Yellowbird Foodshed

Real food. Real farms. Real simple.
Home delivery or convenient community pickup of fresh Ohio produce. Start shopping HERE! 📦🐥

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

We passed a HUGE milestone recently. We've delivered over 50,000 orders to homes! From the farms surrounding Columbus to your doorstep, Yellowbird Foodshed is the leading choice for local food in Ohio. We couldn't have done it without you! Thanks for your ongoing support! 🚚💛🐥

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

We think that big problems need big solutions. Sometimes big problems can be solved by making a million tiny changes. If a million people ate locally grown food today who otherwise would have eaten fast food, millions of dollars would be poured into local economies. Repeat

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

For "Food As/Is Medicine" to work, the food you are using has to actually contain nutrients.

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

At what point to do we look at prices in the grocery stores and realize that we can still opt of that system? There is a point at which we will no longer have that option.

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

We are trained to obey the system. Revolution births when a few people who are trained to obey the system begin to reimagine a new system.

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

When you begin to buy good ingredients and eat meals you prepare yourself, you will quickly discover that "It's expensive to eat healthy" is a lie.

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

Stop eating fast food. That's it. So many things will change for the better.

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

Over 60 farmers are going out of business every day in America.

But one Ohio entrepreneur is building a local network that isn’t just helping them survive—it’s breaking Big Food’s monopoly control of our food system.

Stop scrolling for 2 minutes to hear Benji Ballmer’s powerful story:

Benji and his wife started Yellowbird Foodshed, a food hub bringing farm-fresh food to their community and connecting local farmers with a dependable customer base.

Yellowbird aims to take care of everything for local farmers, from sourcing buyers to social media, so that all they have to worry about is growing the food.

This is his vision:

“You are so good at growing food, don’t even worry about anything else.”

“That’s like saying to Michelangelo… I need you to sculpt, but I also need you to film a 30-second short every day to post on Instagram about it.”

“Like, I know you’re eight hours in and you couldn’t be in more of a flow state. Can you stop that… and take a video of what you’re doing?”

“Talk about robbing something of its… life-giving spirit!”

“Let’s put those people to work in a way that is like, this is what you want to be doing.”

“Don’t worry about anything else.”

“Grow the best freaking spinach that you can grow, because it tastes so good and it’s so full of healing powers that we can get that to all the people that need it.”

Yellowbird is a much-needed lifeline for Ohio farmers.

And it could become a model for saving and empowering small farms across the country.

But whether that vision becomes a reality is largely in the hands of Congress, who will determine how federal food purchasing dollars are spent with the 2026 Farm Bill.

Our new blog breaks down Benji’s story, how Yellowbird has delivered a lifeline for local farmers, and why the fate of countless farmers depends on the decisions Congress makes with the Farm Bill.

Read it below:🧵

@YellowBirdFS @bballmer

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

Let what you eat, and maybe more importantly, what you refuse to eat, be a daily act of resistance.

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

This entrepreneur is quietly waging a war against the Big Food monopoly.

And he’s winning.

“I’m trying to raise up a system under the nose of Big Food…”

Benji Ballmer and his wife launched Yellowbird Foodshed, a food hub to connect local farmers with a reliable customer base.

They’re building an alternative market to the corporate producers.

And Benji hopes to see local businesses like Yellowbird start up all across the country.

The biggest obstacle they’ve faced is making their system profitable.

Local farmers told him that this was just the nature of farming in the modern world, where massive corporations have monopolized virtually the entire food industry.

Benji realized that the problem he was trying to solve was much bigger than he realized—but he didn’t give up.

He doubled down on his mission.

“What we’ve ended up creating is what you see when you see us out and about on social media, at the farms, delivering food, etc.”

“We hypothesize that we can find enough food growers and enough food eaters to develop a for-profit free market system where the customer says, I’m willing to pay for what you’re selling because… I know the value and the quality of what you’re bringing to me.”

“It’s not just food.”

“It’s medicine.”

With the 2026 Farm Bill currently being debated, Congress has an opportunity to empower local businesses like Yellowbird.

Last year, the Trump administration canceled $1 billion in funding for local food purchasing programs.

But these programs are one of the best ways that Congress can empower local farmers and strengthen local and regional supply chains.

We just published a new blog breaking down how Yellowbird has launched a quiet revolution in Ohio by simultaneously delivering a lifeline to small farmers and healthy, farm-fresh food to consumers.

Read it below:🧵

@YellowBirdFS @bballmer

[Michael Pollan @michaelpollan]

Glyphosate safety article retracted eight years after Monsanto ghostwriting revealed in court – Retraction Watch https://t.co/SVFg11zw4T

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

👏 Great to see this coverage of the incredible work our friends @MikeCallicrate, @GGunthorp, and @whiteoakpasture are doing to create a system outside of the one built by abusive corporate meatpackers with outsized control over the industry. https://t.co/LYxQkESUFo

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

It’s great to see this focus on improving access to loans, land, and infrastructure. We hope to see this truly benefit smaller operations.

That said, we'll be keeping an eye on USDA’s new definition of “small farm,” as farmland consolidation is driving up the average farm size.

[Civil Eats @CivilEats]

Sean Sherman Expands His Vision for Decolonizing the US Food System

“This model has such immense potential to have a huge impact on the way we eat, especially for kids and elders—and really everyone.” https://t.co/xmRUbBXJsF

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

.@DrZachBush of @FarmFootprint explains the negative impact of industrial ag on human health: "So here we find ourselves at a moment of collapse...it's time to move to a holistic approach to understanding the vitality of life on earth."#FoodNotFeed

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

.@SenBooker explains realigning our farm programs to create a healthy food system: "The current farm system is working against the very people that protect some of the greatest heritage of our country…this system is created to keep farmers growing commodity crops." #FoodNotFeed

[Farm Action @FarmActionUS]

Farm Action’s Angela Huffman kicks off the #FoodNotFeed summit with a thank you to our powerful coalition of advocates: “We’re farmers, health, environmental, labor, social justice, and animal advocates. And we’re all in this room together to fight for a fairer #FarmBill.”

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

https://t.co/jyNby05KIR

[OEFFA @OEFFA]

Announcing OEFFA's 2023 Farm Bill Platform! 📢

Over the past year, we talked to farmers and consumers across Ohio. Their vision for a sustainable food and farming system revealed five key planks for our platform: https://t.co/vRkdh6fHKw

[Yellowbird Foodshed @YellowBirdFS]

Vegan Cuban sandwich recipe using a brisket recipe we've shared before! https://t.co/T9j3tjyJHi

[🌱Robin🌱 @ohsorobin]

Watching tomatoes ripen is an entire mood.