Is Shared Kitchen Ithaca the Future of Small Town Food Business?

You know, a lot of people don't even s a lot of people grew up with restaurants that think I want to own a restaurant one day. But you know, nowadays that's getting more and more difficult Restaurants are extremely difficult to do for a lot of reasons. But uh you know, people for instance varily think about getting into packaged foods, selling them wholesale to grocery stores and distributors, but actually it's one of the best ways to do a food business. Welcome to the Ithaca Local Economy Lab podcast, where we examine new and innovative businesses, organizations, and programs that are functioning as part of the new economy in Ithaca, New York.

I'm your host and neighbor, Dia, and together we'll explore some of the ways, both unusual and common, that everyday people are moving towards a more inclusive balanced and functional economy while leaving the oligarchs to fend for themselves. If you like this idea, you can help us out by clicking the subscribe button and leaving a good review. Today we have with us Rod Rotondi, founder and executive director of Shared Kitchen Ithaca, which is a new nonprofit incubator for local food entrepreneurs Welcome, Rod. Thank you. Thank you. It's nice to be here.

So so why don't we start by uh you telling us a little bit about your background and what brought you to Ithaca and How you started this whole thing? Sure. At this point in my life, my background is a little bit long, uh maybe long in the tooth, in fact. Summarize So I j I just I it's like I've lived many different lifetimes. I've done a lot of different completely d wildly different things. Now I'm you know, I'm here in Ithaca and I just founded and I'm I'm executive director of Shared Kitchen Ithaca, which is a community development project to try to support small food entrepreneurs in the region to grow and scale their businesses.

Uh we just opened it last May and it's going really, really well. I had been for about 15 years in the Middle East and North Africa, basically. I was doing economic development work. That's what I went to graduate school for. And I worked in Morocco, in Tunisia, in Egypt, um, in West Bank and Gaza Strip. I worked in Tanzania and East Africa. And yeah, I spent about fifteen years doing that. And then my last position in economic development was I was a program management officer for the United Nations Development Program working in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

I have a service orientation to my personality. I like doing works of service, which is why I ended up, you know, doing humanitarian relief work for the United Nations and others. And then when I came back I I wanted to do something in food because I just looked around and saw that human beings have come very far from nature. If you look at how we live our lives, especially how we eat our foods and what we eat as foods. I just felt it was um very far from nature and so I got into the side of the health food movement called raw vegan organic foods.

So the idea is that everything should be like eaten in its natural state, like every other animal on the planet. So I got into that kind of food for a while and that got me into one thing after another and then I ended up in LA and then we're back To the other end of the story. Just came all over. It's like a kind of like a crazy eight. I just took you on a crazy eight. Sorry about that. That's a really fascinating path you you got. So what actually brought you to Ithaca then finally from LA? Well, um, I did live here when I was a kid. Um, so I do have a connection to Corn to Ithaca, but also when I was in LA My long-term girlfriend, Mia, is from Ithaca.

She's she was born and bred here. So we decided to move back to the East Coast. I was really ready to get out of the West Coast. Sorry, West Coast, but I really love the East Coast. And we came back in March 2020. I had gotten out of my food businesses in LA and I w was focused on taking care of my family mostly. And then after a while a guy got antsy and wanted to start one of my businesses again and started looking around for commercial kitchen space. to do that in. Couldn't find any real commercial kitchen space until I found the former production kitchen of Green Star Co op.

And um It's a really it's a serious commercial kitchen. It was a bit big for what I w wanted to do r at that point, but I basically said I told the real estate agent he should speak to the economic development people in town because I knew they didn't have enough commercial kitchens in this area and it might be an interesting project. And next thing I knew a couple a month later they contacted me, some guys from the economic development world. here in Ithaca and we started talking and then they asked me to write a paper and then run some numbers and then eventually do a feasibility study, which was in my wheelhouse because I used to do that kind of thing at the United Nations.

And then one thing led to another, we got a lot of people together. We raised money from the city, county, the state, a lot of local philanthropists, and we signed the lease on the former Green Star Production Kitchen. What did you see in Ithaca at that moment? Because with everything shut down still, or you know, it it did take Ithaca a long time to wake back up after the pandemic. In some regards I feel like we still are waking up. Yes, probably true. So what did you see that that kind of moved you towards that Well, I there is a very rich, robust entrepreneurial and food entrepreneurial and uh culture around Ithaca around this area.

I'm consistently amazed by how the people around here are really foodies. They really know their stuff. And some of them are very passionate about it. And of course we have this fantastic farmers market. which has been going on for so many years. Um we have great agricultural resources around us. And, you know, the pandemic hurt a lot of these food entrepreneurs that they needed help. They when I started looking, people say, Oh yeah, we have a commercial kitchen. And I'd find it was a church kitchen or a community kitchen. You know, those are great for what they are and for the users, that's great.

But for someone who really wants to grow their food business productivity is kind of really key. Like I have a baker here in my kitchen now. She was one of our first members. She's from Ithaca Breadworks. And she makes fantastic breads, but she was doing it under the cottage laws. So she was making it from home basically for five years and it was so hard for her to do all that. So eventually she came into shared kitchen Ithaca and she told me that what used to take her nine hours at home she can do in one hour in our kitchen. Wow. That's an amazing savings, yeah.

Game changer, you know? Absolutely. Now I think her business is uh really thriving and um I think she's you know, it's a lot easier on her physically than having to work out of one small home oven. She's working out of this Italian all-electric steam injection deck oven made by a company called Pula, which is like Like the Rolls Royce of artisanal bread making and pittisserie ovens. Has three decks she can do a huge amount all at once Yeah, completely changing uh her possibilities in that business. Uh which is great for her and it's great for the people of Ithaca.

And uh it's also supporting this project because the more s the more hours she needs, so it's basically a pay as you play kind of operation at at Shared Kitchen Ithaca. So she's paying hourly sort of rent to Shared Kitchen Ithaca, which helps sustain us so that we can welcome in new members and then they More members we have, the more the boat floats. And uh, you know, we are approaching this project um in an entrepreneurial view. A lot of not we're a not-for-profit organization. Some of them um long-term rely on grants and outside money. Well, we did obviously get a lot of uh support as we got started.

Our goal is to get to profitability. or at least break even and um then any office that we do make will go back into the kitchen and back into services that we can provide So we also think it's kind of important that we have that entrepreneurial perspective. We are there supporting entrepreneurs entrepreneurs, training, mentoring entrepreneurs. And so it's I think it's important that we don't have a mismatch between two different types of businesses. We are a not-for-profit, but we want to make sure we cover our costs and we can grow. Just because shared kitchen ithaca is a non-for-profit, that just means that any profits that you make go back into building the business.

And it allows you to and it allows you to take in uh outside money, grants, you know, donations, that sort of thing legally without without obligating anything. But now the people who are who join your kitchen, your who want to members your members, okay, so they are not necessarily not for profit, correct No, no, no. They're they're all for profit. Well, actually we help out some other not for profits who have need of like cold storage facilities. I mean it's not you know, we have a our our goals are certainly first and foremost to help the food entrepreneurs of the region, but also we want to help In our community, any way that we can.

Yeah. It's such an exciting kind of organization that you've got. It sounds really unusual. Are you f are you aware of any other organizations like this in the area or even across the country? Uh yes Yes. Shared kitchens are shared commercial kitchens are a phenomenon now in the United States. They have they started in the fifties and sixties and they had mixed success, a lot of management issues, a lot of them didn't last very long, but things have changed and it's become now a big phenomenon. It's a now a important way where communities are finding a way to help build businesses, local business, food safety and security.

And so there are others in the area. There's one Um, there's one in Rochester. It's called the Commissary. It's a really nice program. It's very similar to ours, except the their location is more forward-facing So they have like a forward facing aspect of their facility. We don't well actually no, I've kind of created one, but it's not on it's not in our building. There's is they're kind of in a mall. So they actually have like a forward facing So that people can go by and pick up food directly from them. When we opened, Diane Cohen, who's the founder and executive director of the Finger Lakes Reuse Center, approached me and offered to rent their food stall.

And I thought that was a great idea. And so we started operating out of there in September. So we did have like two or three months of operating out of there So our me we had like on Monday it was like Peruvian empanadas and tres leches cake and then Tuesday was homemade hot dogs, it's just like a a company, local company, which makes their own hot dogs with meat from local butchers, no you know the bad stuff in there. And then we had Farm De Feast, which is his gourmet uh company which does and so many different things actually. They're very talented.

And then we had, did I mention Sticks, which is a Southeast Asian street food. Anyway of we have one thing after another. So every day was a different cuisine in there. And we just did lunches because we were just starting, but in the spring when we reopen it, we closed for the winter when we reopen it we will have probably breakfast, lunch and dinner there seven days a week, including late nights. Late nights have been actually a good thing because so many students on Friday and Saturday nights, if you go if you ever go down And you check out the Taco Bell, there's like a half a mile line of cars outside of it because all these students have the munchies.

And because we have all these different foods We called the place the schmorg, so. The schmorg. As in Schmorgesborg. Yeah. Uh-huh. That's great. So this is this is down by the reuse center. Yes, and on my restrict. Okay. Great. All right. And you're planning on opening that when in after after the reopen in April. Okay. Probably second half of April, yeah, when it warms up a bit But the commissary, we were talking about the commissary is a great organization up in Rochester. I went up there several times to visit it before we opened here to kind of learn from their experience and they were super wonderful about helping us and sharing any information they could.

There's another um Shared Use Commercial Kitchen, which is undergoing a renovation right now out in Broome County. It's in B Binghamton. I just met with some of their people the other day and and we're gonna do what we can to help them and share our experience. I think they're g they they they've been around for a while but they didn't have Uh they didn't have a walk-in cooler or freezer. They didn't have some some important aspects of a shared kitchen. So they uh they did get some funding from the state and that is gonna be finished. sometime later in the springtime.

And so uh we're looking forward to supporting them as well. That's great. What I what I love about this is is how you're using you're spreading out the idea. you know, and sharing your knowledge not only with the entrepreneurs but with other people who want to function kind I guess as an incubator too, basically. Yeah, most of these are incubators as well. You know, we do get a lot of people coming in who are just thinking about starting a business, um a food business, and we help them navigate that process. What kind of um businesses do you have coming to you?

What kind of people? So many. There's I mean, oh my god, so many right now. I mean I right now I'm getting like three or four inquiries every single day. Wow. Um I mean we now have twenty-four active members, but I have like another couple of dozen who are in process. So right now I have one business uh which is actually it's a beauty products business But they need to make their products be it's sort of kind of a food based beauty products. And they make their stuff in a c they need to make their stuff in a shirt. commercial kitchen or a commercial kitchen.

Interesting. I have a uh I have a food truck which is a fusion of Puerto Rican and Colombian food. I have um A local chef who used to teach at TC three, she does a lot of personal chefing and catering and she does these special wine pairing meals. I have someone who's doing health tonics. I have someone who's doing an overnight oats kind of product. Have the there is the club at Cornell of students interested in chefing and fine cuisine. So they're members. Farm to feast I mentioned. Cardell's Goodies, which does all these fantastic cookies and desserts and Brooklyn balls and whatever, they're becoming very popular.

Uh I have a new this is a new startup. This is uh It's called GFAF, gluten free and fabulous. And they do all kinds of gluten free products and they're doing about to get into Green Star. We got um farm defeats into Green Star as well, by the way. And let's see. Home meet hot dogs. He's got his beautiful little uh cart he he had he ordered and it it's been going great for him. Ithaca breadworks I mentioned her experience a little bit. I have a new one that just entered is doing it's called La La Mexicana, which is doing tacos and Mexican food.

Little Ram Bakery, they do gluten free breads and focaccha and others things I have Rashida Sawyer Bakeries. They're a very well-known local bakery. They recently got out of their brick and mortar shop and um moved into shared kitchen Ithaca. I think it's It's been a really great transition for them from what I'm hearing because they don't have the high rent of uh you know, a brick and mortar. That's a big release. This is the beauty of shared kitchen ithaca for our members. or for prospective members is that they can get in and start working their business without signing any long term lease and without actually having to buy any equipment.

That's yeah. Did that come that's huge. That's a huge That's a huge thing. So yeah, it makes it just takes a lot of the risk out for you. Absolutely. It makes it a lot easier to explore, you know, things. So so when somebody when somebody comes to you with an idea, say um I make a really great fudge, for instance, or something like that. And I want to everybody everybody loves it and they tell me, oh, you know, you should sell this. And so I I say, hey, I'm gonna go shared kitten ki shared kitchen Ithaca and see what I can do there for my fudge.

How would I how would I do that? Well could I do that or would I have to would I have to be a professional or have already a market Could I just come in with an idea? That's a great question. Anybody can try this. You don't have to have experience or a degree or anything like that. That's one of the beauties of the food industry is it's accessible to a lot of people. So usually what happens is they contact the kitchen either through a square space, which is a way to contact us, or just through our website, sharedkitchenethica. com, and there's an interest form on that. on the website in addition to a lot of information about how Share Kitchen Ithaca works.

And if they send an in interest form into them, then I just respond to them. I invite them to um come into the kitchen and get a tour and we can talk about how um shared kitchen ithaca might be able to help and support them in their business ambitions. Anyone can anyone can do it. I mean obviously it's nice to have a product already, but I've people come in who are like, I just know I want to do something in food. I have a lot of different ideas, but I'm inexperienced and I wanna know what are the best products that I could make from sort of the things in my wheelhouse.

And you know That's that's the main thing that the main part of my job in a way. Well, there's a lot of parts of my job, but a lot of my time is spent actually with the members, working with them, coaching them, figuring out their labels. their their logos, their branding, their costings, which you know, there's many different ways to go into the food industry. You know, a lot of people don't even a lot of people I grew up with restaurants, I think I want to own a restaurant one day. But, you know, nowadays that's getting more and more difficult.

Restaurants are extremely difficult to do for a lot of reasons. But uh, you know People for instance v rarely think about getting into packaged foods, selling them wholesale to grocery stores and distributors. But actually it's one of the best ways to do a food business. Uh a lot of them think about farmers markets and so forth. So we start exploring different ways that they can get into the food business. Some is it gonna be direct to consumer or is it gonna be selling to resellers or, you know, is it gonna be online or whatever. There's all these different ways that people are doing food businesses nowadays.

So part of what a lot of what I do is like work with them and then we we basically strategize And then we go through step by step until they get to where they want to get. Nice. Well so I I'm I'm intrigued by the fact that you're offering a mentorship through things like branding and packaging and all that because that to me seems like where my I would just sort of shut down. You know, I I can make fudge, that's all I can do, you know, but I don't know anything about like finding the right packaging or distributing it or Or anything like that.

And also, um, I'm thinking about something like insurance, maybe. You know, how does that work in a shared kitchen? Do you do you have to Well, yeah, after we have that first meeting at the kitchen and if we determine it's a good fit, then I invite the member to to start an onboarding process. And then they have uh the opportunity to upload documents that we need in order to make them a member. So there's the business license, there's the insurance, the food handler certificate, and a signed membership agreement Those are the first four things that we need.

And we, you know, there's a lot of information on the side about, you know, what kind of license they need and what kind of uh business entities should they think about and and obviously we we counsel them on what to do and which which directions to take. And we help them get through those four documents. And then once we have those four documents we make them a member of Share Kitchen Ithaca and then it's up to them to go to get their food process. And once the once they have that license, then they're ready to start scheduling in our kitchen.

Everything is done online so they can go into our system and say, okay, next Tuesday from nine to AM to three PM, I wanna schedule prep station number one. So we have six prep stations right now. And so they schedule that time on that one station. And then they also can go in and they can schedule their time on different cooking stations. So they want to use the deck oven or they want to use a convection oven or whatever. We have a lot of a lot of equipment. in there. So that way when they come in everything is ready for them. There's no competition for equipment.

Also we know exactly what everyone is using. Also we at 24-7 security video of everything and all the members get fobs so they can come in 24-7 and do the work, but we also have a record of everyone who comes in and out So we can maintain good security. If something is left not cleaned up well or there's a mess here or whatever, we can easily see what happened. So It's a you know, it bec it can be in some situations, it can be a complicated and messy thing if it's not organized well and maintained well. Right now we have twenty four different businesses coming into one room to make food.

Um, you know, the potential for Chaos is great. Yeah. But, you know, we have a good uh we have a really great group of people, great group of businesses and Um, they're all committed to helping to make this work. And we all understand that um for this project to work, everyone has to be an adult in that kitchen. They need to take care of it, understanding that They want to leave it the way they would like someone else to leave it for them and even make it better than the way they found it if possible. And we get a lot of collaboration. One of the nice things about being a member of Shared Kitchen Ithaca is you're a member of a makers group So there's all these other food makers and they have all their experiences and their connections and their insights.

And so people talk and I have members who are buying part products from the other members to use in their products. It's really actually it's really kind of fun. Especially now that we're getting to you know, we're over twenty members. We have twenty four now. The end of Within a month I bet we're over thirty. And it's like you go in the kitchen now and there's like three, four different businesses and they're at one time all being productive and making things happen and it's kind of exciting. It's kind of really cool. I'm enjoying it. Oh, it sounds like It sounds like a fun time really.

It's very, very community oriented into rather than toiling away in your own small kitchen at home, you've got you can go into the shared kitchen and and have a group of others that you know you can bounce ideas off of and swap recipes maybe. It tastes like community aspect is fantastic. Also we have uh the support of the um Ithaca Urban Renewal Agency. IURA, which is a local economic development organization, and they gave us a grant for supporting local entrepreneurs with limited income. So in the process of onboarding, there is a There's a form they can fill out to apply for the IURA grant so that if they meet the household income thresholds, then they get fifty percent of their rent and storage fees covered by the IURA.

So we've been able to support quite a few of our local entrepreneurs that way in addition. That's a wonderful incentive to help lower income folks get in there. Do you have yeah, and do you have how are you integrating with the the local farm economy? Well, as I said before, our main Our main goal is helping grow and scale our businesses. Secondly, is actually all the not for profits, the organizations which are helping to address food insecurity. And then there's also an important goal for ours is to support the agricultural economy through value added food processing.

So, you know, when the tomatoes are ripe, what do you do with a million pounds of tomatoes? Well if you can process them then you don't have to sell them right away. You can put them in cans and you can do s you know, freeze dry them or whatever. There's a million things ways you can do it. You turn 'em into a salsa or a sauce or whatever. So we have now started to have farmers come in to do to use our kitchen for different things. And we recently uh were approved for a grant from the state of New York to buy additional equipment for the kitchen.

And some of that equipment is going to specifically be for doing value added food processing. We c we are going to be getting in a freeze dryer and we are getting in a dehydrator. And there's probably going to be some sort of uh bottling line for different things. Jar bottling line. And so it's definitely one of our goals to do more of. We do have several in there now. We have like a guy who's a farmer, a mushroom farmer. Really fascinating company. It's called Wells Spring Forest Farm. and they do all these fantastic mushroom uh elixir and powders and things like that which they make in our kitchen.

Wow. So as you're as you're talking about all of these different things that you can do in your kitchen and all of this different equipment, it sounds like you've got some really top and equipment and s just in general. Do you offer I I assume you you train people on it as well. And are those kind of classes open to the public? Like if I just wanted to learn how to dehydrate food, are you do you offer anything like that yet? Or do you have anything like that in the plan? We have members who are in are talking about teaching courses and different food you know, related issues.

We haven't started it yet. I think what we're gonna do at one point we were looking to teach the classes in our kitchen. But I think what we're gonna probably be doing is collaborating with other local organizations and our members will be the teachers, but we won't do it in our facility itself. And quite a few of our men m members are very interested in doing that. Um but I we wouldn't have someone like come in and learn how to use a combi ovener something or some of the more advanced equipment unless they're a member and they're gonna be using it for the production.

I don't see that actually happening. But a member who wants to teach someone how to make parated pretzels or whatever. Sure, they're gonna go out and do that. We're gonna probably help set that up for them to teach it in other places. So who are your your current members? Are they mostly is this their full time job that as a food entrepreneur or are they kind of uh retirees students, is it a mix? It's a big mix. Most of them are a lot of them are full time, but there's quite a few that also have daytime jobs It's really a mix. We have students.

We have like we have this Cornell Supper Club in there. We have people from all walks of life really in that kitchen, which makes it interesting. That's one of the nice things about the food industry in general. Is that just the the demographics of the food industry? It's it's a very diverse group of people people from all over the world, all these different cuisines, a lot of women entrepreneurs, um, a lot of immigrants. That's one of the nice so when you're helping the food industry, especially the small scale food industry you are already achieving a lot of equity goals at the same time, just automatically.

Of course it's always good to do more, but it is by its nature gonna do that. Right. You know, food is just so fundamental, right? It's it's just who we are. We have to we all have to eat. And as you noted when you started out, uh a lot of the food that we are offered today is like barely qualifies as food, actually. So having, you know, food like substances. Food like substance. Exactly right. Yeah. So knowing that your neighbor is is making this and buying the raw ingredients from the local farms is you know, and then and then giving it to you, it just feels so much more nurturing and supportive and community building and the idea that they're all in a shared kitchen too, that's kind of that's kind of a nice story as well.

You know, if I'm but if I'm gonna buy a some sort of packaged Vegan cheese, for instance, at Green Star, it's nice for me to think, oh, this was made in a shared kitchen where people were laughing and, you know, joking and whatever. It's so true. We have, I think, four members now who have products in in uh Green Star co-op. And when they do demos there, people are just so excited to be able to support a local food business and it it's it's like having a superpower. You do a demo down there and everyone's just like, Oh my God, that's so great.

Yeah I'll I'll buy some. I'll buy some. Yeah. So it's it is and and Green Star has been fantastic in supporting Share a kitchen ethica and our members they're making they really help to bring the members in and show them the ropes and give them a chance to to to take on that type of a business and so far it's going extremely well. We are really lucky. We're in Ithaca. This is a real community minded town and area. So um and it's wonderful for the community and it's wonderful for all all our local food entrepreneurs. Um it j it just adds to such a richness to life here.

I mean, these organizations that like the farmers market, like the the Finger Lakes Reuse Center, even like the Green Star, which is a is a co-op owned by its members, you know, these these organizations add such a richness to our life here. We almost almost take it for granted, but it really is incredible addition to the fabric of our society. I I agree. That's that's the whole idea behind this podcast is to put these ideas out into the community a little bit more so that we all have a better idea of what of the wealth that that is around us right now, um, not only just in the people, but in our ideas and and in the way that we support each other because it is it is such a supportive wonderful community here.

And so I want to ask you though, you've just started. You're not even in uh open a year, which is amazing that you've just taken off like this. It's It's just wonderful. What do you see for the future? What do you see in five years? What would be like, you know, if everything goes just way better than you ever thought it would, what would you what would your big dream look like here in five years? First First step on the dream is get to um break even point. I have a I think we have a possibility of getting to this year, which would be unheard of. for shared kitchens to do that.

So that's my kind of first goal. Um and obviously that's going to be dependent partly on getting more and more members. So eventually I think I think our kitchen could probably sustain 50 or 60 members Which is you know So you're halfway there, yeah. More than halfway maybe. Well, I don't know. We're at twenty four yeah, maybe we're halfway there. I d I I it's hard to imagine we're already halfway there But um, you know, there are possibilities. There are all kinds of other projects can be done as a result of this project. So there's There's a type of project where you basically take this idea that we have at Shared Kitchen Ithaca and then you take it to the for who what happens to the people who graduate from Share Kitchen Ithaca?

Like they They get to the point where it's now too small for them and they need to have some of their own space. So one way of doing that is where you get a facility that has multiple kitchens in it. Say say it's been a long building and then there's there's five three hundred square foot kitchens and then there's five eight hundred square and then th a fifteen hundred square foot and some three thousand so you have all these kitchens together, they're sharing locker rooms, they're sharing uh bathrooms and and and wash-up spaces, they're sharing wet walls.

So there's ways to build these so that you it's much less expensive than doing it all these small kitchens individually. Uh-huh. And so then you have the graduates from Shared Kitchen Ithaca who started in the smaller kitchens and once they've grown past that they can move up. And keep on moving up until they really get to the point where they can move out on their own. Uh if that's what they want to do. Wow, that's so that's one possibility. Obviously, there's a possibility of helping to do these types of kitchens around the area, around the state, around the country.

And my background is from international development, so maybe even around the world. But like you said, it's just it's fundamental. It's food. It's like we're just This is so easy for people to relate to. Yeah. How do you think it would change the world if kitchens like this were sort of standard. You know, if they were if they were the norm rather than the outlier, what do you think would change? Well, I don't think that shared kitchens are gonna take over from all other kitchens. It's just a great way to get businesses started and get them off the ground and help them grow enough.

But you know, you're always gonna have bigger can at some point these these businesses are going to get into a larger kitchen where they need to focus on making one product. You know, in our kitchen i I we have twenty-four members with gosh knows how many products in there. At some point it's gonna be so it it's not that it's gonna take over, it's just again they're gonna be amongst all the other kinds of kitchens. so that a lot of smaller entrepreneurs will have a chance to get started and break into this industry. Whereas before Shared Kitchen Ithaca, the only local food businesses which could really grow and scale their businesses were ones which had access to capital, which was usually family wealth, legacy wealth, and the others just didn't have any chance of doing that.

So I I hope that this will allow This kind of this kind of a project will allow you know access to a much more diverse group of people and it'll end up being better for everybody. We have a website, sharedkitchenInthiga. com. We also have a Facebook page. We also have an Instagram page where we post a lot of stuff, especially when the schmorg is going on. So any one of those is a great way to c connect with us. We are approaching our one year anniversary and we are going to launch a fundraising campaign. We wanna you know, sort of swell the amount of programs we can do to help subsidize uh lower income food entrepreneurs.

So that is something that we're gonna be trying to raise from the local community. But yeah, reach out through there whether you want to help support us. Maybe there's somebody out there who is really great at accounting or graphic design or some other way they want to help and they want to give back to the community through our local food entrepreneurs. We are very open to any community members who want to do that and uh help put them in in touch with the members who need the help. And um we just had a member who just um is opening up at the watershed.

The watershed is a local Ithaca haunt for years that was closed for a little bit. It's now reopening. I think they're reopening as Oh gosh. K house. K house, thank you. That's K House. So F Farm De Feast is doing the food over there now. So I hope people go over there and support them. And There will be a when we have our probably in May we're gonna have our one year anniversary and that's gonna be an open house and we're gonna invite everyone to join us there and we'll have a lot. Shared KitchenIhaca. com. Ski. Ski is the acronym. Ski. It started as a joke because I I'm a big skier.

I actually teach over at Greek Peak on weekends. But um yeah, kind of stuck. So share Kitchen Ithaca. Thanks for listening to the Ithaca Local Economy Lab. If you liked us and you want to hear more, please be sure to rate review and subscribe. It's noisy in the podcast world and every rating helps us so much. You can read the show notes, getting our mailing list, and download your own free copy of Practical Resources for Healthcare Beyond Insurance at Ithacalocaleconomyllab. com. And if you know of a local business, nonprofit, or program that you'd like to hear on the show, please send them my way The Ithaca Local Economy Lab is produced by practically real LLC and brought to life by an amazing team including technical advisor Jake Gribschaw, Associate Producer Stacey Cornelius.

Content strategist Sonia Simone, and creative advisor Erin O'Shaughnessy. Yen Ospina is our artist, and the music is by Carsie Blanton Until next time, take good care.