Is buying local more expensive for you?

[O's mommy]

I have really been going out of my way to buy as much as I can local, produce, dairy, breads, soap, even looking into local dog food etc. but the cost for local is WAY higher than Trader Joe's which is where I normally shop. Example- organic milk from TJ's $5.99 for a gallon, local-$6.99, TJ's orginic yogurt $3.99 local-4.79, TJ's organic cheese $4.99, local- $8.99. It really ups the grocery bill!

It's not an option to buy from the dairy source and such to get a better price, they don't do that here.

Also to buy anything local I have to drive to a natural foods store which I have a couple of options but both are about 25-30 minutes away, Trader joe's is 10 minutes away. I have been driving it every couple of weeks to stock up so I don't have to go back for another couple of weeks.

It's a shame because I would love to buy as much as I can local but the driving 25-30 minutes extra(and an extra place to go every other week) and the cost has me rethinking it.

Does anyone else go out of their way and pay more to buy local? How important is it to you to support local businesses?

[plantmama]

We have a great farmer's market which has organic produce for around the same or sometimes slightly less than whole foods, but it's so fresh. We can also get local sea food for less usually. Meat and dairy is way more expensive direct from the source, local. It sucks but we do shell out the extra $$ typically.
We have a whole foods about a 1/4 mile away so the driving for organic and bulk is nothing but the food from there does not tend to be local.

[Alyantavid]

We do buy alot of local foods. But not at stores. We eat veggies we grow, are given from friends or that we buy at the farmer's market. We try to find alternative sources for our food and for the most part, it is cheaper.

Milk is not. We have a great little shop here where they sell milk and ice cream from a local, organic dairy. It is more expensive but totally worth it so I don't mind much.

[limette]

2-3x as much which is why the only local stuff i eat comes from my garden.

[Llyra]

I do pay more for local, but not that much more, and actually my local milk is cheaper than supermarket organic.

I'm fortunate, though, that there's a big local food culture here-- I have my CSA farm, several farmer's markets, one of which is year-round, a local dairy in my town (not organic, unfortunately), and several local organic meat/cheese/egg/poultry farmers. I can also drive a short distance into the next state for local organic milk. I do think it's usual to pay a bit more, because the small operations can't undersell and price-cut the way the big store chains do.

Have you checked localharvest.org? There may be more local options than you realize? Where are you located?

http://www.localharvest.org/

[O's mommy]

I have checked local harvest. I'm located in Northern Delaware. It's most deffinatly not a eat local kind of place. I do hit the farmer's market's and I buy organic chicken from the source there, but it's $7.99lb and costco is $5.99lb.

[seashells]

Veggies and fruit in my experience (in my neck of the woods) are not more expensive, if you buy them direct (CSAs, farmer's markets, pick your own).

Dairy (including cheese) seems to be about twice as much.

Meat is definitely more as well, but I don't know how much more because I have never bought store meat and I don't know the prices. (And I'm afraid to ever learn, you know? ).

HOWEVER - and this is really hard to quantify. But I think it all evens out when you compare eating SAD versus a local diet. I mean, the cost of a frozen pizza or box of hamburger helper and so on, and snacks and soda, it all adds up. I realize you're not talking about switching from SAD to local, but I think it's interesting that those diets are probably about the same budget.

Also, I think it's handy that veggies and fruits are not so expensive, and dairy and meat are more. I try to eat only a little meat and not take it for granted. Veggies are naturally most of my dinner, and if I have meat, it will just be a small bit. Same with dairy, I try to be mindful of it. So the ratios of what you eat also impact the cost of a local diet.

[earth-mama]

I also find local to be expensive depending on the items that I get. We have been thinking about purchasing a portion of a cow at some point, which I believe would cut the cost overall, but must pay up front.

I also try to shop locally, we have a small local food co-op that I like the shop at. They try to get as much product locally as possible, but also stock other items. But, depending on your shopping options you might find a similar store to shop at in your area. I feel better about patronizing a locally run store over a nationwide one. However, I must admit, as we have limited income currently I do by items from the regular grocery store just so we can stay within budget. Our garden helps a lot--but was hit by 4 hail storms this year and did not do as well as we would have liked. Next year I'm sure will be better

Partner to (7 years) Mother to Lily (8 months) 2 and 1

[cristeen]

Food here is at several different levels of expensive, so it depends on what you're comparing to. But most local animal products are far more expensive than not.

I can buy SAD meat/egg/dairy, or I can buy organic, or I can buy local (organic), or I can I buy local grassfed (organic or not) and the prices increase as you follow along.

For produce though, I can buy SAD, or I can buy imported organic, or local organic, and prices increase there as well... but then I also have the option of buying through a CSA which takes the prices back down almost to SAD level. If I buy local at a farmer's market it's cheaper than buying it at WF, but buying it at a CSA is cheaper still.

Luckily I don't have to go out of my way for any of it... the farmer's market is 2 miles away year-round, WF is around the corner, and the CSA delivers to my door.

[Klynne]

I go out of my way to buy local. It means a lot to me. I drive 20 min once a week to a store that supports local (organic/sustainable) producers. I shop exclusivly at this store. It's more expensive, but I recon the price with quality- which is amazing.
To me cheap sad food is cheap for a reason, maybe I'm wrong, though?

eta: I also shop our local Farmers market when I can. Prices are better there than at the aforementioned grocer which is nice on the wallet.

[funkymamajoy]

Local produce costs the same, sometimes less, then buying at big stores. We budget some of our grocery $ for the farmer's market. But local meat and dairy is beyond our means right now (and would still be a few hundred miles away).

[ursusarctos]

It's a bit different here. I consider eating local to be eating food that has been produced in Finland, which is about the size of Montana. Mostly the southern half (third?) is where everything is grown, and that's where I live, so in practice it's not that large of an area.
Finland has a lot of agriculture and produces its own meat and dairy for the most part. So it's actually quite cheap to eat *locally* (assuming you don't want fresh tomatoes in the dead of winter). However, it's much more expensive to eat high quality and/or organic and locally. The farmer's market has incredible veggies which are sometimes strikingly cheap and sometimes strikingly expensive. I usually go there for my produce as long as it's open (about May through October) regardless of price because the quality is just so much better. When it's closed I usually have a choice of local produce that may or may not be good quality and foreign produce that usually looks better and is cheaper but has been mass produced and flown in and doesn't taste like much. I try to choose local in that case unless it's really bad looking or it's been grown in a greenhouse in wintertime. Organic meat and dairy are good and local but expensive. We usually shell out though because it's much better quality. We just eat less meat and dairy. The exception is cheese - organic is way too much and Finnish cheese does not have that much variety so we usually buy conventional or imported. I guess that's our major sin.
Bread is one thing here that is good, relatively cheap, and local so fortunately that's not an issue.
I don't feel bad buying dried or canned items from non-local sources though. They are usually shipped in trains or by ship, which are far more energy-efficient and less polluting than transport by plane or truck (for fresh items).
So all in all, yes, it is somewhat more expensive/tricky to buy local especially in wintertime. Mostly the cost comes from choosing the higher quality or organic option though.

[sunnysandiegan]

I don't know yet. I am just getting started in a serious, methodical way. I used to buy local just by happenstance (well, I shopped there on purpose), but that market chain went from locally, family-owned to being owned by a nationwide natural foods chain and gradually has stocked less and less local items. It is rather frustrating, actually. It WAS cheaper to buy locally than in supermarkets, at least for produce. Now, we are having to really hunt down local produce and none of the options are close, so it adds in the time/fuel costs. For awhile, we had a local farmer's market that we walked to and that was NICE! It was more expensive than other options, but it was great to talk to the growers of our food.

Part of the problem here is more and more farmers have sold the farm to developers and "local" is pushed farther and farther away. We are six plus hours from the central valley of California, where most of the food in the whole country is grown. Mexico is 30 minutes away from our door. Unfortunately, the "product of Mexico" sticker doesn't tell me WHERE in Mexico.

In any case, I am educating myself and attending a local lecture series on sustainable food. From that lecture series, I have a long list of books I am reading. I have finished a few and seen a few films on the topic. At the beginning and end of each lecture, there are local businesses (I use that term loosely....nonprofits, CSAs, co-ops, etc) who have tables and representatives to chat with you. Very enlightening!

For those of you who wonder about the high costs of "local" (and anyone interested in educating oneself in sustainable food systems), I highly recommend reading Stuffed and Starved by Raj Patel. I found it in our public library. This book is very well organized and details the entire world food supply system from farmers to consumers and ALL the businesses in between. In foods where government subsidies are high (milk, for example), it makes sense on why local is more expensive. Local is circumventing the system and opting out (by choice or force) of those subsidies in many cases. In foods where there are many "middlemen" adding layers of profits/costs (out of season produce, for example), it makes sense on why local is less expensive. I am not quite finished with this specific book.

From cumulative information, though, we are deciding that paying extra is worth making our voice heard that the current food system is not okay with us and that we want fresher, more wholesome, tastier, healthier food. We're just beginning to figure out exactly what that means in our area....

[seashells]

Thanks for the book recommendation! I actually just reserved it (on my library's online system) based on your description.