Past Pages, June 20, 2011: Subscription Farming Provides Valuable Sources of Income

The cover of the June 20, 2011 edition of Northern Nevada Business Weekly.

And deals in which customers often make a down payment and payments throughout winter and spring for cartons of produce delivered at regular intervals give smallholder farmers a solid way to gauge demand for their crops.

Some northern Nevada farmers with subscription plans have as few as 15 customers, while others have over 300 subscriptions. One of the biggest benefits of subscription farming, according to Ray Johnson of Custom Gardens Organic Farm, is the living income provided by winter and spring subscription sales.

– Page 1, by Rob Sabo

Launch of “Nevada Connectors” to connect experts with entrepreneurs

It didn’t take long for questions from entrepreneurs to start pouring in last week after the launch of the Nevada Connectors online initiative.

Among the first requests: A question from an entrepreneur who wants to establish strategic partnerships with other start-ups but is concerned about the potential for legal entanglements.

Like other questions at www.nvconnectors.com, the investigation was assigned to one of two dozen business, financial and legal experts who agreed to provide one-on-one consultation, one question at a time, to entrepreneurs. .

The website, a joint venture of the Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada and the College of Business at the University of Nevada, Reno, is the brainchild of Chris Howard, a longtime venture capitalist and business consultant in Reno.

– Page 1, by John Seelmeyer

Emerging greenhouses as an opportunity for SunScience

The founders of SunScience Corp. thought they had developed great green energy technology for use by the military and disaster relief agencies. But the technology appears to be gaining traction first in a drastically different industry as SunScience prepares its first commercial installation in greenhouses in the Lovelock area.

The private company founded in Reno two years ago projects 2011 revenues of just under $ 1 million and estimates it will become profitable on a five-fold increase in sales next year. She raised capital through private equity sales.

Like many plants that grow in Lovelock greenhouses that will use its technology, SunScience’s system is a hybrid; its solar panel combines photovoltaic technology, which converts sunlight into electricity, with a solar thermal system to capture heat from the sun.

– Page 2, by John Seelmeyer