I peer through my bifocals at the book on the table in front of me, then at my computer screen.  Next, I squint down at my iPhone.  I’m trying to understand the difference between the feed (it’s actually called just “Feed” in Instagram lexicon, the book explains), and the story (is that just “Story?”).  If I can get just this far this week, I’m going to put the book away and just give myself time practicing using those two features before I move forward and try to understand all the different terminology and applications surrounding the various types of moving images that I see as I scroll through the app.

What does it say about me that I need a paperback book and a set of strong bifocals in order to learn this new social media platform?

What does it say about me that I’ve waited so long to tackle this “new” platform that there are paperback books written on the subject in their second and third editions?

But in a meeting a few weeks ago, Shilo, our new twenty-something assistant farm manager, tactfully urged me to expand my marketing efforts to reach a younger audience.

“I don’t mean to be offensive,” her eyes grew wide and apologetic as she spoke.  “But FaceBook….It’s….Well, my mom uses FaceBook.  You know what I mean?”

I see Shilo’s mom as young and hip.  My mom can’t even send an email.  

But I know she’s right.  We have about 20 half and quarter pig shares I need to sell, and many of my FaceBook followers’ households are getting smaller as kids go off to college and start their own families.  The key to staying in business is a willingness to forever re-invent ourselves while staying true to our core values.  Thank goodness there are still real books that I can read to bring myself up to speed.  

I follow my fellow pasture-based farmers across the country who are way ahead of me on the Instagram learning curve.  I watch their videos and images of laying hens dashing across the pasture, beef grazing peacefully in a dewy morning sunrise, pigs poking out through brush and hedgerows.  I admire their snapshots of homemade bread, garden flowers, farm-fresh feasts.  I try to work out in my mind what stream of images I might share, and how I can elegantly communicate with imagery and minimal text my desire to sell 1500 pounds of pastured pork in 30 and 70 pound shares.  Despite the astronomical savings, pork shares are a tough sell.  They require freezer space.  And if a customer has a freezer, it usually requires the chore of cleaning it out in order to make room for a share.  Then they have to make a trip out to the farm store to pick it up.  And it takes some skill and labor to cook all that food.  It’s a bigger time investment than just going out to lunch or picking up prêt a manger for dinner.

I thumb through the feed.  Sorry.  I thumb through Feed, scanning for inspiration on how the other farmers do it.

Then I see it.  This post doesn’t come from any farmer.  It’s a combination video/slide show. It’s a slick ad. A woman’s hands receive a neatly packaged box.  Across the screen and my mind blip all the right magic words:  Organic.  Earth-friendly.  Healthy.  Free range.  Making a difference.  She puts the box down on a clean countertop in a stunning sparkly kitchen.  Her hands easily lift the sides of the box and lovingly caress a package of glistening bacon.  Then a package of boneless, skinless chicken breasts.  The box is full of pristine prime meat cuts.  There is nothing to braise, no bones to boil, no fat to render…none of the meats that remind the viewer that the food came from walking animals.  The beautiful hands fondle the surface of each package briefly before the next image, where they easily pull out a freezer drawer and drop all the cuts swiftly into…get this…A COMPLETELY EMPTY, absolutely PRISTINE freezer!  It’s that simple.  She doesn’t have to shuffle anything.  She doesn’t have to wipe up any spilled freezer goo, or cook a batch of pot roast and stew in order to clean out last years’ frozen vegetables and those soup bones she saved off of the past two months’ of chicken dinners.  She doesn’t even have to hoist the freezer drawer from the bottom to make sure the weight of it won’t bust the drawer brackets when she closes it.  It’s so easy, in fact, that she can kick the freezer door closed with a sassy tap of her heel!!  I don’t have a single customer who has a freezer like that (maybe because they’re all Facebook users?).  

But that’s not the best part.  The best part is this fabulous juicy burger that appears as the final image in the frame.  The lettuce is crisp and fresh, the tomato bright red, the bun toasted golden and the burger perfectly caramelized.  It just appears from nowhere and bounces into place on an invisible table, looking delicious.  My stomach growls.  I want that burger.  Hell.  I don’t just want that burger.  I want that life.  I want my kitchen that clean.  I want my life that simple and streamlined.  I want food to magically show up from nowhere.  I want delicious burgers to bounce down in front of me that I didn’t even have to mess up my kitchen to cook.  I want to know that the earth is being saved while neat packages show up at my door with placating slogans stamped on the boxes assuring me that some invisible corporation has seen to the planet’s salvation on my behalf.  

No wonder it’s so hard to market a pork share.  I’m not selling what people want.  I’m selling a messy farm with ridiculously personable pigs.  And when people show up to pick up their pork shares in January, they come into a chaotic cafe where their twelve-year-old waitress may or may not have washed her hair or trimmed her fingernails before showing up to work.  The cook may be having a good day, or she may be trying to keep the sixteen-year-old barista from pouring a pitcher of steamed milk on her sister’s head.  And if you ask for a personal message about how your purchase is saving the planet, I’m going to ask you to walk in the fields with Kate, Shilo and my dad.  I’m going to ask you to touch an animal and think about it’s connection to the soil and to your soul before you eat dinner.  If you want your purchase to save the world, then we are going to start with a conversation about your family.  I’m going to want to know about your kids, about your mother-in-law, about your health.  Because saving the world, in our view, starts with living a life that makes sense, connected to family and community.  And mess.

The Instagram ad says we shouldn’t know each other.  It says that my messy life isn’t real to you, and your messy life isn’t real to me.  And we can live clean, neat, separate existences, free from the hindrances of engagement.  

But I want that engagement.  

Engaging with life’s messes makes for good conversation.  It makes us sit long and ponder.  And when we sit long and ponder, we learn.  And when we learn, we get a little buzz.  Engagement is just as delicious as the smoked bacon and the perfectly seared pork chops.  It’s juicier than the burger.

And although I am forever trying, my experience thus far tells me that engagement is never tidy.  It is never simple.  Engagement is messy.

I think that advertisement was hugely successful.  But I cannot sell you a meat share while marketing clean kitchens, empty freezers and ready-made burgers.  Committing to a meat share means committing to a little mess:  to greasy pans, dinner dishes, to dinner conversations, and maybe even a few arguments.  It means packing away leftovers and bones to boil for broth.  It means committing to come and see me and my family.  We might be well when you show up, and we might be sad about something.  It means you are willing to walk in our door and accept the fruits of our hard labors either way…No matter how pretty, sloppy, tidy or harried we may be that day.  And it also means that when you cross our threshold, we embrace you and your joys, your worries, and your imperfections.  There will be no promises stamped on the box that your purchase will save the planet.  Instead, we make a promise to each other: to work together to support this land, this community, and each other…In all our chaotic messiness. 

Now how do I upload this to Instagram?

Interested in a pork share?  You can learn more here.