Years ago, before factory farming and mass production became the norm, it was pretty easy to figure out where your food came from.
Eggs, dairy, meat and vegetables often came from nearby farms and it wasn’t unusual to pick up your Sunday roast from a local butcher. Today, while Farmers Markets are around, most of us head to massive grocery stores to get everything we need. While that may be convenient, it also means that we often have no idea where our food is coming from.
One company is working to bring food traceability back by not only telling you the farm your eggs are from but also showing you, via video. Here’s how it works:
When you buy a carton of Vital Farms pasture-raised eggs, you’ll notice the farm’s name printed on the carton. You can then head to the Vital Farms website to type in the name of the farm and view a 360-degree video of the exact place your eggs came from.
While Vital Farms appears to be the only egg producer that actually shows you the specific farm your eggs are from, some other egg companies do let you know which farms they use.
Both Happy Eggs and Pete and Gerry’s list their farms on their website, so while you won’t know which one your eggs are from, you can still explore the farms they use. Pete and Gerry’s also offers in-person tours of some of their farms so you can get a first-hand look at where their eggs are from if one is offered in your area.
If you’re a coffee drinker, there’s also a new app from IBM and Farmer Connect that will show you where your coffee beans came from. The Thank My Farmer app will allow you to not only trace your coffee in order to understand its quality and origin, but even to further support the farmer who grew the beans.
By scanning a QR code on select packages of coffee, you will be able to see the entire journey of the beans from the farm to the grocery store shelf and can even send a small contribution to support sustainability projects near the farmer who grew the beans. You’ll find QR codes to scan on Folgers 1850 brand premium single-origin coffee and other well-known brands of coffee starting this month.
Would you be more likely to buy food from companies that show you where it is coming from?
This story originally appeared on Simplemost. Checkout Simplemost for additional stories.
