Better Fresh Farms

“Grandpa would yank a radish or pearl onion out of the ground, pull his pocket knife from his shirt, wipe it on his sleeve, cut off the top and take a bite out of it. And Grandma would always complain about his breath.”

—Grant Anderson, Founder of Better Fresh Farms

When you’re starting a business as unproven as hydroponic container farming was back in 2016, you get an earful from naysayers. Instead of letting that get under his skin, Grant Anderson, founder of Better Fresh Farms and CEO of 4 Fungi’s Regenerative, recalled his grandfather’s plain stated fortitude in farming the half acre of land directly behind their house. Grant worked in his grandfather’s shadow, dropping seeds in the freshly hoed ground he left in his wake.

As the anchor business of the Georgia Grown Innovation Center, Better Fresh Farms is Grant’s way of placing a focus on “Georgia feeding Georgia.” His work ethic was cultivated by a life of working with the land, and his Georgia Tech background has helped him envision how that work ethic can manifest itself in robust and resilient food production.

Grant’s push to innovate is one way to celebrate his deep attachment to his grandfather and to embody his respect for what it takes to grow food, as well as the diligence and care required to bring it to the table. He’s grateful for being raised by an older generation in touch with the land. And we’re grateful for his undying efforts.

The Humble Visionaries of Metter, GA

4 Fungi’s Regenerative creates conditions necessary for abundance. If you tend the soil, plants will grow. And if you create conditions conducive to vitality, vitality results. We’re not only stewards of this approach, we’re beneficiaries of it.

Only a few years back Better Fresh Farms was identified by Georgia Grown and the City of Metter as an anchor business worth luring to the city. This coincided with the opening of the Georgia Grown Innovation Center and the naming of Metter as the first Georgia Grown Community.

Lucky for us, Mayor Edwin Boyd and Director of Economic Development Heidi Jeffers saw promise in Grant’s approach to indoor agriculture, and put out the welcome mat! To this day, they’re our biggest supporters, and City Manager Carter Crawford has been right there with them!

We also owe our gratitude to Chris Chammoun, Director of Ag Tech at the Georgia Center of Innovation. Our expansion into the world of mushrooms has a lot to do with his input and creative networking.

Everything is Better in Metter for a reason: It’s all about the good and caring people!

Candler Gin & Warehouse Co.

“Starting when I was about 8 or 9 , I’d ride my bike across town to peek into the cotton gin building because it was so fascinating. I never thought 30 years later I’d own the very same company.”

—Ronnie Flynt, President of Candler Gin & Warehouse

When he was 40 years old, Ronnie Flynt heard the cotton gin that had been a centerpiece of Metter since 1924 was shutting down . After successfully running the town liquor store his dad started in 1952, Ronnie took the jump from one kind of gin to another and never looked back. That was in 1994.

Today, the Candler Gin & Warehouse can process thirty bales of cotton an hour. That’s a 500 lb bag of cotton every two minutes. The operation serves cotton farmers within a 35-mile radius of Metter, with peak season running hard from October through December.

Ronnie, his brother Tommy, and a dedicated crew of employees spend the other 9 months of the year painstakingly rebuilding and maintaining the heavy machinery that cleans incoming cotton a total of 6 times before the final product is ready to haul. Each of those steps generates a fair degree of byproduct, some of which has already found secondary markets.

We’re grateful to know Ronnie, Tommy and their team, and happy to work with them generating value and closing the nutrient loop.

Candler Peanut

“Sometimes what seems like an annoyance can be the best thing that happens to you, and a setback gives you the energy to do more than what you thought you originally could do.”

—Bo Pattterson, President, Candler Peanut

As a fifth-generation Georgia farmer, Bo Patterson has seen a lot. But in 2015, soon after he and business partners Ricky Nevel, Will Anderson, and Greg Sikes purchased an existing peanut processing facility, he witnessed an exterior wall of their storage facility give way and nearly take the life of an employee. If it weren’t for the employee walking away from the building to report on a broken flashlight, he likely would been have buried alive in the thundering avalanche of peanuts.

The collapse of the newly purchased structure was a devastating event, but it lead to a redoubling of efforts to upgrade the site as much as possible, which led to a further expansion of the site and the installation of a state-of-the art shelling facility. This expanded their peanut buying business to include seed shelling capacity for their own peanut farming operations.

Candler Peanut proudly serves hundreds of regional peanut growers every year, and their peanut seed operation discards enough hulls to fill two tractor trailers every day during peanut season. We’re excited about transforming this byproduct into a foundation for new nutritious products.

COR Compost

“Soil is what soil does, and we love what it does so much we spend our days whispering sweet nothings to it and feeding it the best compost we can get our hands on!”

—Maria Vaughn and Michael Wedum

Playing in the dirt and watching life grow resonates strongly in these founders' greatest childhood memories. Originating from small farming communities in Texas and Ohio, Michael and Maria connected over these hometown roots, and it quickly became the budding focus to the future they wanted for themselves and their family. They knew they wanted the resiliency that came from growing their own food, down to the art of preserving it in hundreds of canning jars just like their parents still do.

The team had such a passion for this homesteading mentality they pursued deeper knowledge, and committed to a movement larger than themselves and their family. Code of Return was founded on the act of closing a broken loop commonly found in commercial farming, and bringing nutrients back to the land. This special link mimics more of what nature intended, which is putting value in the resources of end materials and returning them back to become future nutrients for life again.

The COR team wholeheartedly believes that recovering these resources through the art of composting is not only a benefit to nature’s growing cycle; it’s a benefit to community resilience and strength!

Chomp Energy

The centerpiece for our on-site closed-loop system is an anerobic digestor designed expertly by Chomp Energy. Chomp turns would-be food waste into valuable resources. Uneaten food goes into a self-contained vessel called an anaerobic digester. Fuel and biofertilizer come out—and nothing gets wasted in the process. At a local level, they help communities generate their own energy and be better environmental stewards. At a global level, they are leading the way to a sustainable future. Chomp is bringing balance back to earth, powered by food.

We’re excited to turn our long term relationship with Chomp into a vibrant reality in Metter. In doing so, we’ll be able to generate energy from some of our own byproducts, and turn the rest of them into a mixture of liquid fertilizer, which will feed our Better Fresh Farms hydroponic systems, and powered fertilizer, which we’ll share with our regional farming partners.

Not only do we see a positive future in a circular farming economy for central Georgia, we’re turning it into a reality. Learn more of what Chomp does and how they do it in this video.

  • Georgia Grown Innovation Center

    Where would we be if it weren’t for the amazing team at the GGIC, and especially Heidi Jeffers, Director of Economic Development for the City of Metter.

  • Georgia Grown

    We’re a proud member of Georgia Grown, a division of the Georgia Department of Agriculture. Their support and promotion of Georgia growers is a constant source of inspiration!

  • Candler County Industrial Authority

    We can’t say enough about CCIA’s industriousness and welcoming spirit! Special thanks goes to to Executive Director Hannah Mullins.

  • MycoLogic

    Mushrooms are strange things, indeed. And the folks at MycoLogic are truly mushroom whisperers. We’re happy to have them along on our journey!

  • Equiterra Design

    Specializing in regenerative design, Equiterra engages in new construction, remodels and renovations. If your goal is a sustainable building, Equiterra’s the team!

  • Kate Sharp

    Kate Sharp at Sharp Strategies has a keen eye for business opportunites, and we’re happy to work with her on creating a vibrant and equitable Georgia economy.

  • Diana Earwood

    Nobody knows food branding and food distribution like Diana Earwood of Plain Stated! We sit down with her every chance we get!