Barn2Door disrupts local food ecommerce by eliminating mark-ups to all food purchases

SEATTLE, Feb. 2, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Barn2Door.com (B2D), an ecommerce platform offering web stores for farmers to seamlessly manage online and direct local sales, today set the food industry on its head by announcing they will no longer levy a service charge for each sales transaction between farmers and customers.

Since the site launched in July of 2015, B2D carried a 15% service charge for transactions. As of today, B2D will no longer be adding mark-ups or take profit from farmers' food sales. This is great news for farmers, who often suffer margin loss on sales at the hands of middlemen, distributors and aggregators (typically 20% - 85%).

Barn2Door.com will move to a low, predictable monthly subscription for farmers to use a turnkey web store to manage sales, customers, communications, and local and online fulfillment across all buyers (wholesale and retail) seeking to buy the highest quality farm food direct. B2D offers a 30-day FREE trial, then will charge $10/month or $96/year. A standard 3.5% merchant fee will be charged per transaction to cover payment processing and hosting fees.

B2D Chief Executive Officer Janelle Maiocco said the change was prompted by experience and feedback: "We have been in this space assessing marketplace models, technology alternatives and listening to food producers." Maiocco, a former marketing executive, trained chef and farmer, noted that Barn2Door.com was going the right direction by creating a direct sales platform which includes the ability to create private offers, receive product requests and adjust delivery or shipping options as needed. However, she said it was clear B2D was only part way to being the go-to solution farmers needed to be successful, and decided to introduce some innovation to the process. "Adding a mark-up was a barrier to farmer adoption – it also increased prices for buyers. We wanted to do something to distinguish Barn2Door from every other company in the food space."

Maiocco seized the opportunity by evolving the Barn2Door business model to an all-in-one ecommerce solution that is custom-tailored for the food producers and buyers. B2D now functions like Shopify, Bigcommerce or Squarespace, who offer ready-to-go web stores and charge a monthly subscription with no barriers to driving large volumes. "Like those solutions we are building ecommerce best practices for our users," she said. "What is unique about Barn2Door.com is our 100% focus on building features and capabilities specific to farmers – plus the benefit of belonging to a 'collective food marketplace' versus being a stand-alone website." Petrina of Skylight Farms, who uses B2D to manage local delivery including on-farm pickup, added: "We chose to use Barn2Door because it gives us an opportunity to reach many more people than we could possibly reach on our own."

Kelleigh Stewart of Big Island Coffee Roasters, who has been using Barn2Door.com since last summer to ship just harvested, roasted-to-order coffee direct to customers across the country, said this of the recent change: "We were thrilled Barn2Door moved to something predictable for farmers: a simple, low monthly fee instead of a cut from our revenue stream – it feels like a true partnership." She went on to say, "We have tried other solutions and found them complicated, time consuming and expensive. Unlike those solutions, Barn2Door is simple and affordable."

About Barn2Door:
Barn2Door, Inc. (B2D) is a farm food marketplace designed to help farmers save time, make more money and easily track all customers and sales through an easy-to-use web store that integrates online and local sales. To learn more, visit www.barn2door.com

Media Contact:
Janelle Maiocco, Chief Executive Officer
Phone: 206.787.2220
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.barn2door.com

SOURCE Barn2Door, Inc.

Related Links

http://www.barn2door.com