Food at first hand

Why the same food costs more in a shop

Between the person who made the food and the person who wants to buy it there is usually a long row of go-betweens: a reseller, a warehouse, a shop shelf. Each takes a cut — and, more importantly, each prices their own risks into it. The risk that the goods spoil while they wait for a buyer. The risk that they go unsold and the remainder has to be written off. The risk of going unnoticed on a shelf among hundreds like it — so the money goes into loud, elaborate packaging rather than into the product itself. All of these risks land in the price long before the counter, and in the end it's the buyer who pays them. The same product could cost noticeably less; the difference in price is exactly someone else's risks that somebody had to cover in advance.

What changes when the order comes first

When the orders are collected in advance, the person making it knows the number before they even begin. They make exactly as much as was asked for, come once, and take nothing home to be thrown away. The risk isn't shifted onto someone else — it simply disappears. That is why the price here can be lower.

And it isn't only about the price

The same risks strike not only the price but the food itself. So that goods can survive the road and a long spell on the shelf, crops are often picked before they ripen, and preservatives and shelf-life extenders go into the product. A short road needs none of that: something made for your order doesn't have to sit for weeks or travel through a warehouse. You get it ripe and eat it within a predictable time — not whenever it's finally taken off the shelf.

What you get

Food that came straight from the person who made it: no warehouse, no shelf, no other hands on the way. Its price carries nobody else's losses. You know whose hands made it, and anything else you can ask them yourself — nothing here is anonymous.

What the producer gets

Demand they can see before they start getting ready — and, if they close orders earlier, before they even start making. Not a guess about a crowd, but names and numbers: how much cheese, how much bread, how many portions — and for which Saturday. That is what lets a small business plan the next batch and the next week instead of making as much as they dare and hoping.

How it works

1. 1The producer opens their own page: they put up what they have and say where and when they can be found — the day, the places and the hours, and the moment orders close.
2. 2Those who follow them are told, and order for that day. How much is still left is visible before anyone commits.
3. 3On the day, the two of you meet at the stop. You settle directly with the producer, and afterwards you both say how it went.

What we are not

We do not buy the food and resell it — it is never ours. We do not drive it: the producer drives their own route, or the two of you agree on something else. And we are not a payment middleman — the settlement is directly between you, and whatever a seller's country requires of them stays with them. We introduce two people and get out of the way.