What is OPEN FARM DAY?
Barnstead Open Farm Day began in 2012, including only Barnstead farms. Organized by Robin Donovan and Don Walker. They created the Barnstead Farmers and Gardeners Network and put together a campaign to allow Barnstead Farms to open their farms for one special day in the Summer. Marked by custom made booklets and posters, they would plaster the community with the date and the people would come.
When Jared and I bought our fixer upper farm in 2015 we were immediately approached by Robin and Don and asked to join in on their event. 2016 was the very first time we open our project farm to the public. Even though we didn't have anything to sell (we were still in major renovation mode) we opened our farm up to several small business' and other farmers to showcase the community offerings in our small town. We did have our rabbit barn built and our rabbitry business was a big draw for other enthusiast who wanted to come and see our set up and talk about raising rabbits.
Jared and I worked with Robin and Don every year to help organize the event. We created facebook marketing campaigns, recruited new farms to join and shared in the vision they had for Open Farm Day.
When Covid happened in 2020 there was a momentary pause in Open Farm Day for that year but Amy (with LorrenJoyce Farm) and I were insistent that Open Farm Day would happen in 2021. Small but mighty, Open Farm Day was a huge success despite having lost several small area farms. No matter how big or small the event was, it was always an important day for the farmers and community. Our farm hosted several farms, area business', crafters, artist, demonstrations, BBQ Lunch, live music and self guided tours through the woods. This was the first year our Farm Store was open for business. We were finally able to offer our own farm foods for the event and show off all of the hard work we had been investing in our infrastructure for all of those years.
In 2022 we decided to include Pittsfield to help bring in more prospective farms for the event. The event grew and was a HUGE success. We saw more people at that event then in any other Open Farm Day event before. With the combined online marketing and social media campaigns and the eager community ready to get out of their homes for a fun summer outdoor event, we had record growth and new vision for the future of Open Farm Day.
Fast forward to 2023 and we are still here, happy to open our farm every year to the community for the Annual Open Farm Day. One of the most important things for us is showing how we are growing. For those of you who have been visiting our farm since 2016 to today, you know what we mean. We have moved a lot of soil, planted trees, cut trees, built new barns and outbuildings. We never stop growing and expanding and we are so happy to share that with you.
What will we be offering this year?
We have a very exciting line up of community artist, crafters, farmers and more to share with you this year. Our farm demonstrations have always been a huge hit and we will be inviting some extremely talented and hard working farmers, metalsmiths, loggers and more to come share what they do.
We will have a BBQ Lunch being offered all day.
Hay rides through our woods and self guided tours for you and your kiddos. If we're lucky, we might even have Lucy-Loo, our resident pig, come and meet everyone.
As always, we offer plenty of off-street parking and a fun and safe atmosphere for everyone.
See you all August 19th, 2023 for OPEN FARM DAY!!