Organic Produce Delivery: A Review

I've been getting a CSA box (community supported agriculture) for about 6 months now.  It is essentially organic produce delivery.  I do it because I like convenient things, I like supporting local businesses and I like organic produce (but when I go to a grocery store, I am often tempted by the price of conventionally grown produce).  My CSA (Full Circle Farms) has quite a bit of flexibility.  Full Circle allows quite a bit of customization, which I appreciate.  You can

• choose the frequency of your deliveries - weekly, biweekly, monthly 
• choose the method of delivery - pick up location or home delivery 
• choose the size of the box - small/medium/large
• choose the contents of your box, depending on what is available that week
• add items to your box for an extra cost such as eggs, tea, coffee, any produce available that week.

 I should mention that not everything I get in my box is locally grown - In the winter, I'd say about 50% of it is - in the summer it's closer to 75 - 100% - so if you really want to only get locally grown produce - check out a different CSA program.
When people find out that I get organic produce delivery they usually ask me two questions,

1.  Do you use all the produce, or do you you end up throwing stuff out?
2. Is it cost effective - how does it compare to buying groceries at a store/online/farmers market.  

The answer to the first question is simple - I eat a ton of produce.  So not only do I use everything that comes in the box but I have to supplement at grocery stores and farmers markets to get me to my next box delivery (I get one small box every 2 weeks and live alone).  I never knew the answer to the second question - and frankly, I didn't care a lot.  In general I prefer convenience over cost (but that's just me) and truthfully - I just love opening the box and seeing what's inside (even though I already knew what I was getting).  It's just fun.  BUT - since I got so many questions about it - I decided to see just how cost effective it was.  I have to admit, I was a little nervous about this because I wanted my CSA to come out on top - but I had a feeling it wouldn't.  Read on to find out what I discovered....

So here was THE PLAN (this is when you truly discover how nerdy I am):

I took inventory of what I got in my box and I weighed everything.  Here's what I got:

2 Avocados (snow pea replacement)
1 Golden Bell Peppers
2 Yellow Onions (la ratte potatoes replacement)
1 Cucumber
2 Parsnips FCF (carrots replacement)
1 Golden Bell Peppers (braeburn apples replacement)
1 Bunch Celery
4 Minneola Tangelos
1 Bunch Green Onions
2 Rio Star Grapefruit
1 Bunch Romaine Lettuce
4 D'anjou Pears
0.33 pounds Baby Spinach

I made a few replacements and doubled up on peppers (I heart peppers).  The box is always a flat rate of $30 and is delivered to a pick-up location about a half a mile from my house.  I could pay $34 to have the box delivered directly to my door.

I went to 7 different grocery stores and Amazon Fresh online and wrote down the prices for the equivalent amount/weight of items from my box, wrote up a little computer program and calculated away!  I was mostly interested in comparing only organic produce (when available), since my produce delivery only includes organically grown produce.  However, I also recorded the conventionally grown prices for select stores.  Some of the stores I went to didn't even have conventionally grown produce. 

List of stores: Safeway, QFC, Madison Market (co-op), Whole Foods, Trader Joes, PCC, Fred Meyer, Amazon Fresh

Here is the document with the breakdown of prices at individual stores.  A couple things to note.

1. Some stores did not have certain organic products, if that is the case, I replaced the missing price with the price of the conventionally grown item (indicated by blue text).  
2. Some stores simply did not have an item, when this was the case, I used the average price of the other stores and highlighted the price in grey.  
3. If an item was on sale, I used the sale price - this is not indicated on the spreadsheet.

Here are the highlights:
 Fred Meyer, Trader Joe's and CSA win (w/ caveat).

• Only Trader Joes and Fred Meyer beat the price of my CSA box (note: Trader Joes did not have parsnips, nor did it have organic green onions and Fred Meyer was missing 4 out of 12 organic items).
• Fred Meyer was the cheapest overall - they happened to be having very good sales. 
• Trader Joes has ridiculously priced organic produce - if their excessive packaging practices don't bother you then shop there. 

QFC sucks it up, big time.

• QFC organic produce is far more expensive than other stores (~$45), even PCC and Madison Market (~$32).  More than $10 more!  
• In fact, the QFC conventional prices (~$28) were more on par with PCC and Madison Market.

SHOCKER! Conventional is cheap.

• The difference between buying organic and conventional produce within the same store is substantial.  Safeway ($38 vs. $22), QFC ($45 vs. $29) and Fred Meyer ($25 vs. $17)

Delivery vs. Delivery.

• My CSA box beat out Amazon Fresh (even without the additional delivery price Amazon Fresh charges).

Fancy store = higher prices? Not necessarily.

• PCC and Madison Market have much more reasonably priced produce than I expected.  I expected Whole Foods to be expensive, but was surprised their prices were similar to Safeways (cheaper even!).

Want organic greens? Go bulk style.

• Buying organic spinach (or any leafy greens) in a bag or box is FAR less cost effective than buying it from a bulk bin. (This really hurt QFC and Safeway prices as they did not have bulk bin spinach)

Shop Smart.

• This isn't a huge shocker - but some produce is just plain expensive to buy organically - avocados, grapefruit, yellow peppers.  If I am more careful about selecting expensive produce to fill my box, I could be making it much more cost effective.

And because I'm told that "people like graphs", here you go:

Bottom line?  As long as I want to buy organic produce, I feel good about my CSA box.  Had most stores been cheaper than my CSA I would have seriously considered canceling my deliveries.  I'm happy that it is cost effective.  And I'm never shopping at QFC ever again.  They are robbing you blind.  I've never really paid attention to prices at grocery stores, but I'm gonna start.

If you've ever considered joining a CSA, I hope this helps.

If, after reading this, you are considering joining the Full Circle Farms CSA feel free to mention me (Margaret Kloster) in the referrals section.  Referrals = credits to my account.  Here is a pretty comprehensive list of other organic produce deliveries (CSAs) in the Seattle area.

Also of interest - Here is a similar comparison of Whole Foods, Madison Market and QFC, not limited to produce.  Again - QFC fails (although they did not incorporate sale prices).