetables, I think it's pretty easy. But some things, like eggs or meat, it's a little more complicated. Definitely asking questions at the farmer's market. A lot of cities will have co-ops, which will usually have a local section.

People can join a CSA, which is what our companies model off of. There's a website, I think called localharvest.org, where you can find the closest CSA to you anywhere in the country. I would say to do a lot of research if you're buying from a sexy tech startup that is bringing farms to you, even though that's what Local Roots looks like.

We're very authentic with how we do our work. But I have noticed a lot of people that are similar companies completely lie about how they source.

Just because someone says local, small farms doesn't mean they're actually sourcing like that. It's definitely worth checking out the list of farms they source from other website, not to scare people away, but you have to do a little research.

[00:19:13] Emily Race: To add on that, that's a great skill to just build in general.

[00:19:18] Wen-Jay Ying: Yeah. Even for me, I was talking to this woman who makes sustainable accessories like bags, and it's the first I learned that a lot of vegan leather is made with plastic.

And even if someone's marketing their products as, Oh, we're eco-friendly, we have vegan leather, it's maybe just doing a quick Google search of what does vegan leather actually mean? What is it usually made out of? Because if H&M is selling the vegan leather for that price point, I guarantee it's not much better than whatever material they're using. Yeah, those are some tips.

[00:19:50] Emily Race: Thank you. I wanted to ask on the vision front as well, you talked a bit about folks being curious about what they're eating, putting in their body. What about your vision for how food is grown?

[00:20:02] Wen-Jay Ying: I prefer farms that practice for regenerative agriculture that's really just taking care of the soil and their soil health, which includes not using pesticides, but it focuses more on soil because that has an ability to sequester carbon from the environment back to the earth. So it's a great way to fight climate change.

Regenerative farms don't have to just mean vegetables. Cattle is actually used with regenerative farming. Cows have a really amazing ability to sequester carbon. People don't realize that. So do sheep, I believe. That is my focus on the farms that take care of the soil.

I’m a big advocate of food grown in soil versus hydroponically grown food. I think there's a place for hydroponic food, but I don't think it's ever supposed to replace soil based farming.

[00:20:47] Emily Race: The hydroponic piece is interesting because I've been hearing more and more about this recently and also through the context of utilizing space better It's interesting to hear your perspective on that, because it sounds like it's not just like black or white, yes or no, that's good or not. But you feel strongly that we still have a responsibility to take care of our soils because to that step that you threw out there before, we may not have soil to grow food in if we continue down. The path that we're currently on. Is that more or less what you're saying?

[00:21:16] Wen-Jay Ying: If you're not supporting soil based farmers, then you're not preserving farmland. If you're not preserving farmland, you can't absorb that CO2 from the air back into the earth. If you're not preserving farmland, you're also really altering the ecosystems of the land around you.

You can't grow every kind of produce in a hydroponic system. So if you're not supporting the farms and soil right now, eventually, there'll be a point where we can't farm anymore because of conventional agriculture. Then you can't get the other yummy things like, your potatoes and sweet potatoes and peppers and cucumbers. Those are some things that are a lot harder to grow hydroponically and space wise I don't really believe that because there's a shit ton of farmland in this world. I think the statistic, I might be wrong, I can't remember, but I'm pretty sure it's 1.1% of the world's farmland is organic.

Nobody can tell me there's not land to farm. There is, it's just conventionally grown, which eventually becomes so depleted you can't farm on it anymore. The solution to feeding people, the solution to climate change, is back to the basics and back to nature, which is just farming the way that we're supposed to be farming and how we used to always farm.

[00:22:29] Emily Race: I personally drove across the country several times and you see how much farmland there is and then that totally evokes that question, right? What is being grown here? Those mono crops like you mentioned, and how is it being grown? As you share some of this, what comes alive for me is, Oh shoot, how can I, as someone who purchases food and is a player in this food system that way, help to move the needle more towards regenerative farming? Do you have any thoughts on that?

[00:22:56] Wen-Jay Ying: Honestly, I really think it's the more people talk about it because the more there's conversations about it, and the more there is demand for that by larger companies, the more larger companies will actually make a shift. I know that a lot of oats that you eat have glyphosate in them, pesticides, and I feel like maybe there was a lawsuit against General Mills because of this reason.

So they have been trying to make a dedication to convert X amount of farms and work with to be regenerative.

The more people speak out about these things and they show they want to purchase these items and there's interest in it, the more the bigger companies will actually make a shift. And you need those bigger companies to actually care to actually make a difference. Realistically yeah, Local Roots could make a small difference, but I'm not delusional thinking we're going to change the world because we're such a tiny company. You need to have the General Mills, the Ocean Sprays, all those people on board to actually make a difference.

[00:23:52] Emily Race: That seems to be the case with everything. These larger institutions and companies, we need to see a tipping point there. But I also want to acknowledge it is conversations like this, when it is the work that you all are doing that can start igniting that desire in others to hold those corporations accountable.

[00:24:08] Wen-Jay Ying: Our company is completely grassroots and word of mouth since 2011. I probably should hire someone to do sales and marketing from a business standpoint. But we're mostly just word of mouth, so that's a good example of showing the power of word of mouth.

[00:24:23] Emily Race: And how much have you all been able to grow? Aside from the fact that now you have this cafe open, for example, are there any other measurements of growth that you want to point to over those past 11 years?

[00:24:33] Wen-Jay Ying: We do things that are more strategic now, like crop planning with our farmers, talking ahead of time in the summertime or in springtime to figure out where they're going to grow in the summer and fall. That makes a difference. That means we can diversify the kinds of foods our farmers grow. So people, our customers, don't have to eat kale every single week, but they get to eat tuna and bok choy and and collard greens and callaloo, So that's important to me.

Another sign of growth is, again with the planning of our farmers, we co-invested in a greenhouse with one of our farmers to grow food throughout the winter time because winter and spring is the hardest time for Northeast farms, with not much growing there.

But we sell to our customers all year round. So that was important for us to extend the season.

It's not a sexy thing, but the more organization we have within our company, just systems in place, that's a good sign of change for us because it is hard as a small business without funding to have those kinds of systems in place and have that kind of infrastructure.

[00:25:32] Emily Race:  I'm so glad I asked that question because in your response I'm like, Damn, that's not just growth, that's healthy growth. And I'm also hearing what's possible through building these relationships, albeit through a liaison, I guess you could call it, that Local Roots is providing, but it's really awesome to hear. This feedback and communication is allowing farmers to now meet the needs or the demands of what their consumer base really wants and needs. And that's a really promising and inspiring sign of what could be possible, and on that note, maybe you will cover this by talking about the cafe, but I do know that community has been a huge part of your model from the beginning.

And I heard something about how you would do pickups from cafes and bars and coffee shops and stuff like that. I'd love to hear about your vision in terms of the role that community plays and how we eat and how we enjoy our food and learn about it.

[00:26:21] Wen-Jay Ying: Community is really big because it's one of the main inspirations for me starting my company, to bring people together, having a small town vibe in a big city.

So that's important to me. Community can be seen in many ways. For us, the easiest way for community is actually between our market leaders and our customers. Every week when we're seeing customers, we talk to them about how their week was and what they’re cooking, give them recipe ideas.

So that's a really strong community we have. It's just Local Roots and our customers at the cafe with the same thing. We make sure to train our staff to be as friendly as possible. When we're friendly, it automatically creates the energy in our cafe where people want to talk to each other also, which is really important.

Community is important to me also in terms of diversifying what a local food leader looks like. It's why I think if you were to come to our cafe in Carroll Gardens, that it's very diverse between age range, ethnicity, sexuality, and everything like that. We make sure to have lots of drag shows, for example, drag brunch is really important to me, because it's introducing people also to drive culture in a community that there isn't much of in this neighborhood. So I think that's a good, nice way to combine communities. In the end, we really just have each other, and in New York it's really easy to forget that. So to me it's important to have these little touchpoints within our company that people can be reminded of why it's important to look out for your neighborhood to know each other.

[00:27:45] Emily Race: I love what you just shared too about the drag queen connection, because it really comes down to the fact that we all eat and then we all deserve to have healthy food that is good for us and good for our planet. To break down some of these stereotypes around what a farmer's market shopper looks like but then also build the soil of our community, there's like a metaphor there that I'm completely butchering, but yeah, it's beautiful.

Another question I have, which is related to community, but in terms of how we shop for our food: I feel like there's a wide range of how folks get food these days. Whether they're going to Walmart to buy their food, depending on where they live and what's accessible there, if they're going to a Whole Foods type experience or farmer's market. Do you have a vision for how we collectively could shift the way that we shop for our food? 

[00:28:31] Wen-Jay Ying: I think it just goes back to what I said before about making small changes within your buying habits, of buying one or two things that are local or organic.

I think that’s the first shift. And being curious, if Walmart says it's from a local farmer, how local is that? I'd be curious about that.

[00:28:48] Emily Race: Before we wrap things up here, I do want to celebrate the fact that you opened up this cafe and it seems like it's such a beautiful iteration of your mission and what you're up to. Is there anything you wanted to share around what you're learning from this process and this experience of actually opening up a cafe and evolving past just the subscription services?

[00:29:05] Wen-Jay Ying: It's definitely a different experience, having a brick and mortar in a physical location. There's a lot of different things to upkeep and maintain.

It's nice because I always like being this little focal point of the community, so I'm glad that we get to actually have that now. From having this physical space, we've been able to expand into things I've wanted to for a while, like catering or more events, like in offices.

That stuff is exciting to me. Honestly getting to know the neighborhood and seeing people's faces light up when they come in because everyone says it's such a unique place and that people have been waiting for this kind of thing to happen for a while.

That's really nice, that constant feedback loop, which is accessible if you have a physical location.

[00:29:41] Emily Race: And is there I'm assuming cross pollination, for lack of a better word, between folks who find you through the cafe versus finding you through a subscription service? Are they aware of who Local Roots is and then they come into the cafe that way?

[00:29:54] Wen-Jay Ying: There's a little bit of overlap; it's less than I thought they'd be. A lot of people that know of the cafe are just kind of walking by. They haven't heard of us before. I think everyone who's a subscriber to our farmer's market definitely knows we have a cafe, but not everyone who comes for a cafe knows who might have a farmer's market just because they're a lot newer to who we are.  Our social media does an okay job of showing both sides of the company.

[00:30:18] Emily Race: On a note of social media, I just want to say, if you don't follow Wen-Jay already, you need to because the videos you put out there are so educational and they're fun. It's taking something that could be done really poorly and in a boring way, but you have elevated the experiences of the viewer so that people can really get the information you are out to share.

[00:30:35] Wen-Jay Ying: Thank you. That was a huge intention of mine.

To me it's really important to show the truth behind food and there's a lot of lies that happen in the food industry, but do it in a really fun way, because it's heavy and boring stuff normally.

[00:30:49] Emily Race: My last question for you is do you actually have a vision to expand Local Roots outside of New York or is your vision to keep things local as the name describes it?

[00:30:59] Wen-Jay Ying: I want to open up a location in LA in some capacity but it's always going to be local, so whatever city I'm in is going to be sourcing from the local farms there.

[00:31:07] Emily Race: So then for folks who may not live in New York or LA, what words of wisdom do you have for them if they are inspired to start something like a CSA or something similar in their area?

[00:31:17] Wen-Jay Ying: You have to just do it and be a little delusional about how much work it might or may not take. I think if you asked me this question three years ago, I'd be like, Yeah, you should just do it. At this point of being in business for 12 years, I'm like, It's a terrible idea. It's a lot of work. So fulfilling, but it's a lot of work and most people probably don't want to do that much work behind it, but if they're in a different city, you need to access local food.

I would definitely say looking up farmer's markets, Googling who your local farmers are, if it's easily accessible to drive there, to actually pick up food right from their farm or to see if there is some kind of co-op delivery service that feels authentic to you.

[00:31:56] Emily Race:  Thanks for being real about the effort it takes, because I think that also would incentivize some folks to just continue to support the work you're doing.

And on that point, how could we support you and Local Roots moving forward?

[00:32:07] Wen-Jay Ying: Obviously buying our stuff, bringing us to your office, that's a huge part for us. Letting us bring a farmer's market to your office, following us in social media and just telling people about us is really helpful, @localrootsnyc and my personal is @WenJayYing. Those are the most easy and tangible ways to support Local Roots.

[00:32:30] Emily Race: Before we close out, anything else that you've been dying to share with us as listeners or want to make sure that we walk away with?

[00:32:37] Wen-Jay Ying: No, but check out my videos I've been putting online because the more feedback I get from them, the more I can figure out what kind of content people want to hear.

So far the most trending videos are, “Is salmon bad for you?” “Are your oats killing you?” I know the titles are a little dramatic, but those seem to be doing the best. Take a listen, take a watch of those videos and let me know what resonates or what feels exciting, what you have questions about, because again, there's a lot of misinformation out there. 

[00:33:09] Emily Race: Thanks for creating those and you're natural at it. So I look forward to continuing to watch. Again, thanks so much Wen-Jay for joining us and all the work you're doing and the model that you're really creating for others to see how we might engage with our food differently with our local farmers differently. It is so needed. 

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Founding Mother's Podcast. This podcast is produced and hosted by me, Emily Race, and edited by Eric Weisberg. If you want to support the show, please leave us a rating or share this episode with the important people in your life.

We'd also love to hear from you if you or someone you know would be a great guest to share about their vision for the world. You can email emily@founding-mothers.com or visit www.founding-mothers.com/podcast.