CAROLINE, Alta. – Caroline is home to figure skating champion Kurt Browning, vast oil and gas fields and now, Ravenwood Farm Fresh Meats.
Mark and Tamara Taylor’s main street shop has grown from a small space to store excess pork into a busy butcher shop and diner.
Ravenwood services a village of about 500 people plus thousands of tourists passing through to campgrounds and mountain retreats.
With Tamara’s parents, Dayle and Alice Murray, the half-section farm raises goats, Jersey cows, Beefbooster cattle that calve in spring and Angus cattle that calve in the fall to supply beef year round. Pork comes from their pasture-raised Berkshire pigs.
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When they decided to get pigs, they knew they could not compete with a large commercial hog barn so they researched heritage breeds with good meat quality.
“We thought this is a niche market where we can have less numbers and still be competitive in the marketplace,” Tamara said.
They worked off the farm at the beginning of their marriage: Mark, 30, worked at a private research company and Tamara, 27, was employed as a lab technician for a dairy processor.
Tamara wanted a business where she could work from home and look after the couple’s two young children. Mark left his job this year to work full time on the farm and in the store.
The meat business started small with internet sales, and Tamara was soon delivering orders throughout the province.
They moved the business to town in 2005 to a building where they could install freezers for the extra meat.
With no firm business plan or template to follow, the business grew beyond expectations.
“We keep surprising ourselves,” Tamara said.
“It is a good problem to have I guess, to be too busy rather than having nothing to do.”
The shop opened six days a week in May 2008 following a major renovation to develop a 3,000 sq. foot ope-ration that includes a cafe.
The diner started offering soup and sandwiches and now provides a full menu with daily specials using their own homegrown products supplemented with additional items from other local farmers.
Employees have grown to include two kitchen staff, a full-time butcher and a partnership with a local baker. Butcher Dale Nash was a necessity because the meat must come from an inspected plant. It was costing about $80,000 annually to pay a local meat packer to kill, cut and wrap everything.
Partnerships are evolving with neighbouring producers who had meat to sell but did not know where to sell it.
“We realized there was an opportunity to market other local producers’ natural meats as well, so now we have chicken, veal, lamb, venison, bison – pretty much all creatures that you could eat,” she said.
They can also source rabbit, llama and yak if someone is looking for a specialty meat.
“If people want old-fashioned bacon with rind on, we can accommodate them,” Tamara said.
They offer 10 cents a pound over the rail grade price and provide producers with spec-ifications on how the meat should be produced. Most were already following those practices.
Cattle need to be slaughtered before 24 months of age to stay under the 30-month rule. Older animals must have the spinal cord removed, resulting in smaller carcass sections to hang.
The Taylors continue selling at farmers’ markets and they are also connected to local chefs through Dine Alberta and other local food movements.
The next step may be cheese production from their goat dairy. They recently won an Alberta agripreneur scholarship so Tamara could tour Ontario dairies.
Another sales direction is a line of dog bones and pet food.
Starting a restaurant and meat shop during a recession is a risk but the Taylors believe they are probably serving wealthier clients who want to be informed about their food and are willing to pay more for fresh, locally produced goods.
It has been a hectic year sand-wiching farm work, store duties and family commitments into each day but they are happy with the choice.
“It is really exciting because we have been able to obtain the lifestyle we were shooting for. We can be a family,” said Tamara.
“I think the family farm is such an important piece of our culture. It is kind of an endangered species so I think this is really good,” she said.
