Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in food and beverage but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with William Cook, CMO of lemonGRAFT, located in Tampa, FL, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

lemonGRAFT is a decentralized marketplace for buying local, homegrown food. Shop in your neighborhood to find the best foods. There are three roles to play: Grower, Host, and Buyer. Growers sell food to local Buyers and deliver orders to handoff locations run by Hosts. Hosts prepare orders for pickup by Buyers. As urban development divides farmland and converts it to something else, lemonGRAFT is weaving the remnants back together to form a quilt-like landscape for the future of agriculture. We've built lemonGRAFT in a way that allows the individual growing food in their backyard garden to have access to the marketplace without cumbersome barriers to enter. This incentivizes smaller producers to participate more, as we believe that the future of agriculture rests with the people within the community all participating in a small way to contribute food to the system. This doesn't exclude medium to larger-sized growers; we are still compatible with farms to give them an alternative to the traditional supply chain in order to more efficiently access the market.

Tell us about yourself

My name is William Cook, and my passion is building sustainable communities. I grew up in Argentina, where my family spent many years serving by helping provide access to water and filtration systems. This left me with a strong desire to serve those around me, and I carried that with me as I went to college. I have two master's degrees in Architecture & Community Design and Urban Design from the University of South Florida. During my time at school, I became interested in the design of sustainable communities. I tailored my time to learn all I could. While studying architecture, I met one of my good friends Zach Correa, and we worked together for years as we pursued our dream of sustainable communities. We discovered that in order to build true sustainability, we needed to take a step back and design a system that came before architecture. We discovered that food was the best vector for creating change which eventually led us to found lemonGRAFT and begin working with local food systems.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

I would have to say that my biggest accomplishment was seeing a local food system that was once a dream become a reality. Since before we launched, we had received such positive feedback from everyone we have shared lemonGRAFT with. Having the opportunity to see people actually engage with the food system and others in their community is amazing. People are genuinely excited to know that they can make a difference. That we have made a tool that facilitates that makes us very proud. To see the business that had been so many years in the making provide an opportunity for people to come together around food was a dream come true.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

One of the hardest things is staying true to your dream and not being discouraged when things do not go as planned. Creating your own business is a very hard thing to do. It may be easy to start something new, but it is very challenging to keep going when it seems like it is not working, taking too long or when those around you do not understand what you are doing.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Find those who share your passion and build a team of people who can make the business better. Don't obsess with being the smartest person in the room; instead, set the goal of filling the room with the smartest people.
  2. Always listen first. Never hesitate to ask questions and always be willing to learn from those around you.
  3. Set values for your company from the beginning and stay true to them as you move forward.

Is there anything else you'd like to share?

Ever since we had the privilege to be chosen as one of the 2021 NPR's How I Built This Fellows we have found an incredible community of people who are ready for a change in their local food systems. Within the past month, we have officially opened the market for people to grow, buy and sell local produce right in their own community. Since then, we have grown over 60% as we connect people throughout the Tampa Bay area to local growers. We are very pleased to have our first lemonDROP location at Meacham Urban Farms in downtown Tampa and to come alongside local growers to give their communities access to fresh, local, and healthy produce. We are excited to continue growing and serve the Tampa Bay area as we look for investors during our seed round. Up until now, our team has bootstrapped everything and has worked selflessly to bring lemonGRAFT to our area.

We are always looking to connect with anyone who would be interested in discussing what we are building and how to get involved.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://lemongraft.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lemonGRAFT
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lemongraft/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/lemonGRAFT
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/william-cook-ba72a4215/

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solopreneur that you'd like to share, then email community@subkit.com; we'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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