For Immediate Release – Norwich, CT – February 23, 2024

FC Development Corp. today announced the official signing of a Letter of Intent (LOI) with the Farmer’s Cow LLC, a cooperative of six Connecticut-based family farms working together toward expanding the locally-based and farm fresh products and offerings of the Farmer’s Cow for marketing, sale, and placement within major grocers (including Stop & Shop, Big Y, and WholeFoods) utilizing new distribution channels and negotiated mechanisms to provide multiple strategic paths for the Brand’s success. New products potentially include dairy offerings; non-dairy beverages; and a variety of other farm-based goods sourced not only from the Farmer’s Cow cooperative member-farms, but also from other local farms and craftspeople whose farming and community dedication mirrors that of the Farmer’s Cow Brand, and whom can benefit from the Brand’s support.

The Farmer’s Cow, originally established in 2003, in Connecticut, serves many local and regional communities throughout nine states, including throughout New England. This cooperative experience has been successfully built upon each of the member-farms’ independent generational experience – with each family farm’s own success contributing to the overall success of the cooperative as a whole. As a testament to that collective success, the Farmer’s Cow (on behalf of the cooperative and the Farmer’s Cow Brand of Companies) recently received the national U.S. Small Business Administration’s (SBA) State of Connecticut Award for Business Excellence – the only business entity in the entire state to garner such recognition and acknowledgement of performance. The Farmer’s Cow is also a supporter of the Connecticut Farmland Preservation Act which allows for the preservation of farmland and support for farming and community education and growth initiatives. The Farmer’s Cow itself, as part of the Act, currently has preserved approximately 10,000 acres of the 17,000 total acres preserved throughout the State to date.

“We’ve been working with FC Development Corp. for almost four years now and they’ve been both helpful and effective in supporting our development of ideas and plans for our implementation of growth and expansion initiatives,” said Jim Smith, Chairman of the Farmer’s Cow LLC. “The strength of our combined brand will only continue to grow as we together pursue growth through a culture of excellence and top performance – in our restaurant, grocery & distribution, and clean energy production and carbon reduction/capturing digester divisions.”

FC Development Corp. functions as a management and development entity for the Farmer’s Cow brand of companies, partnering with the Farmer’s Cow collective of six Connecticut-based family farms, and leading the Farmer’s Cow Calfé & Creamery collection of restaurants and kiosks, as well as other farming-related and community-based programs and projects. With a unique combination of local and community assistance expertise on municipal, state, national, and even international levels of project development and implementation, FC Development Corp. strategically blends a strong record of success in a variety of technical, professional, and hands-on projects and programs – from comprehensive management to marketing, promotional, and operational plan execution and oversight.

“Our mission is to support our local farms, centering around the Farmer’s Cow LLC and including other supportive farms and farming families – and to connect the community to the land through our partnership together,” relayed Steven Ayer, Chairman of FC Development Corp. “We know that farmers are the backbone of this country, and we want to help them create a stronger, locally-supported supply-chain that may be able to minimize future risks for the Northeast and beyond.”

Over the past several years both parties have worked in partnership to design and implement the best operational practices and a combined culture of excellence focused upon employee and company care and development – identifying lessons learned and plans of resultant improvement, and developing and implementing processes that promote continued business growth and expansion while supporting local communities via a variety of significant educational, economic, and cultural programs. The Farmer’s Cow brand of companies is developing plans for expanding its footprint of the Brand’s products and other company related offerings beyond the current nine-state (including all of New England) foundational status, and into other geographically-based markets. This expansion includes the company’s partnerships and work within the clean energy and pollution mitigation industries, as well as its restaurant, kiosk, and pop-up market growth build-outs and initiatives.

For more information about the Farmer’s Cow Brand of Companies, including FC Development Corp., please contact: Steven Lane, Chief Development Officer at lane.s@fcdevcorp.com

To visit the Farmer’s Cow web site, please visit: www.thefarmerscow.com