The New Year and The Old Year

- 2008 is ended with much uncertainty for many people, us included. Yet more war in the middle east, a shrinking economy here at home, job losses and home foreclosures. I don't know about you but this is not the future I had envisioned. As some of you remember, we moved our entire operation to a new, larger piece of land just to keep up with the growth we were experiencing. Now we've had to cut back on everything and reduce our staff. A very disappointing outcome after all that hard work and planning. I could make a list of all the things we might worry about but that won't get us far.

- We have reduced staff this year and we've had to discontinue some products and keep smaller inventories of many of the things we always had on hand in large quantities and fewer new products are being introduced. What this means is longer wait periods for product and reduced customer service over the phone. We're still here every single day doing our best for you and working longer hours than ever. My hope is that the situation with the economy gets better and we can get back to all the expansion plans we had and hire more people to answer the phones and e-mails everyday. We still get flooded with calls everyday from people asking tons of questions. It's flattering to know that people have come to depend on us for so much important information. I'd like to start a blog with a chat service but there's no time for that right now. If you can help me set something like that up and want to be a part of it, write and let me know your ideas.

-Unfortunately we can't answer all of the calls we get these days. There are just too many of them. You can write your product questions and send them to info@dirtworks.net and I will answer as many of them as I can. My best response to the need for information about products is to fill the web site with as much information as possible and provide downloadable instructions for the products we get the most calls about. Please download the information and read it as many time as you need to and keep it handy for the times when you have questions. It can save us all a lot of time.

A good trend that I saw happening this past year was and is the growing interest that people have in living a more sustainable life style. One way we see this manifesting itself here on Dog Team Road in Vermont is, we sold more heirloom seeds for gardens and more of our organic wheat and barley is being used by home owners for making home made bread from scratch. I suspect some of the Barley was used for home made beer too. Why not I say! There's no better way to guarantee access to good, safe, wholesome food than to grow it yourself. You don't need to have all the fanciest equipment or years of study to grow a little food for yourself and your family.

Sprouting seeds on the window sill are signs of hope and the promise of good things to come and brighten your days even in the heart of winter when all is frozen and still. A little organic soil, some trays and some organic seeds and water are all you need. Imagine fresh salad in the middle of the winter, tomato plants, ready for transplant to bigger pots and then outside as soon as spring allows and you grew it all yourself. No running to the store and waiting in the check out line listening to the beeps as the bill rings up. No more $3.00 a pound tomatoes and 3,000 mile salads. More and more people are doing this everyday now.

Like I said, there are many things to be worried about now but it's important to see the good things that are happening too. The seemingly small trends that are emerging are signs of good things to come and collectively, they signal a positive shift in the way we think and relate to the earth and ultimately I hope, each other.