Four All + Legacy Greens
A large part of Four All Ice Cream is our community partnerships that allow us to sell ice cream all around KW and we would never be able to do that without the businesses that put us on the shelves. So this week's "supplier series" is turned stockists series, in order to brag about our friends Legacy Greens.
For those that haven't had the chance to visit, Legacy Greens is a grocery and retail store right on King Street in downtown Kitchener. They strive to be the go-to spot for local and seasonal fresh produce, fun snacks, and food-focused gifts. The owner, Jordan Dolson, explains how much Legacy Greens has grown since it began as a small-scale farm in 2014 selling produce at the Stratford Farmer's Market, the Prune Restaurant, and Cowan's Country Store. In 2015, Legacy Greens came to the Kitchener Farmer's Market and opened as a pop-up at their current location on King Street. Jordan says that, thanks to their customers, they renewed their lease at 10 King Street East in 2016 and have been growing the business to provide produce, value-added foods, dairy, meat, and some unique grocery items to our downtown community. Operating a small business can bring all sorts of challenges, but Jordan's favourite part of her work is seeing a customer absolutely in love with something they bought or when they just love the feeling of browsing through the store.
The space they have to work with is nothing like a conventional grocery store, so I ask Jordan how she decides what gets to go on the shelves. She explains, "We are a small shop that focuses on fruits and vegetables. Local and fresh produce is our absolute number one". The other items that Legacy Greens stocks are focused on local, unique, and in-demand products since anything that takes up shelf space needs to sell. Jordan says they stock products that have a high rotation and are constantly selling, such as Ambrosia Chocolate, Hugo & Nate Caramels, Four All Ice Cream, Pickles Eh Pickles, Mountainoak Cheese, Nith Valley Honey, and The PopStand Popsicles. Legacy Greens also puts energy into developing their own products like hummus, soups, salads, mulled wine kits, and they are hoping to launch flatbreads and jams as the next Legacy Greens features!
Jordan explains that Four All Ice Cream made the list for Legacy Greens because she likes that we are small-batch, using local ingredients, offering fun flavours and are popular with customers; "The Whiskey Caramel Pecan and the Raspberry Sorbet flew off our shelves last year! So delicious!". Last year, Legacy Greens sold Four All Minis and did just a bit of scooping since they were already in a sourcing relationship with Henry Browns in Hamilton (another awesome ice cream business!). Jordan says, "For 2017, we saw an opportunity to work with Four All as they now have their manufacturing facility a short 15-20 minute walk from our store. We love working with Ajoa and her team and are looking forward to Four All being our primary ice cream for this summer!". When asking what she is looking forward to most about our partnership, Jordan says she is really excited to learn about ice cream science: "To learn how to create the perfect scoop. To test all the flavours. To see the production facility. And, to hopefully provide some ingredients such as ground cherries and herbs".
On top of the store, Legacy Greens has maintained their small-scale farm and this year will be their 4th growing season! They will be growing greens, tomatoes, herbs, and ground cherries. Keep up with all their exciting activities and our ice cream partnership this summer on their Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Website.
We will be doing a tasting of our ice cream flavours for the summer at Legacy Greens on May 8th from 1-3pm. This will also be the day we are stocking the store with ice cream products! Check out the event on Facebook.
