Jeremy Bloom and Matt Hokanson met through working together in the Portland Food Co-op, which currently purchases food as a “buying club”. Through their personal interest of local food and the knowledge of e-commerce within their careers, they decided to explore building software to solve our own problems in running a buying club. The software would manage the bigger picture of buying club operations, create a bridge between consumers and farmers/fishers/producers, and offer a simpler and smoother virtual shopping experience than what was available to date. Over time they found over 30 buying clubs in Maine, and many others around the country, that would potentially use a tool like this so they started writing the software in the spring of 2009 with the goal of offering the software as a service that can help grow the local food system and give people power over their food. Today, Jeremy & Matt are partners in the Internet Farmer where they offer BuyingClubSoftware.com in addition to other e-commerce and web services for farmers and those in the local food economy.
Jeremy Bloom came to Maine in 2004 after living in New York City’s East Village for the previous 9 years. He has been developing and managing websites for e-commerce and marketing since 1995. In 2007 Jeremy worked on a friends’ farm where he learned about small organic farming. Since that time you’ll often find Jeremy outside gardening/farming, in the kitchen, or being active in the food communities of Maine. Jeremy will serve as the business manager, salesman, and marketer of our software services, as well as hands-on and daily customer service.
FMI: http://www.Jeremy-Bloom.com
Matt Hokanson is a bearded gent from Maine who now lives in Oakland, CA. He is a programmer and e-commerce developer, and has a love for the local foods movement. As a member of the Portland Food Co-op Matt has taken a large part in developing technology for the purpose of purchasing food locally online. He will take part in training and some sales efforts, but will mostly serve as lead programmer of buyingclubsoftware.com and will provide technical support to sales and customers.
FMI:Â http://www.h0ke.com