Cereal Maker Rolling Oat Products
Cereal Maker Rolling Oat Products
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SARE "seed" money that helped launch a value-adding, regional food business is giving some farmers a stronger market for organic oats. The fledgling Vermont Cereal Co. was paying high transportation costs to process food-grade rolled oats in Ontario, Canada. A SARE producer grant paid part of an engineering consultant's fee to design a local production line in Cabot, Vt., cutting processing expenses in half. "We roll organic oats thick and chewy and toast them to a nice flavor," notes company cofounder Andrew Leinoff, who knew the product would impress health conscious buyers. Sizable orders from two distributors and a Boston supermarket chain will allow the firm to buy better equipment, hire another worker and increase weekly processing capability from 3,500 pounds of rolled oats to 18,000 pounds.
The company hopes to process an average of6,000 pounds of rolled or chopped oats weekly for sale in sixpackage sizes. Nine farmers will grow hulled oats for the companythis year. They could gross more than $300 per acre and share incompany profits. Dairy farmers eager for low cost organic feedsnap up whatever broken oats, hulls and flour the mill generates,keeping even more resources in the local economy. (NortheastRegion project FNE94-59.)
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