Seal the Seasons Makes Local Produce Available Year-Round

Photo credit: Nathan Lambrecht

North Carolina business Seal the Seasons is helping solve food waste and making local products available throughout all seasons. During spring and summer, local farmers markets bustle with activity. Customers arrive early to get the first choice of freshly picked produce from their proud, friendly farmers and return home with their purchases to prepare nutritious, fresh meals and snacks for the week ahead.

While those same markets are quiet in winter, their customers can still enjoy the delicious taste of North Carolina fruit and veggies thanks to an idea hatched at a Durham Farmers Market by two University of North Carolina Chapel Hill students, Alex Piasecki and Patrick Mateer.

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Lineberger’s Maple Springs Farm in Dallas, North Carolina, is one of the farms participating with Seal the Seasons. Photo credit: Linebergers Maple Springs Farm

Field to Freezer

“The idea for Seal the Seasons came while running a donation station at the farmers market where Patrick saw firsthand the customers’ commitment to local food and their connection with the farmers,” Piasecki says. “We also could see how harvest timing and weather-related issues were creating problems for farmers with waste due to excess product or produce past its prime. We thought, ‘How can we create a partnership that will help the farmer, satisfy the consumer and make local produce available year-round?’”

Nature provides two ways to preserve produce – pickling and freezing. As college students, Piasecki and Mateer had purchased frozen fruits and vegetables to ensure a healthy diet and saw that most of what they were buying came from abroad.

“We knew local farmers had a great product and a loyal customer base,” Piasecki says. “They just needed a way to preserve their produce and get access to a broader market.

The duo founded Seal the Seasons, an innovative frozen produce company, to do just that.

Photo credit: Linebergers Maple Springs Farm

Frozen While Fresh

The company had humble beginnings. In 2015, Seal the Seasons built an individual quick freeze (IQF) line in a shared kitchen at the Piedmont Food Processing Center in Hillsborough.

“We froze local produce, packaged it in zip-close plastic bags with no branding and delivered it out of a pickup,” Piasecki says. “We quickly realized that for this idea to be successful we needed a partner with manufacturing expertise, so we could concentrate on telling the important story about the value of local farmers and local food systems.”

In 2017, Seal the Seasons began a partnership with Cottle Farms in Faison, a strawberry producer that already had an IQF line, to do the freezing, packaging and storage.

“This partnership not only helped us build our business, it added to our mission of supporting local farm families,” Piasecki says.

See more: North Carolina Collard Greens Are Making a Comeback

Farmer-Focused and Flexible

Seal the Seasons now works with more than a dozen North Carolina farmers to freeze their produce within 24 to 48 hours of picking.

“We met Alex and Patrick in 2016. They were looking to buy our extra berries,” says Ethan Lineberger, of Lineberger’s Maple Springs Farm.  The Dallas, North Carolina, farm is a Seal the Seasons farming partner. “It was an exciting opportunity because it provides a market for the produce we pick during the week. The partnership helps us handle the peak of the crop, which is too much for retail alone. It also allows us to spread our harvest over time and create less food waste. Plus, they’re farmer-focused and flexible.”

The fourth-generation farmer says Seal the Seasons is good for the consumer as well as the farmer.

“We sell to the public on our farm and at farmers and roadside markets. Consumers tell us how they much they appreciate the quality of the product and the connection to the local farmer,” Lineberger says. “Seal the Seasons makes sure they can do that all year.”

Photo credit: Seal the Seasons

Putting a Face to the Grower

Seal the Seasons consumers know who those North Carolina family farmers are because they are featured prominently on the packages.

“That connection to the growers is something consumers value,” Piasecki says. “Our relationship with the farmers is authentic. We know them and their stories. Having them front and center allows us to recognize their commitment. Our package is like a postcard from the farmer.”

Lineberger says the public is getting the message of that postcard.

“Some consumers who see us on the package have looked us up and come out to the farm,” Lineberger says. “Others have sent us messages about the importance of local products and the quality of Seal the Seasons produce. It’s a way we can keep the personal connection even when the roadside market is closed.”

– Cathy Lockman