Seeds Are a Literal Gift From This Company

A multimillion-dollar organic seed company is ending sales and giving hundreds of varieties away, declaring "we can no longer commodify our beloved kin, these seeds, or ourselves." The cocozelle zucchini, now $14.25 per 100 seeds? No charge. Catnip, kale, mint? All free, reports the AP. Petra Page-Mann and Matthew Goldfarb, who run Fruition Seeds in Western New York, said they're letting go workers, stopping sales on Aug. 27, and relying on public goodwill—donations of money, talent, and effort—to grow and distribute seeds on a $76,000 budget. That's a dramatic shift for a company with more than $22 million in sales, according to 2022 records, and a profile high enough to be featured in the New York Botanical Garden's shop.

"The call is simple enough: Seeds are gifts. Gifts are shared," the couple said in an announcement. They've thought about barriers to access and what they call the indignity of the dollar. Burnout, too, played a role. "We're weaving a new fabric together, Friends." As ripe apples plunked into the grass at their farm in the hilly Finger Lakes region, and workers pounded together a bunkhouse for the volunteers who'll now be crucial, Page-Mann and Goldfarb were open about not having all the answers. Their parents are "terrified," said Goldfarb, 48. "'I'm concerned you're freeloading, I'm concerned you're gonna become a liability to this community,'" he recalled friends and family saying. "And I think the potentially hard thing for people to hear is, yes, that's actually how this is gonna work."

Next year, instead of shipping seed packets, they plan to give away seeds by hosting events and visiting cities around the Northeast. It's a radical extension of their work with seed libraries, seed swaps, and community harvests. They've begun listing their own needs, from financial donations and legal expertise to items like printer paper and Mason jars. "I trust, like air, what is present—though not yet visible—will carry us all," wrote Page-Mann, 40. She and Goldfarb said the most excruciating part of their decision was making it without the collective consent of their 12 employees. "Simultaneously they were very gracious, like, 'This makes sense for you and your lives,' and also, 'This sucks,'" Page-Mann said.

(More seeds stories.)