Oct 25th Magic Mushrooms

We met with the Chester County Economic Development board. This is a great example of a community taking control to drive development themselves. They have specifically worked to set themselves up so they do not have to depend on Government, and so are not dictated to by the government. They appeared to be doing a great job of building capacity within their community and attracting business investment. One point of interest was their trade board, which recruited local foreign Expatriates and used their networks to forge links with foreign companies to drive investment. 

Pietro Industries is a family owned mushroom growing business in Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania state produces 60% of USA’s mushrooms. This was a really well run business, and also includes great aspects of collaborative farming. The composting business which provides the growing medium for the mushrooms is owned by a group of mushroom growing families in the area. Of particular interest in this business was the QA programme which they had developed with the PA university, which was then rolled out to the rest of the industry. This gave them the opportunity to in effect write the quality rules for the industry, in a way that suited them best .

Paradox Vineyards was the final stop for the day. Dave Hoffman, joint owner of Paradox showed fantastic innovation in the way he marketed his wines. He has developed a line of bulk wines which he sells in paint tins and a T infused wine which is very popular with the novice wine pallet, which makes up most of his market.