Paul Greive '07 was working a desk job and struggling with health issues when he decided to make a change. Seeking a lifestyle with greater meaning and quality, he and his family began raising pasture-fed chickens for local consumption. 在短短三年内, 格里夫的家庭农场, 原始的牧场, 涨到了350美元,年销售额达1000万美元.
“It’s growing really fast,” says Greive, who was a 商科专业 在肯考迪娅.“There’s plenty of demand but the problem is supply. It’s not like a technology company where we can put in more widgets. We need more soil, more grass, more animals.”
原始的牧场 出售牧场饲养的鸡, 羊肉, 猪肉, 牛肉, 火鸡, eggs and raw honey directly to consumers in greater Southern California. It is one of just a handful of farms in the area that raises animals for consumption in a rotational grazing method, allowing the animals to eat and live close to nature.
They get fresh air, sunlight and fresh clean water, and are not trampling all over each other.
原始牧场有1个,500 customers and limits its market to Southern California by design because they believe consumers should be able to see where their food is raised. Greive works with his father-in-law Tom and brothers-in-law Jeff McDaniel ’03, MEd ’07 (and wife Bethany Loesch ’11) and Rob McDaniel who attended 欧文康考迪亚大学 for a year. Greive met his wife Lynsey McDaniel 在欧文的康考迪亚大学.
“None of us would have thought we’d be into farming as a career,格里夫说. “We had never farmed before and had no idea what we were doing. But one of the most important calls we have as Christians is to be open to God’s Word and obedient to his lead when he calls us to certain things. 我觉得我们很幸运，非常幸运.”
It all started with fifty chicks and an idea to raise them the natural way—letting them eat bugs and worms in an open field.
Health problems had prompted Greive and his family members to seek solutions in their diet.
“I was struggling with arthritis,格里夫说. “不同的饮食方式完全治愈了它. That caused me to study the food system and look for locally-grown organic food.”
But he could find no chicken that was raised outside, ate bugs and worms and had not been fed genetically modified feeds. “It shocked me that nobody was doing this anywhere,他说. “So we said, ‘Why not raise it ourselves? 我们有几英亩地.’”
It was a half-serious idea until Paul’s brother-in-law announced, “I just ordered fifty chicks. 他们两周后到达. 我们需要做好准备.”
The men devoured books on chicken-raising, put the new chicks in a brooder and then onto the lawn. They posted on 脸谱网, “We’re raising pasture-raised, soy-free birds. 如果你想要，请告诉我们. 我们会想办法给你的.”
“We were planning on eating most of the birds ourselves,格里夫说. “We were doubtful anyone would pay for it, but all fifty birds sold. 这让我们大开眼界.”
Slaughtering the birds was a challenge, since none had killed an animal before.
“We had a bird in one hand and YouTube on the phone in the other, and we followed the steps literally off YouTube,格里夫说.
Customers were pleased and the waiting list grew to a thousand families. People also asked where they could get pasture-raised 牛肉, 猪肉, 羊肉 and 火鸡. So 原始的牧场 was born and began partnering with local farms that used the same raising and grazing techniques.
We are passionate about connecting our faith to the way we farm. We've relied on God’s providence through-out the whole business.
“The most important thing for us is the Lord,格里夫说. 我们的身体是耶和华的殿. We are passionate about connecting our faith to the way we farm. We've relied on God’s providence through-out the whole business.”
Greive, 有天赋的运动员, grew up in downtown Seattle and was “super involved on campus” 在欧文的康考迪亚大学.
"I loved the small classes, the small vibe,他说. “Compared to my friends at big public schools I had ten times as many friends. I loved every minute of Concordia and thought it was the best place ever.”
He came to play baseball but burned out on the sport and was recruited instead to throw the javelin.
“Track was amazing because the team was super diverse,他说. “I had roommates from all over the world: Africa, Mexico, Asia. 那是一群很酷的人. Coach Blutreich will forever be the ultimate mentor to a college kid. He shared his faith in a way that was so unique and compelling to a college athlete. 他是我大学生活的重要组成部分. 我还是想像他一样.”
Greive also joined the handbell choir, first as a joke.
“Some of us jocks thought it would be hilarious,他说. “But the funny thing is we had an amazing teacher, 有趣的人, super cool and he got us totally into it. 我们喜欢玩手铃.”
Greive even received a scholarship for it. “It exposed me to a totally different crew than athletics did,他说. “这是一种祝福. 去认识一些很棒的人 音乐系 opened my eyes to a different side of campus. The relationships and memories of going on tour with all my friends was really cool.”
Greive also helped found the Chinese language club. And when a national race-walking coach visited campus, another surprise awaited.
“The whole track team was laughing about how funny it would be to do race-walking, 所以我说, ‘I will put on the shortest shorts I can find and do this race-walking thing if you guys will,’”格里夫回忆道.
But afterward the visiting coach told Greive he had textbook form and urged him to pursue the sport. 五周后, Greive had qualified for nationals and earned sixth place at championships, making him an All-American race-walker and javelin hurler.
“I was a hundred pounds heavier than anyone else in the race, but I can probably walk as fast as I can run,他说. “Something about how bowed legs work with hip movement. I had a short but crazy race-walking career.”
Team USA invited him to try out, but Greive was already heading in another direction. While he was job-seeking, three friends separately suggested he consider joining the military.
“I thought, ‘Maybe God’s trying to say something,’他说. “我为此祈祷了很多次.”
Those prayers led him to serve four years in the Marine Corps as an intelligence officer. His year in Iraq was a terrific cultural experience, he says. “I learned a lot about the middle East and learned conversational Arabic. 每个人都安然无恙地回家了. We felt like we really had an impact for the better.”
然后，格里夫回到了文职工作, earned his CPA license and landed a job with a good accounting firm. But “I wasn't passionate about what I was doing,他说. “I always knew I wanted to do entrepreneurship.”
Meanwhile, arthritis plagued him and in desperation he changed his diet. 回归旧时代——肉类饮食, 鱼, 水果, vegetables and healthy fats—made him and his family feel healthier and they began searching for pasture-raised chicken to eat. It was the first step toward a new lifestyle—and a new career.
I had no plan ever to go into farming but God opens certain doors for you and if you’re willing to walk through those, 神奇的事情会发生.
“I had no plan ever to go into farming but God opens certain doors for you and if you’re willing to walk through those, 神奇的事情会发生,格里夫说.
After raising the first batch of fifty chickens and selling them on 脸谱网, Greive and his family members realized they had a viable business. Greive began plowing money into the operation and farming before and after work. 他们很快赢得了15美元的奖金,加州大学洛杉矶分校的创业奖, which made it realistic to try farming full-time.
“It’s not all fun and games,格里夫说, recalling how difficult it was to leave a regular salary. “我们一度只剩下10美元. 对我们来说，它一直处于最低点.”
一个主要的推动力来自于 2013年Kickstarter活动 that caught national attention and was featured on MSNBC, L.A. 每周 和美国在线.com. Dubbed the “Let’s build a farm together” campaign, it raised $60,000.
原始的牧场 arranges leases or mutual benefit agreements with land-owners and smaller satellite farms, allowing them to graze animals on land they do not own and avoid large capital investments. In less than three years their home-based farm and seven partner farms operate on four thousand acres, with several thousand chickens for meat and eggs, 一百头羊, 一千头猪和五百头牛.
They learned the hard way that keeping chickens outdoors without protection is a recipe for disaster. Ninety percent of the flock was lost early on to coyotes, 邻居的狗, 山猫, 鹰派人士, 猫头鹰和黄鼠狼. So they began using a “chicken tractor,” a large upside down box that shields birds as they graze. They pull the tractor daily to a new location on the grass. The chickens fertilize the lawn as they eat, regenerating the soil.
他们还买了九只看门狗, a mix of Anatolian Shepherd and Great Pyrenees, which “are the protectors of our whole farm,格里夫说. “At sundown they start patrolling the property, setting themselves up on a point where they can see what’s going on.”
今天, Greive still slaughters every chicken himself and every part gets used—feathers go to the compost pile, entrails feed the guard dogs and the rest is sold to consumers and food businesses.
格里夫，谁是 在加州大学洛杉矶分校读完MBA, is planning to expand the rotational grazing ethic of 原始的牧场 to a national scale. 他的想法, 叫做牧场鸟, involves a proprietary technique to graze chickens in much greater numbers on grass, 吃虫子和蠕虫.
“If we want to change the world we need to bring prices down close to what they sell for in the store,他说. “Pasture Birds will scale the idea way up, producing pasture poultry close to a conventional price using methods that are healthy for the land, 动物和消费者. 这是件大事. We are taking lessons we learned three years doing 原始的牧场 and putting it on a hyper-scale system. Think of the impact you can have on the land with thousands and thousands of acres every year.”
The Pasture Birds idea has already won $25,来自美国农业局的一万美元, 还有30多美元,000美元的奖金.
Greive says he is grateful “to rely on my passion for what I do for a living. The ultimate blessing is waking up every morning knowing you’re making a difference. With this venture I feel like I’m having an impact on things that matter.”
了解更多关于原始牧场的信息 primalpastures.com.